Oregon Joint Line N Scale

[tefsom85]

Great video.   Looks like alot of fun to operate!

[reinhardtjh]

I love yard ops.

Hopefully I can work my way up from the Monument Tramp to one of the busier yards.  If I can keep up.   

[MVW]

Wow! That was excellent work, all the way around. Thank you!

Jim

[Denver Road Doug]

Dean,  fantastic video about Silvies.   Thanks for the effort to put it together and share it.

Great seeing you at the show yesterday and hope I can make it out sometime.

[reinhardtjh]

Great seeing you at the show yesterday and hope I can make it out sometime.

There was a show yesterday?  Where?  How did I miss it?   

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Loving the video.

So far I've noticed one curious thing.

It seems like the yard crew keeps moving cars that are already set into each siding. Presumably, those cars would've had their handbrakes set since the yard is on a grade. Your poor brakeman will be killing himself constantly climbing the ladders to apply and knock the brakes off.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Oh, also, I really do love the video.

It reminds me of the hectic old days of running the vest pocket Ridgely Yard on Lee's old WM.

[SAH]

Fine video of action at Silves Dean.  What method do you use to keep track of car movement?  I don't see tabs on the cars.  Car cars, switch lists?  I'm weighing options for Brittain Yard.  I'd like to do switch lists but don't want to turn the session into a clerking exercise.

A comic aside:  While I was watching the video our cat jumped into my lap.  She immediately spied the little freight cars racing back and forth during the sped up switching moves and watched intently.  She'd relax when the movement went back to normal speed, then watch closely again when the speed picked up.  Funny little animal.  She probably watched more of the yard ops video than many humans can stand.   

Steve

[Rossford Yard]

There was a show yesterday?  Where?  How did I miss it?   

Yes, a small one in SE Ft Worth, part of a club.  Doug and I set up joint tables to sell off our used stuff.  Dean came by and should have much better speed matched locos in the next video, based on his one purchase from us......

Bad news, small crowd.  Good news, Doug and I were two of only 3 N scale vendors, so we did good biz.  Not hard with a captive audience and a willingness to give things away at lower than lowest EBay prices.

Synopsis - You didn't miss much.  See you at Plano, or maybe sooner in a non show environment.

[coldriver]

Loving the video.

So far I've noticed one curious thing.

It seems like the yard crew keeps moving cars that are already set into each siding. Presumably, those cars would've had their handbrakes set since the yard is on a grade. Your poor brakeman will be killing himself constantly climbing the ladders to apply and knock the brakes off.

The thing about hand brakes is that most people assume they're either applied or not.  But you can tie a loose brake (what we referred to as a "stinger") which applies enough pressure to keep the car from rolling on a slight grade but still allows the wheels to roll if an engine ties on (you tighten the chain, but not that tight).   So in the case of Silvies, you might tie a stinger on the first car into a track and then just kick cars on top of it.  As the track filled up the stinger might not be enough to keep the track from rolling so you'd just tie another stinger or two until they stopped rolling.  You might drag a car with a "stinger" applied around the whole shift if it made your job easier - noisy as hell and not the best for brake shoe wear but it might keep a switchman from having to constantly climb ladders to apply or release brakes.  If you lost track of which cars had stingers applied you'd just listen for the brake squeal.   

[coldriver]

Fine video of action at Silves Dean.  What method do you use to keep track of car movement?  I don't see tabs on the cars.  Car cars, switch lists?  I'm weighing options for Brittain Yard.  I'd like to do switch lists but don't want to turn the session into a clerking exercise.

I actually use car tabs but I pulled them off for the video.  A friend of mine put together a great explanation of how I use them https://meridianspeedway.weebly.com/car-tabs-on-np-oregon-joint-line.html

[nkalanaga]

If you're switching from the uphill end of a yard, and need to keep the cars from rolling out the other end, you can also use skates.  The Pasco Yard use to use them on the bowl tracks, to keep humped cars from rolling out the far end, until they installed small spring-loaded retarders on each track.

When I was VERY young my father worked the "skate job", before he became the night shift retarder operator.  It was not a fun job in the winter, because skates are heavy, you had to constantly dodge cars, and were out in the weather most of the time.  They did have a "skate shanty", with a coal stove, where the men could warm up during slow times.

It would actually be possible to make N scale skates, from very thin brass, if one wanted to go to the trouble.

[coldriver]

geez - didn't realize it'd been so long since the last post...  Here's my latest operations video highlighting Monument Yard which is the largest yard on the layout.  If you've ever gotten bored to tears by operating session videos that move at a snails pace and have no description of what's going on, give this one a try (it even has a cliffhanger!).

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Watched it last night and loved it.

I think you've definitely captured the flavor of being a real yardmaster...

[Cajonpassfan]

Lol, the end of the trick is much too stressful, a little too much like the real world.
Nice work!
Otto K.