Album 25 Lead
I have made operations on the Wyoming Division very easy, because I am NOT an experienced operator, and from what I have seen trying to participate in such sessions as TT&TO and those rule book heavy sessions, I don't want to. I want to run trains and see others run trains, and work constructively together, not argumentatively frustrating others. I want to have relaxing fun and see that my guests also enjoy every expensive (in time and money) moment.
It seems t me that with those type of sessions 2 or 3 guys are having a whale of a time "teaching" each other the finer points in the rule book for excruciating periods of time while the rest of us stand and fidget and watch. I did not drive 600 miles and budget $500 for this. I am glad they are having fun, but I am P.Oed.
Let them have private Rule Book sessions among themselves. Don't screw up my trip.
Upload Date: Nov 19, 2022 11:45 AM•Views: 67
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P1001437 Wam from SE TD1 Exp 0.83 SC25 CROP
These photos are largely the same scenes as Album 24, but from slightly different angles that show other details in the scene.
This is Wamsutter. Wyoming. Just west of the eastern end of out Harriman Siding (the siding in between the two mains), is the depot, which, along with the team track on the gravel road, is cut out of this view to the left.
Desolate town,isn't it? Well, that is Wamsutter for real!!
Each yard or even sidings that serve businesses, like here in Wamsutter, has a dedicated switch engine, even if there is no yardmaster working there. These are for the use of the road crews (engineers only, unless a first time operator wants the support of an old hand to help him for a while).
These road crews may be for a "Manifest," a "Local," or an "Extra," or "Drag," train in declining superiority. This way the road engineer can double as the yard engineer and work each locomotive in turn to do his setouts and pickups along the way. Today Wamsutter has a diesel, but often a Consolidation steamer is used.
Capture Date: Jun 14, 2022 10:34 AM•Views: 68
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P1001532 Dupof 1525
Here is an exposure that need work. Note how I carefully removed the car cards from the fascia slots and carefully laid them on the floor in the correct order--then I photographed them there, not realizing they would look like trash scattered around!!!
I caught Sharon in the photo, but it was badly lighted.
Note that there is no dark band due to the fluorescent fixtures, I guess because there are many more fixtures and they are on different circuits, so they tend to be out of phase with each other, so no dark band.
Capture Date: Oct 24, 2022 10:10 AM•Views: 65
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P1001525 CROP TD1 same per Sheet
This is better. Using a post processing program, I adjusted the overall exposure to brighten it generally, and then used a Gradient tool to light the right hand edge gradually across it. The gradient tool allows me to set the location, angle, width, and density, so that the correction is gradual so as to not leave a sharp change in brightness, i.e., no sharp,bright edge.
Then I "picked up" the trash on the plywood sub floor with the Clone & Stamp tool, which clones an area (copies it and then stamps (copies it) to another area (over the car cards/trash). You can select the diameter of the C & S tool, and how transparent it is, from hazy to full coverage, and how "soft" the edges of the stamp are--usually you would want the stamp to have faint, feathery edges, so it looks natural.
The wall phone is one of 16 around the layout to call the Dispatcher to report his train's position (to ""OS").
The blue 3 ring binder holds a 7 page list of spots where cars may be left to load or unload. A page of it is shown in the next picture.
Capture Date: Oct 24, 2022 10:10 AM•Views: 65
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Spots Single Page jpg
ANYONE can mark a car card to cause it to move, if in his opinion that car should be moved. i.e., ALL OPERATORS are also UP AGENTS; they can help decongest a yard or spot by this action. This layout need never get clogged up, because all operators can keep the cars moving.
Cars thus tend to move randomly* because random "agents" move them. *Naturally a NYC MT car should not be sent to Portland; it should head home to avoid demurrage. This is page 3 of the 7 page color coded list of spots (locations where a car may be left to load or unload) on the railroad.
The towns are listed on the left in BOLD print. Under each town is a list of the locations that UP serves in that town. They are numbered as independent industries or UP spots. the next column is a list of the spots by name. Then there is a set of color coded columns, one for each type of car. If the spot should not accept that type of car, the space is blacked out.
For example, for UP #9, the coal Track and the Sand Track can only use gondolas or hoppers. It would be silly to send a flat car of sand there. Those spots can take a combination of up to 6 and 4 Gondolas or Hoppers.
Upload Date: Nov 19, 2022 07:28 AM•Views: 67
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P1001521 lookTD1 per sheet
This is Medicine Bow on the right with The Virginian hotel and depot on the right.
Laramie is on the bench to the left and in the distance is the west half of the Cheyenne Steam Yard on the 84" wide bench across the building.
The Cheyenne buildings just beyond the Laramie roundhouse in the upper right corner are about 65 feet from the camera.
To see more detail, you can hold the cursor over the image, and it will turn into a "+" sign. Click the image,and the image enlarges, as the cursor turns into a flat hand. If you click it, the flat hand turns into a fist with with you can grab the image with the mouse to push or pull it around to move the hidden parts into view. Click again and the image returns into full view.
Capture Date: Oct 24, 2022 09:58 AM•Views: 65
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P1001428 W Sh Hill Lar Hanna TD1 CROP
This is a reprise of an overall view of about 1/2 of the layout, counting the 2 lower levels, both of which can be seen here.
This photo was taken while standing near the top of the west stairway. The 2 Lower Levels of the bench work can be seen here in the aisle just over the stool. Between the upper level and the stool are glimpses of the two lower levels. The "lower level" shows as a black winding line; the lowest level is straight and goes to Park City. The winding track are going into Utah. That track goes though Tunnels 4, 5, 6, and 7 plus the daylighted tunnel near Castlerock.
Tunnel number 1 is the twin Hermosa tunnels bored 30 or so years apart They are called "#l." We have all 10 of UP's Wyoming Division tunnels, and their data are shown on the next image/table. Tunnels #8, and #9 (twin tunnels), and the single #10 are on the next bench to the left facing the left hand wall.
Recall that the very wide upper level bench along that wall extends to the wall, but it is suspended over the aisle below it. This was to allow the Harriman Cutoff (Track #3) up the east slope of Sherman Hill to be separated far from #1 and #2.
Capture Date: Jun 14, 2022 10:23 AM•Views: 63
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UP Tunnels Data
TUNNELS ON THE UP WYOMING DIVISION
Data per Don Strack (see his "Utah Rails" website)
We have managed to model all 10 of the tunnels on the real Wyoming Division. Tunnel #1 is the twin tunnels drilled about 30 years apart. This time gap between the two is possibly the reason they are numbered together as #1. Otherwise all the others would have to be renumbered to keep the numbers in east to west order.
Our Aspen and Altamont tunnels, #2 and #3, respectively, are about 11 and 13 feet long. Our minimum major yard track length is 17 feet, and trains are limited to about 16 feet. Our model Tunnels #2 and #3 on the layout curve 180 degrees under the lower level end cap of Benches between aisles #3 and #5 on the lower level Just in front of the front doors on the lower level track plan.
See the track plans for the three levels on the parent SlickPic album "Wyoming Division HO Operation Layout."
This chart is not at all crucial to operations, but I thought it might be interesting that this layout is big enough to not leave out anything as important as a tunnel. The layout does cover about 5.6 miles of UP track.
Upload Date: Nov 18, 2022 01:54 PM•Views: 63
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P1001529 ROTATE TD1 per Sht
Back to Rawlins on this tour. This shows nearly all of Rawlins. Coming into Rawlins from the Red Desert on the right, the alternate main through Rawlins starts with a turnout off Track #2, the east bound main.
All of the yards have alternate mains through them to facilitate switching cars onto or off trains that stop to deliver or set out cars at that yard. The alternate main can be parked on by a train temporarily to pick up or set out cars, and this leaves both mains, Tracks #1 and #2 clear for passing traffic. Wamsutter does not have a yard, and it has no alternate main, but the center siding with the east entrance to it serves as a place for a working train to duck onto to clear either main. Or at Wamsutter the train to drop off or pick up cars can park on the center siding, and the switch engine there can pull cars from it or take cars to it on the siding.
More of the Cheyenne steam yard is in the distance, and it can be seen by enlarging the view as described in a previous photo.
Capture Date: Oct 24, 2022 10:26 AM•Views: 62
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P1001529 ROTATE Crop TD1 per sht
This is the same Rawlins and Red Desert photo with much of the overhead building structure cropped off. The former full photo gives a feel for the layout in the 50 x 75 foot building, and it gives an idea of what can be seen from the hanging mezzanine.
This picture emphasizes the distinct parts and details of the layout on the two nearby benches and on the distant Cheyenne steam yard/Speer wye bench.
Here the same car cards that I dropped on the floor in order have been replaced into their fascia slots.
To read about my unique 4 card car forwarding system, the article "Operations on the Wyoming Division" is in the Wyoming Division Historical Society website at
http://www.wyomingdivision.org/
That article was originally published in "Dispatcher’s Office," the National Model Railroad Association’ Operations special interest group quarterly magazine.
Upload Date: Nov 14, 2022 11:48 AM•Views: 64
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P1001440 Rawlins TD1 CROP
This is another photo of most of Rawlins thrown in for continuity so you can keep an idea where the camera is pointing. I have cropped it to concentrate on the model.
Since I built/am building it for operations, I tend to photograph wide angle views of large swaths of the layout, exactly because my emphasis in model railroading is operating and sharing the operations with other operators. Since I don't drink anymore, this is how I party.
This is not to say that I do not appreciate Allen and Lenny's exacting and fantastic skills at modeling. And I have had extreme good luck in stumbling on them as partners in building the Wyoming Division.
I am not a good modeler, and with Parkinson's as my contribution to the covid pandemic, I have given up trying. I am proud of my contributions of the concept, the design work with AutoSketch and the track planning software, "3rd F***ingPlanit, I mean "3rd Planit," and of course the financing of the whole deal. Oh yes, and of course, I like to give parties.
Capture Date: Jun 14, 2022 10:38 AM•Views: 60
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P1001516 TD1 per sheet
This photo, taken from about 2/3 the way up the east stairs to the Mezzanine, shows Laramie on the right, and up the western slope of "The Hill," the Hermosa Tunnels , Dale Junction where the Harriman Cutoff (Track #3) connects to #1 and #2, then the two routes on the east slope of Sherman Hill.
Try the enlarged image feature on both the distant areas of The Hill and Cheyenne on the left and on the extreme lower left corner, which shows a small part of one of the two third (lowest) levels. This one runs from Echo, Utah on the second level down to Park City about where the rolling 3 step-ladder is in the aisle. There are no structures or scenery on either of the third levels. Park City consists of a two track "yard," both tracks of which terminate in a 12" manual turntable that is used to turn the loco on trips to deliver and return a string of cars to Ogden via Echo, Utah.
This photo shows a tiny bit of the end of the aisle covering bench just to the left of Dale Junction . The top bench was extended to the wall widen the upper level bench to make the Harriman Cutoff realistic. The very small front part of this "lid" is on the extreme left. It is painted baby blue, and is connected to the large fascia that curves out of sight around towards it.
Capture Date: Oct 24, 2022 09:54 AM•Views: 62
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P1001523 TD1 per sht
This is taken from the east stairs up to the yellow railed mezzanine that spans the 75 ft length of the building. It is 7 feet wide and is suspended from two massive girder arches. There are straight sections of the arches at the walls, and the two on the right hand side can be seen where the right hand bench backdrop with sky and clouds bulges out from the walls around them. They are bolted to the sloped roof arch members, and these two members make up one half of each arch. At the peak of the arches, and of the roof, they are bolted to the other half that runs down the other half of the building. Part of the joint at the near peak can be seen at the extreme upper left corner of this picture.
There are two arches. On each side of each arch, 25 feet from each building side wall, a vertical beam is bolted to the bottom of the arches and hangs down to support the I beam mezzanine floor joists that run the 75 foot length of the building and mezzanine. The 4 vertical beams and the floor joists are coated with rust inhibiting brown paint.
All that is my long winded way of saying there are no posts out on the floor of the building.
Capture Date: Oct 24, 2022 10:03 AM•Views: 63
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P1001523 TD1 per sheet crop
This expansive view is cropped from the last photo. It shows the first 4 benches going across the building. A train on the left traveling on the inner pair of tracks (above the clipboard "Velcroed" to the front of the bench)--those two tracks which pass out of sight behind the Hanna coal mine area on the end cap to the benches, that train would enter Rawlins on the next bench out of sight.
Beyond these 4 benches before the camera are 4 more benches parallel to these 4 counting on to the left. The ninth bench, immediately in front of the camera, extends to the left out of view. It lays perpendicular to the 8, the 4 plus 4. The 9th bench is the 84 inch wide Cheyenne yard bench that here cuts the inner corner to the lower right toward the Sherman Hill bench. The Speer, WY wye can be seen nestled into the ground cover, and the 5 industries in the foreground comprise those in west Cheyenne.
In other words, I am boasting at how large the layout is--only 1/4 of the bench tops can be seen here, or 1/2 if you imagine the lover level is visible below these. The mains #1 and #2 are about 1,005 feet long including the 30 feet or so in staging. That staging portion connects the sceniced portion of the layout into a circle (although we never run in a circle--it is just that staging can be entered from either end).
Capture Date: Oct 24, 2022 10:03 AM•Views: 67
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P1001527 TD1 per sheet
From nearly the top of the mezzanine steps. The bench in the middle is the west slope of Sherman Hill, and the eastern slope (to Cheyenne is against the wall.
This picture was taken before Lenny's Laramie depot was finished and set in place on its cork flooring covered space against the backdrop at the bottom center.
All the yards, Cheyenne, Laramie, Green River, and Ogden, is covered with 1/4" cork flooring underlayment. Likewise, all the the spline roadbeds also have the 1/4" cork under the tracks.
One of the four antennae for the DCC command station hangs from the A/C duct on the upper left.
We painted the ceiling sky blue, although it has a green tint here. One of the vertical and roof angle mezzanine beams clearly stands out here, as does the fire sprinkler system.
Capture Date: Oct 24, 2022 10:19 AM•Views: 61
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