Layout Design

When I started building the structures for the engine service facility I built a module with the intention of simply adding that to the layout when the time came.  Once I started construction of the layout though I realized that the module had some limitations and it made more sense to just start over.  The biggest problem was that the animation motors were mounted between two layers of the module base and access was difficult.  I'm also going to be using 1/2" Homasote on the layout but the module only had 5/16" which I've read isn't thick enough for hand laid track.  So I'm using the structures I built but am starting over with the base.

The layout is being built in an 11' x 12' room with a 4' x 8' closet.  The closet door has been removed and my work bench is located in there beneath the lower level of the layout.  The track will all be hand laid except in the helix, which will use Micro-Engineering flex track.  Rail is On30 code 83.  Minimum radius is 18" and maximum grade is 5%.

The main layout design is point-to-point with a four level helix connecting the upper and lower levels.  There is a return track that forms a loop on the lower level.  I added this as a whim thinking I could run a railbus on auto-pilot, looping the lower level and creating havoc for switching operations. Just to make things more interesting.  Where the loop connects at the bottom left side of the photo below there's a hinged drop-down panel that allows access through the doorway.  An additional thought for this area is having a roll-around cart with a storage module on top that has 3 or 4 tracks.  The cart could be rolled up to the bottom end of the yard to transfer cars.  This would represent incoming and outgoing traffic from other lines and would be rolled up at the beginning of an operating session.  This is an idea for sometime in the future when I actually have some boxcars and hoppers to deliver goods around the layout.

To take a tour of the layout we start on the left side of the image above.  This is the main yard and engine service area and includes a turntable, roundhouse, car shop, sand house, coaling tower, water tank and ash pit.  The roundhouse is a Thomas Yorke design with plaster walls that I bought about ten years ago.  I have to modify it to make it fit closer to the turntable than originally designed.  The turntable will be made from scratch and has a return track coming in from the ash pit and north and south outgoing tracks going out to the mainline.  Along the wall on the left are building flats for shops and industries.  The yard design is a modified and stretched out version of John Allen's Time Saver.  As the track curves around at the top of the photo it passes several more building flats along the wall and a smelter on the bump out.

The smelter will be made from scratch and is a very condensed version of the Rose-Walsh smelter that was located at Silverton, Colorado.  After getting through the yard area the mainline goes down to a single track, crosses on a bridge over a small town in a ravine and comes to a fork.  Going off to the left will take you to the helix and up to the upper level, the mining region.  Going to the right takes you around the outside of the helix, across three bridges traversing a mountainside that extends to the floor.  This area is based on the high line above Ophir, Colorado.

After the third bridge the line passes through a short tunnel into the closet (4' X 8'), then runs along the side of a mountain and approaches a fork. One side is the return loop and will take you back to the roundhouse.  The other side forks off to pick up processed ore from a 20 stamp ore mill.  The mill is based on plans from the book "Modeling the Mining Industry: Gold and Silver Stamp Mills" from Western Scale Models.  I'm planning to have a fully detailed interior to show the refining process.  The mill won't be animated but will have a sound track with the sounds of a stamp mill in operation.  The other end of the fork is the return loop back to the roundhouse.

The helix has a radius of 18" and a grade of 4.5% rising through four full loops to climb 20" to the upper level which will be a narrow shelf only 18" deep.  It will represent the mining district so the landscape will be mountainous.  There is a "Y" for turning the engine and a runaround siding to ease the process of picking up and dropping off cars. The mill in the upper left corner of the image below is based on the Little Dora mill located near Silverton.  The four small mines will send their raw ore to be processed at the mill in the closet.  This will take a run around the outside of the helix on a 5% down-slope to arrive at the upper level of the mill. 

All three mills will send their processed ore to the smelter on the lower level.  Many of the industries represented by the flats on the lower level will also be to serve the mines.  I'd like to include a forge and a lumber yard if space allows.  The idea is to have plausible reasons for traffic on the railroad.  I plan to use a car card system that has one card for every car on the railroad.  A computer program will generate deliveries and pick-ups for each operating session and the cards will be used to make up trains and tell the crew where to go.  The plan is to make operation as realistic as possible.  All engines will be equipped with sound and controlled by RF hand-held remotes.  Power will be by batteries stored in the tender for each locomotive.