My layout as it progresses

He sure did stick a lot of stuff in a very small place.  Nicely done for the most part.  I have some of the facilities that he incorporated. If I have I problem with it, it's because the buildings and businesses dominate at the expense of the railroad.  With me it's the locomotives and railroads that I want to feature.  Maintenance buildings, switchman shacks, control towers, etc.,  But the beauty of the hobby is, there are no wrong solutions, what ever suits your individual fancy goes.  

With me as with model airplanes it's the engines that dominate.  Same holds true in my model railroading.   I love motion be it diesel (PA's, FT's), pure electric (GG-1), or steam (Mallets, Berkshires, Mikados) nothing like watching side rods and valve gears do their thing at full speed be it model or real thing.  

Son over today and we hung the fourth display.  I just stuck some engines in it to get them off the table but eventually each will have a theme.  I have enough engines to fill several but just enough wall space for two more without going completely nuts.





Mostly I enjoy buying old dirty or non-functioning engines and cleaning them up.




Notice the coupler installed upside down.  I find a lot like this.

Love the railcar Levent.  I printed it out and trying to figure a way to paste it on to one of my box cars.

Thanks all for your comments.

OBTW - That $5.00 black Penn Central engine above is a dud.  All of the brush tension mechanism is missing.  Win some, lose some.

Fred, you poppin' Geritol??????????

You sound and write a whole lot better than you did a couple of months ago.

Yeah but your gainin'. you took a pretty good (couple of) hits there.

Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut are the three states where most of my recently acquired locomotives have come from. Must be big model railroad country there.

Anything Boston and Maine and Illinois Central suits me. But, I have had to come to a screeching halt buying anything. I am a long way from being a hoarder reading about collectors with garages full of model trains but I'm getting closer.

For weeks now I have lusted after Rivarossi's New York Central's Stream lined Hudson and Casey Jones locomotives both running well over $100 apiece. Last week I found both on ebay for around forty dollars apiece, snatched them up and found two more BIN for the same price. Four altogether.

The gem is the Casey Jones. A pert little 4-6-0 engine in which Ol' Casey met his maker.

Jonathan Luther "Casey" Jones (March 14, 1863 – April 30, 1900)[1] from Jackson, Tennessee, was an American railroader who worked for the Illinois Central Railroad (IC). He was killed on April 30, 1900, when his train collided with the caboose of a stalled freight train near Vaughan, Mississippi. His dramatic death while trying to stop his train and save the lives of his passengers made him a folk hero; he was immortalized in a popular ballad sung by his friend Wallace Saunders, an African-American engine wiper for the IC.[2][3]
Jones was born near Cayce, Kentucky, where he acquired the nickname of "Cayce", which he chose to spell as "Casey."

Johnny Cash………………..

https://www.bing.com/search?q=jhonney+cash+casey+jones&form=WNSGPH&qs=SW&cvid=1f85041a99f546e38800543dac933d89&pq=jhonney+cash+casey+jones&cc=US&setlang=en-US&PC=HCTS&nclid=D3444C275672C9AFE0C45280498689C7&ts=1577627052178&wsso=Moderate

NEW222 wrote:Wow. What a history that Mr. Casey Jones had. I had to search it and read it.

Can be seen here:
Casey Jones History

I read about him when I was a kid. A stamp was issued in his honor, I may have a first day of issue. Know I have the stamp.



New picture of my layout. Doesn't look much different but it is.

Wired in my last two turnouts (track switchers) for the figure 8 spurs, kept them separate. Eighteen switches in all, most I have ever had.




It's a jungle under there. Eventually I will tie them all off and label them....eventually.

Levent Suberk wrote:Just commenting to use Hot Wheels cars for the layout. But I learn that HO scale for cars is 1/64 and NMRA HO scale for trains is 1/87. So Hot Wheels cars are a little oversized for HO train layout. But anyway I think that small cars of Hot Wheels can be used for diorama.

I have been thinking about that Levent, only with model planes. This one is outsized, but I like it. I have seen layouts with model planes on pedestals that rotate about 2' above the layout.

fredvon4 wrote:Considering all the switches and how most don't know that powering track either DC or AC or Digital control AC is very complicated to keep polarity oriented in front of and after the switches....

This one facet of designing a track layout, I might model, will probably be my personal nemesis

off to watch UNSTOPPABLE a Denzel movie I like....filmed near RSV1 Bob

Yeah, just when I think I'm out, this thing pulls me back in again.

Thought it would be nice to build in a spur where I could store cars or bypass a slower train. Thought I could just wire it in, common rail and an insulated rail. Not so, another reverse loop as it doubles back on itself. Already running 3 reverse loops off a single switch and transformer so have to wire in a double pole double throw switch and another transformer to accommodate.

From my nice clean organized layout yesterday to this today:

Pink stinks Eric. Get out your airbrush and paint it rustic red. Great buy though. Anything Lionel for that price is unheard of.

But years ago I found a whole box of transformers including Lionel's for $20 at Good Will. Saved them for years before throwing most of them away. Saved a few including a MRC copper box that I just integrated into my model railroad.

People here give me way to much credit for this project Chancey.  Of all the talented people on this forum I am probably the least qualified to pull this off.  This stuff is simple.

Why?  Atlas products.  Just about everything is made by Atlas.  Track, both flex and sectional, switches, turnouts, controllers, selectors, even the track nails are Atlas.  Application directions are printed on the back of each item.  If you can read, you can make the most complicated layout.

All those turnout switches are just three wires, center wire is always common, side wires switch polarity as commanded by the momentary contact switches to either mainline or turnout be it right or left.  Be it one switch or 20 like I have the procedure is the same.  




The "Controller" (Red, green, and gray switches) receives voltage (0-18VDC (variable)) from the transformers to "Cab A and Cab B" which through a series of switches send it to the "Connector(s)" green switches which connects either cab A or cab B to a certain block of track which is isolated from other track blocks by an insulator on the "hot" track and the "common" track which is common throughout the layout except for the reverse loops which are completely isolated through the use of two track insulators.  This is the infamous "reverse loop" thing where you cannot have a positive and negative voltage meet.   This reverse loop is controlled by the gray switch on the controller and aligns the correct voltage when locomotives cross that intersection.  

The yellow switches are just on/off switches used to control track lighting and some accessories.  



But this thing is really, really done this time.  No way I can stuff another block of track in there.  I'm beginning to think of it now as a massive rail/manufacturing yard  with maybe a small town stuck in there someplace.  Got to landscape it now.  Months.


Simple.

Oh yeah,  I wired in a third transformer so I can run three trains at the same time.  It actually controls the spur (siding) that I just added and eliminated the need for a second controller.  I just use the direction switches to match polarity when entering/exiting the spur.  There are actually four reverse loops in there which means that any train is not restricted to just doing a circle. Each track can be doubled back upon itself allowing for a whole lot of possibilities.