Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Work and Rework

Ended up not placing the crossover last night, since as I review what I had placed previous was missing insulated joiners. Oops!

So, I went ahead and pulled the track out that I had placed, adding insulated joiners as needed. Of course, as I did this, I needed to trim a bit of rail here and there since I managed to solder together two pieces of flex track and match the movable rail to the unmovable rail, giving me two unmovable rails. Doh!

After I finished that up, it was past 10, so I decided discretion was better than valor in this case and called it a night.

Decided this afternoon that I'm going to operate the railroad next month and future months and not wait on the upper level. Finally realized it was silly to not operate.

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Upper Level trackwork, continued

I've been able to spend a bit of time working on the railroad recently, so I figured I would take the opportunity to bring everybody up to speed on where I currently sit, progress wise.

I have completed the crossover, so that will be placed over the next 2 weeks or so when I get a chance to hang out in the basement. I also need to figure out where the CB&W Interchange needs to be placed and the turnout for that, but that is fairly minor.

This first picture shows the completed main and siding lines on this level. My plan is to come back and piece in the industrial spots as I get a chance. If you notice center right, some ties have been placed for the code 70 industrial spur here. (Hand-laid since I'm too cheap to buy Code 70 ME flex..)

With the camera hovering over the north end of Acca, we get a nice establishing shot

This second shot is from further back in the aisle; two other industrial spurs can be seen, one is right in the foreground, while the other is hiding way back.

I need more lights down here...


Now we are looking the other direction.


Next two are the ties that I've put down to accommodate an industrial spot next to the aisle. My plan is to put code 70 here to really show the difference between the industrial trackage and the main line.


I'm going to sand these ties a smige and then hit them with some more stain, if need be, to make sure the track flows well.
Ties are the Mt Albert/Kappler standard HO ties. I found the ME ties a bit too short to mate with Atlas and FT offerings.