Tehachapi, BC

[basementcalling]

Nature abhors a vacuum:





-gfh

Nature also abhors staging with turnouts on the track furthest from the aisle. Any plans how to access the turnouts when they are blocked by trains on closer tracks?

Love the look of those Atlas #10s.

[GaryHinshaw]

Agreed that this is not recommended practice.  This was briefly discussed upthread (months ago - alas...).  Two things 1) the only Atlas turnouts I could source were LH, and 2) this yard is temporary, until I get the helix and permanent lower staging installed.   In fact, these tracks will be repurposed for that yard when the time comes.  In the meantime, it's not really difficult to access those turnouts since they are still close to the aisle.  Also, the geometry of the ladder is such that, if a train is immediately in front of a turnout (making it hard to reach) then it is also fouling that turnout, so there would be no need to throw it.  That's my story anyway. 

[GaryHinshaw]

On a slightly more photogenic note, I have the Tunnel 14-17 track ballasted now and I can start to think about landforms and tunnel portals there.  Tunnel 17 is especially key, because that is the first scene you see as you enter the room, and it also has very distinctive wing walls.  In the shot below, the front one is a master Ed Nadolski made for his Loop pike that will be used to make molds, since there are several walls that have this basic geometry.  The one on the back is a simple cardboard mock-up of a unique wall, to check sizing and general fit into the scene:



The prototype:

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=146532&nseq=4

Clearly aging and weathering will be keys to success here.  I can't wait!

[GaryHinshaw]

Ballasting continues...







Happiness is a ballasted turnout that actually works:



"Fun" fact: I am spending about 3 hours per foot of track on this task, counting clip painting, two passes of ballast application, clean-up and weathering.  To date I have completed about 50 feet of mainline, and I still have the Loop shelf to go (another 50 feet...)  Note to self: double track takes twice as long to ballast as single track.

I have another session coming up this Saturday.  We had a pre-session get together last night with Mark and a few other locals to flesh out some operator-train interface ideas: we discussed how to manage distributed power (one person crew or two; independent throttles or consisted, etc.), and did some reliability testing.  I think the bulk of the issues we faced can be traced to truck-mounted couplers and/or trip pin interference.  Both will be banished in due course.

Thanks for looking,
-gfh

P.S. Experts will notice that the signal bridge in the first shot is the (now defunct) Walong bridge mis-cast as the MP377 bridge in the desert.  I'm ready for you Traincat!



(I'm also starting to play with fascia sizing, lattice-work, etc.)

[Bendtracker1]

Your ballast is looking fantastic Gary!

[Noah Lane]

Seeing that background puts me right on Highway 58, somewhere between Barstow and Tehachapi.  When I'm sick of driving, and gas station cuisine.  Trying to keep my eyes open and "hold it" until Bakersfield.  The only relief is getting to railfan.   That being said, I'd say you're succeeding with realism. 

[Baronjutter]

As someone just getting into the whole world of fun that is ballasting I have to say that's some world-class ballasting.  Your concrete track looks so perfect and your ballast is so even and, well, perfect!  No matter what I do it never quite turns out like that.  Care to share any secrets of your ballasting methods?

[jagged ben]

Gary,

Please tell me that your modeling era ends in 2013 and that that Walong signal bridge will be installed at the loop.   
If you want any tips on how I routed the wiring on the one I built for our club, I can send you some pics.  (I have your e-mail somewhere.)

Also, when will you be doing a ballasting clinic in the Bay Area?   

[GaryHinshaw]

Seeing that background puts me right on Highway 58, somewhere between Barstow and Tehachapi.

I'm reminded of a song. 

Gary,

Please tell me that your modeling era ends in 2013 and that that Walong signal bridge will be installed at the loop.   
If you want any tips on how I routed the wiring on the one I built for our club, I can send you some pics.  (I have your e-mail somewhere.)

All three signal bridges will live on in my world (Sandcut, Walong, MP377), as will SD40-2's!  They're just too cool.  I want to capture the spirit of the Pass, but I'm still going to pick and choose according to Rule #1.  Please do send me the info about wire routing. Thx!

On ballasting, the only real secret I have is patience, but I gave that away in the previous post.  Honestly, how many modellers are willing (or even should be willing) to spend 3 hours per foot of track when they have 150 feet of mainline to process (250' counting sidings).  If I get 10 hours a week of modelling time (when I'm lucky), that's still 75 weeks of nothing but ballasting... Fortunately I don't mind the task, and I love the results, so I guess it's ok.  Just don't look for it to be done next week.

So what's next in the construction queue?  The temporary staging will be exercised in the next two sessions, and that will help me do some performance testing of trains in the hidden track.  The next logical steps in permanent construction are the permanent staging yards indicated in orange in this schematic:



The storage yard (left) and north/Bakersfield staging (right) are on the "0th" level and need to be built and tested before the Edison-Bealville deck can be built.  But to make that useful, I also need the south staging helix to connect them to the upper deck.  The benchwork for the storage yard is already in place, the lowest level in this shot:



My original plan was to transfer the ME code 55 track from temporary staging to this yard, but two factors argue against this now: 1) the wood tie track is a pain to work with and has the offset tie problem and 2)  the temporary yard will be useful to have up until the Edison-Bealville deck is tied in, which produces a bit of a chicken/egg problem.  So, I'm leaning now towards just hand-laying all my wood-tie track (including the storage yard) since it's not really any harder than working with ME flex.  This would make the construction order:
1) storage yard; unconnected to start with.
2) south staging helix; this would allow me to connect the storage yard to the upper deck and test the fluidity of the whole south end, but it would require removing the shoo-fly the closes the upper deck, making a point-to-point plan from storage yard to helix to upper deck to temporary staging.
3) north staging; this will also connect to the south helix and give me a reverse loop for somewhat more interesting interim ops.
4) Edison-Bealville deck to complete the mainline.  This allows me to keep the temporary staging up until the time I'm ready to tie in the mainline at the throat of the temporary yard, giving me some ops potential throughout construction.

-gfh

P.S.  A big shout out to NZT for those awesome little switch machines.

[GaryHinshaw]

TBC session #2 is in the books and it was great fun (for me at least).  We had 7 people and one dog in the room, and I'm happy to report that it didn't seem impossibly crowded.  When the full line is in place, we could run some serious train schedules with that many operators.  I don't know if that will be the target or not, but I think it's possible at least.  Here are some photos taken by our own Tim Horton.  Thanks for sending these along Tim!

Tim brought over a gorgeously weathered BCR train to run on the hill, headed by his newly-completed MLW trio:


It had an odd-looking DPU on the rear  :


The two-tone green was a sight for sore eyes on the arid east slope of the pass:


A short-ish grain train descends the hill with two matched SD40-2 rear units helping to hold back the tonnage under the shadow of Halo Mountain:


Andrew Hutchinson manages a meet near summit, in front of the Monolith cement-plant-to-be:


N scale legend Steve Stark brought along a time traveller to haul an updated version of a PFE reefer drag, seen here between "Tunnels" 14 and 15:

What a beautiful looking and sounding loco!  Steve will be moving to Vancouver Island at the end of the month and he will be missed.  Look for his soon-to-be-former layout in the upcoming issue of NSR.

The cement job arrives at a Dali-esque Monolith to do some switching:


...in the capable hands of Mark Dance:


There is only one temporary track installed here now, but it was enough to get an early look at how it will work.  Note that it was a beautiful evening, and it stays light until after 9 these days, so we kept the door open for some en plein air railroading.

Noting that Mark muffed the product placement a bit, we had to do a re-take:

Bowen Island Deep 6 Lager, the pause that refreshes.  At TBC, Rule G says "See Rule #1".

Finally, Superintendent Banjo was reading the train sheet to see who he had to call for the next crew:

He works for peanuts, literally!

Thanks to all who participated - this is what it is all about for me.  A few notes on the session coming next.

[Scottl]

Banjo looks to be the sending dispatch signals with those ears.  Either that, or he wants a Bowen Lager himself. 

The effort of closing the loop has paid off and operations seems to be roaring ahead.  Nice to see the space and track plan able to absorb so many operators.  The benefit of bulletproof trackwork- nary a guard in sight!

[C855B]

... The two-tone green was a sight for sore eyes on the arid east slope of the pass:

%$#@$& Alcos! CARB and SCAQMD was having collective apoplexy!

[basementcalling]

Fun stuff.  Banjo looks like a no nosense kind of boss, unless you have doggie treats. He does have semaphore ears however.

Glad you got to do something besides paint track clips and spread ballast.

That shot behind Mark though. That vegetation is grossly out of scale.

Have you thought about placing space heaters in certain locations to replicate the desert heat of summertime trips over the hill?

[Kevin C]

Gary.

The progress on your layout, in particular the ballasting in the last few photo's is totally awesome. Well done.

Kevin

[GaryHinshaw]

Thanks!  Mike, those MLW's haven't hit the Basin yet - the winds through Mojave will clear the smoke out in no time!  Peter, I do in fact have baseboard heaters installed: one directly under the Edison/Mojave shelf, and one under the aptly-named Caliente curve.  I have thought about cranking them during a session.   

Here is a quick cosmetic update on the layout.  I cut and installed a fascia board on the Loop shelf, because I'm getting tired of looking at benchwork, and I'm anxious to see what the terrain will look like there:



I left a window in the middle so operators could monitor their trains as they negotiate the 1-turn helix between the lower and upper decks.  Here is the subterranean view:



I wish I had made the top edge a little lower to block the view of the bus wire, but oh well.  It will be low light under there, and I will probably add a lightly smoked window to it.

I also quickly threw together a bit of terrain with lattice and masking tape to help me visualize the narrow cut the lower track will traverse after it crosses Tehachapi Creek:



This is one of the key features I wanted to capture in this scene, and I think this will work.  Here are some proto shots for comparison:

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=186933&nseq=10
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=323274&nseq=1
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=401519&nseq=19

Note the Conrail power in that last shot. 

The white control panels are temporary.  I have been thinking I would like to make the permanent panels as dry transfer type graphics applied directly to the fascia, along the lines of what museums use to caption paintings.  Has anyone ever tried printing custom dry transfer or heat transfer graphics and applied them to wall-type material?  Here is a sample vendor:

http://www.decalpaper.com/category-s/38.htm
http://www.decalpaper.com/category-s/7.htm

I would like to paint the fascia charcoal grey with the lettering in light grey (hmm, sounds very SP).

-gfh