PRR/Conrail Juniata Division Engineering Report

[Chris333]

Yeah I don't know about the TT & roundhouse 

If that was in your layout room could you walk all around it. Or at least the left and right?

[Dave V]

Yeah I don't know about the TT & roundhouse 

If that was in your layout room could you walk all around it. Or at least the left and right?

Yes, so the top and left sides are against the wall.  The door to the room is below the smaller peninsula.

And yeah, I'm not at all sold on any part of the Lewistown scene right now.

[eric220]

I like where you're going with this.  I'll second (or third) the reservations about the roundhouse, but overall I like the plan.

[Chris333]

This is saved in my photos:
https://goo.gl/photos/pYWTtgVet8bATbdh9

I'm sure some of the old ones are still in this thread. 

[Dave V]

I keep thinking about how to preserve the current JD as part of an expanded layout but the track problems are really starting to become apparent.  I could resolder everything but I really wish the track looked better anyway, and then there's the wide-tread-BLI-wheel-versus-narrow-insulated-gap-in-a-Peco-Insulfrog-short problem thingy that keeps me reapplying clear nail polish on all the frogs periodically.

Then I ask myself "if I had to tear out all the track and relay it, would I keep the same track plan?"  Chances are I'd want to modify it (in addition to changing it to meet a new expansion).  Now it becomes less a relay and more a wholesale remodel that almost begs for a new HCD.  Almost.

Sigh.  And then the paralysis by analysis sets in...   

[eric220]

Dave, for what it's worth, I think most of that analysis has been done and redone. This thread is full of efforts to expand or improve the JD, and you always come back to the current layout's shortcomings.  As much as I hate to say it, I think the answer is to commit to the heresy and chalk the current JD up to "it's been a good run." Just start fresh. If you try to shoehorn the old layout into a new one, you're still stuck with all the shortcomings and baggage that comes with the old layout.

[Yoda voice]Clear your mind...[/Yoda voice]

[davefoxx]

Dave, for what it's worth, I think most of that analysis has been done and redone. This thread is full of efforts to expand or improve the JD, and you always come back to the current layout's shortcomings.  As much as I hate to say it, I think the answer is to commit to the heresy and chalk the current JD up to "it's been a good run." Just start fresh. If you try to shoehorn the old layout into a new one, you're still stuck with all the shortcomings and baggage that comes with the old layout.

[Yoda voice]Clear your mind...[/Yoda voice]

I agree with Eric.  In fact, I wrote the following earlier in another thread, but it makes sense to include it here, too:

Not sure you want my two cents, but here goes.  I think, based on what I've heard from you over the past few years, that you should scrap the original Juniata Division and recycle much of its parts into the JD 2.0.  I suggest an around the walls layout to allow for larger curves and a much longer mainline.

However, not long ago, you wrote that you did not want a pit, so around the walls might not happen.  Okay.  Consider this.  Around the walls, water-wings style, with a four-track mainline.  To save space and track, you could even make it two tracks doubled back on itself to appear as a four-track mainline, when, in fact, it's only two continuous run loops.  This way, you have the look of the PRR four-track mainline, and, as a result, the dogbone-style layout with a mainline turning back on itself is disguised.  Create a center stage (the four-track mainline) and make the return loops off-stage.  The return loops could be a great place for staging.

Just a thought,
DFF

[John]

Honestly each time I go back to that area--as much as I love spending time with friends and family--I'm even less interested in living there.

I live here -- and I not interested in living here

[davefoxx]

I live here -- and I not interested in living here

Yes, sir.  I'm very content on this side of the Bay.  I have no interest in living on the Western Shore.

DFF

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Scrap the original JD. Save the buildings and signals, and give the rest a fitting funeral.

Don't let your past limit your future.

[davefoxx]

Scrap the original JD. Save the buildings and signals, and give the rest a fitting funeral.

Don't let your past limit your future.

. . . and then, post the carnage on the JD's Facebook page, sit back, and watch the fun!   

DFF

[Ed Kapuscinski]

. . . and then, post the carnage on the JD's Facebook page, sit back, and watch the fun!   

DFF

Yes!

[sirenwerks]

I live here -- and I not interested in living here

Hehe, I escaped to the land of milk and honey  [size=78%]  (and anarchists and pot shops [/size] [/size][size=78%]).[/size]

[eric220]

. . . and then, post the carnage on the JD's Facebook page, sit back, and watch the fun!   

DFF

But it has to be a surprise there.  No forewarning.  I want to see tears!

[Dave V]

I love that idea.   

Okay, back to design stuff...  I agree, it's been analyzed to death.  And I've come full circle so many times my design vector looks like a slinky.

I'm in the home stretch on the Midland so this can start in a few short months.  Like I said, waiting on some news work-wise, but hell, if I have to move for work then it's a perfect excuse to burn the motherf**ker down.  If I don't (most likely) then I already know the space I'm working with.

Track.  Tired of code 80 but wanting some of the robustness and reliability of something other than Atlas 55.  I'm actually considering Peco 55 because of the switches.  Peco Electrofrogs don't have the issues with the frog short problem that the Insulfrogs do.  Peco 55 would let me run that deep-flanged Japanese box electric painted as an FF1.  Just thinking aloud.

I really wish I'd used Peco 55 on the original JD like Lou Sassi did.  I honestly don't know why I didn't.  The tie spacing doesn't kill photos as much as the rail profile does for code 80 so Peco 55 is a compromise I might be OK with.