24 Progress Signals 060316 26
This is the west end of the center siding with the approaching signal mast (east bound) having two 3 aspect heads.
We call this Table Rock, Wyoming although Table Rock and Wamsutter are miles apart. This siding is long enough to hold an eighteen foot long train with loco(s) and caboose.
Allen wants to drive to Wyoming with a dozen 5 gal paint buckets in his pickup and collect dirt from places along the line to sprinkle on the SculptaMold and Geodesic Foam terrain.
Capture Date: Jun 3, 2016 01:12 PM•Views: 177
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 13
Somehow I missed taking any pictures of the first aisle after the Main Helix down from the center siding at Table Rock. That aisle is Rock Springs on both sides of the benches with 29 industries to switch. This did not leave any room for a Rock Springs yard, so every thing goes into and out of Green River, shown above. the Green River cliffs on the north side of town are shown well here.
The 1/2 sheet cards are Block Cards (number of cars designated by the card as to Road, color, number and type on each end of the block), and the 1/4 sheet cards are car cards, one destination per line (From, To, Load?, MT?, LCL?, Loaded?, Unloaded?). We lean the cards on the cars when sorting a large yard, otherwise keep them in numbered card boxes like those above on the overhead fascia.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:59 AM•Views: 177
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 14
West end of Green River Yard. The 9 stall roundhouse has been removed for the installation of the backdrop, and we have no coal tower or station or other buildings (which will be mostly flats). Allen wants to build the Green River Depot with its built in "observation tower" and the classic Ogden station.
Westvaco and Alchem are two huge Trona (soda) mines spread over about 150 sq miles of prairie west of Green River. We have a loading track, a bagging track, and a runaround track for Westvaco shown on the left.
The red painted lines on the concrete were my as-designed bench lines we laid down from my plans right after Thanksgiving, 2011.
The steel legs of the bench skeleton with leg levelers can be seen, and one of the 8 lower level phones to Dispatch is hanging under Westvaco.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 10:00 AM•Views: 194
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 11
Lenny applies SculptaMold to the layer of foam around the east portals of Altamont and Aspen tunnels. These tunnels were 6,706 and 5,941 feet long, respectively, on the prototype. Ours are about 13 and 11 feet long, and they wrap around the end cap as shown.
The hidden track for the OSL is below these tunnel lower level tracks, and here the OSL has completed its 360 degree turn to run back to the third level 9 track staging yard under east Rock Springs and Bitter Creek. From here this single track follows under the very edge of the lower level except for the 180 degree turns at the end of this aisle (behind the camera) and the end of the next bench to the left and the end of the next aisle. At these 180 degree turns the track is run at the very rear (or front) of the lower level to make those turns have a 36"+ radius.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:58 AM•Views: 175
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 12
Lenny is working on the Aspen and Altamont tunnels. In 3+ years of operations before the hard shell was applied, we had no derailments, and never had to reach through the cardboard strip terrain forms to rerail a train. The inside of the tunnel can be reached with difficulty from the upper level aisle from the back of the mountains. If it becomes necessary, we will cut through the Bragdon Enterprises foam to create a hatch on this side, but we do not see the need to do so now.
The OSL is visible as the "hidden track" here as it rapidly falls in elevation. It originates just under Lenny's right hand at the mouse hole (bright streak of light). It is hidden track, because it is not going to have scenery. It can be seen entering into the wire tray below his left hand. On the bench to the left tray door is open. The OSL is also seen under the bench to the right where the wire tray normally is. At the aisle ends it always swings way to the back for maximum radius.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:58 AM•Views: 185
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 09
Here are the unfinished western portals for Aspen and Altamont. From here the tracks drop in elevation into Evanston a few feet behind the camera.
A thunderstorm is brewing in the clouds above the prairie. The last time Sharon and I were there we drove through a thunderstorm and some rain every afternoon about 4 PM for several consecutive days.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:57 AM•Views: 184
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Scenery & Backdrops 090116 02
Lenny has finished the hard shell and tunnel portals for Aspen and Altamont. Aspen is the inside one here and is the older drilled in the 1860's and Altamont was finished the turn of the century.
This is a good view of the "mouse hole" that leads to the hidden track of the Oregon Short Line. It bends around the end cap under the tunnels and runs around the outer edge of the end cap. The single track OSL can be just seen below the tunnel portal before ti bends back under the illuminated electrical switch for operator control of a panel switch indicator as part of the ABS system. The panel light is normally red (as shown). When your train is stopped on the other side of the mouse hole ready to come onto the main on the layout (tracks shown in foreground) the procedure is to call Dispatch and ask permission to come ahead. When so ordered, the operator presses the button to turn the panel switch yellow and enter the main. The yellow automatically reverts to red in 30 seconds.
Capture Date: Sep 1, 2016 12:39 PM•Views: 80
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Scenery & Backdrops 090116 04
The back side of the mountains through which the mile long tunnels #2 and #3 (Aspen and Altamont) are drilled.
We have only very, very rarely had trouble on the tracks inside the tunnels. Prior to applying the hard shell we could reach through the cardboard strip skeleton and rerail a train. We can still get to the tracks through the back of the "mountain" on the end of the upper level aisle. If it ever causes trouble in the future we will cut a hatch into the hard shell for access, but it probably will not be necessary. Cleaning the track is the big problem; part of it close to the other portals to the left are not accessible through the back (one has to reach around the opening and behind and to his right from that side). A small hatch will be cut near those portals to clean track.
The hidden track of the OSL can be clearly seen diving down in grade rapidly to beneath the lower level.
Capture Date: Sep 1, 2016 12:40 PM•Views: 77
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Scenery & Backdrops 090116 05
This is where the small hatch needs to be on the beginning of the straight part of the lower bench.
The slit in the lower fascia is where the OSL hidden track becomes visible from across the end cap where it enters the mouse hole.
Capture Date: Sep 1, 2016 12:40 PM•Views: 76
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Scenery & Backdrops 090116 06
This is the west portals of Aspen and Altamont tunnels. the signals show green, although the one laying in a zip lock bag needs to be put back in its mounting hole with the lights facing the tunnels. We left long loops of wires hanging under the benches so we can bump into them and not break anything or pull them out for scenery and maintenance.
Capture Date: Sep 1, 2016 12:41 PM•Views: 80
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 08
Going into Evanston we cross the Bear River, and a moose is wading--in the fast moving stream--in the middle of the high prairie. Moose spend hours grazing in still streams where water plants can grow, and usually only in streams that flow though densely wooded forests, like in Yellowstone. I trust that our artist found this photo of the prairie river on the web someplace.
Any eastern folks seeing these photos may wonder at these streams being called rivers, and not creeks or streams. It is the prairie, where the annual rainfall, mostly snow, is 12-14 inches a year! in the Sedona, AZ area where the layout is, we get about 18 inches, and we call it "desert."
The crossover here is to provide a way around a passenger train stopped at the depot, not shown to the left in Evanston.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:57 AM•Views: 170
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 07
This is our Evanston. Like all the photo backdrops the photos are captured from the web for that particular place.
Evanston has a small depot and team track and an oil distributor and stock yard. It is a minor yard that uses the floating YM to occasionally move cars from the yard tracks to these spots and back from the spots to ready them to be picked up.
The ranch barn and corrals on the model setting askew on the bench belongs across the aisle out in the country. It was set here to make room for other work there.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:56 AM•Views: 169
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 06
This is Tunnel #4 just inside Utah and just beyond Evanston, Wyoming on the layout.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:55 AM•Views: 169
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 05
The east portals of the Curvo Tunnels # 5 and #6 in Utah. They were drilled many years apart at different elevations (1860's and ca. 1905) when UP double tracked the line. Naturally the new track was made with its grade less than on the hurriedly and manually built original track. The newer track is the higher one here and it meanders a lot to make it longer, giving it the gentler lower grade between Evanston to just past Echo where the tracks had to be side by side in the steep walled Weber Canyon of the Weber River. (Pronounced "Weeber").
Allen has built up the mountain from layers of foam. He has more control over the shape of the terrain with the foam compared to the epoxy sheet foam, and in such a tight place it was easier to use the insulation here. He will fill in the layer gaps with Sculptamold before adding paint and "dirt" and shrubs, but very few trees. These are the western foothills, and it is still high prairie, nearly treeless. The thunderstorm clouds are becoming quite dark now.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:55 AM•Views: 181
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Scenery & Backdrops 080416 02
The west portals of Curvo #5 and #6 and the overpass that causes the current of running to become left hand (west bound, west being to the bottom of the frame).
The details of the all thread (left over from the helices) and angle iron supports of the higher track, used to save space so the Park City Branch could be hidden beneath it at the bench level of a constant 42 3/4." This bench height, for the lower level, was kept constant regardless of variations in floor unevenness or welded steel frame length by adjusting the surface height to that of a reference height with a water level (a 100 foot long clear plastic tube almost filled with water so that when one end was held with the water meniscus at the reference mark, the bench at the other meniscus was adjusted up or down to match the meniscus at the other end of the flexible tubing.
Capture Date: Aug 4, 2016 09:53 AM•Views: 168
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