Weekend Update 2/15/2015

[mark dance]

Mark Dance-your trestle is exactly what I need for the Kingman Canyon layout...did you scratch it?...would love some more info on this; need to build a few like this, only with ballasted deck.

Bruce

Hi Bruce...the trestle is scratch built to CP standard pile trestle plans for trestles under 15' in height. The plan is available of the CP Historical society site.  It is a very simple build with styrene for the pilings and cross members and dimensional wood for the stringers.  The rivets are 1.75" HO rivets from Grandt Line.

Hope that helps!

md

[mark dance]

Mark - really like the pulp mill scene.  The thing that most strikes me (other than the structures, lighting, backdrop, etc) is that you allocated enough room for an industry that large so that it doesn't look like it's been squeezed into a way too small space.  The huge paved area, inclusion of parking lots, and adequate space for trucks to turn around is not something you often see from our HO brothers!

Thank you Bruce...you can do a lot in N scale in 2' depth of benchwork!   The Celgar mill is one of two large industries on the layout.  The other is the Slocan Forest Products Mill at Slocan City which takes about 1/2 the number of cars as Celgar but has about the same number of dedicated tracks ( to serve it.



Kootenay Forest Products sawmill in East Nelson is a third large industry though much smaller (four dedicated tracks)

[nkalanaga]

For pins, I use common straight pins, bought in a box of 500 years ago.  Most of the materials I push them into aren't that hard, and if I do need to push harder, a pair of pliers does the job.

They also make nice stovepipes, air cleaner intakes for trucks, and, with the heads removed and top file smooth, road sign posts. 

[coosvalley]

Have a great weekend.
md

Mark, I have enjoyed watching your layout progress for quite some time now, thanks for sharing and keep it up...

However, I feel I have to play devils advocate for a minute.....In the above pic, all I see is yellow tags!!!!....I am sorta bewildered that someone would spend so much time, building a believable layout, weathering etc, and then put those tags everywhere, and on the cars too!!...Surely there is another way(operating system) that would not include tags on everything!!?......This is one of the nicest layouts I've seen in N scale, but those tags ruin the scene every time for me....Of course, it's your layout and your opinion is the one that matters, but I couldn't hold it in anymore!....Hopefully I can encourage you to get those things off this otherwise AMAZING layout!

[peteski]

Mark, I have enjoyed watching your layout progress for quite some time now, thanks for sharing and keep it up...

However, I feel I have to play devils advocate for a minute.....In the above pic, all I see is yellow tags!!!!....I am sorta bewildered that someone would spend so much time, building a believable layout, weathering etc, and then put those tags everywhere, and on the cars too!!...Surely there is another way(operating system) that would not include tags on everything!!?......This is one of the nicest layouts I've seen in N scale, but those tags ruin the scene every time for me....Of course, it's your layout and your opinion is the one that matters, but I couldn't hold it in anymore!....Hopefully I can encourage you to get those things off this otherwise AMAZING layout!

Wouldn't those tags be for identification during Ops sessions?  An alternative to car-cards or switching lists?  They probably identify industries too (which is sometimes a major pain when operating on untagged layouts).  These photos seem to be more or less candid snapshots. I have feeling that if the layout was to be set up for an open house display session of for magazine article photos, the tags would be removed.

When I operate on layouts using car-card systems, the ops crews often props the car-cards against each corresponding car while blocking or switching cars. You think that tags are bad? You should see how a layout looks like with relatively giant car-cards are standing up on the layout, hiding the cars behind them!

[mark dance]

Mark, I have enjoyed watching your layout progress for quite some time now, thanks for sharing and keep it up...

However, I feel I have to play devils advocate for a minute.....In the above pic, all I see is yellow tags!!!!....I am sorta bewildered that someone would spend so much time, building a believable layout, weathering etc, and then put those tags everywhere, and on the cars too!!...Surely there is another way(operating system) that would not include tags on everything!!?......This is one of the nicest layouts I've seen in N scale, but those tags ruin the scene every time for me....Of course, it's your layout and your opinion is the one that matters, but I couldn't hold it in anymore!....Hopefully I can encourage you to get those things off this otherwise AMAZING layout!

thx for the feedback...and I appreciate your compliments as to its appearance but what is most important to me is that the layout try to be *amazing* to operate.  Normally for "glamour shots" like magazine publications I take the tags off however I have an ops session coming up next week and the layout needs staging. 

I am primarily interested in operations not modelling and the layout has thus been built primarily for operations and secondarily for appearance. To this end I will air on the side of what makes it easier and satisfying to operate rather than what makes the layout look more "realistic".  The primary customers I would like to please are the crew.

I have studied car forwarding systems extensively and compared many approaches under the specific circumstances of the C&W (many many similar cars (60% are CPR box car red 40' XMs) , non unique car numbering, 5:1 fast clock, tracks on 13' centers and deep scenes).  My estimates - verified by N scalers who use other systems on their layouts like Al Frasch and Scott Sabo  - is that car cards, switch lists and other systems that require cars to be uniquely identified and referenced to off-layout paperwork might well add as much as 20% to the overhead of operating the C&W.  I define overhead as time spent by operators dealing with the car forwarding system and thus delaying the movement of cars during a session.  This OH is worse for yard operations and less or zero for through freights, but we don't have many throughs and those we do have don't get tagged.  For a switching job like the Kraft switcher which serves the Celgar plant I think 20% would be a fair estimate of the overhead which tags eliminates.

I also recognize that in photos tags can cause a negative reaction.  I tend to look through the tags now and actually think it is more accurate to portray the layout as an operator would see it in a session.  This may well be the same reason I don't like the "deception" of photo shopped model photos.  The occasional negative reaction caused me to seek data so, 18 months ago, I surveyed *all* of the operators who have ever operated on the layout and got back about 60 replies.  About 60% of the replies were from HO modelers and 40% from N scale modelers.  I think I published the results on Railwire at that time but to recap: 

92% of respondents felt the tag system is easier to use than other Car Forwarding systems would be in [the C&W’s] environment and 81% felt the appearance of the tags on the cars did not detract from their operating experience.  I think when you operate most people are pretty much oblivious to what is happening away from their immediate tasks and therefore not struggling with a car forwarding system makes the session easier, less stressful and in the end more fun for them.

So thank you again for the comment.  It is something I struggled with previously but I won't sacrifice my primary objective in the hobby and the survey results indicate to me that until something better (easier *and* less noticeable) comes along we are on the right track.

md

aside: should anyone have an interest in this area, I would be happy to post or forward a presentation I did recently on different car forwarding systems and an analysis of their pros/cons and "overhead".  [12 meg in size as lots of pictures]

[coosvalley]

I figured you had weighed the pros vs cons, and really didn't expect you to change your mind because of my comments...And, if it does make operations have less "overhead", I see the advantage. If your goal is to make the operation AMAZING, and you feel it's successful, then far be it from me to tell you to change!

Thanks for taking the time to reply, and keep up the good modeling!

[chessie system fan]

Now that Bachmann has made a NE caboose the old Life Like model looks a bit dated.  I decided to turn mine into a Reading wooden version.  It was quite a challenge to keep all the scribed lines straight.





I've also been working on a narrow hood GP35.  More info here: https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=35407.0

[Philip H]

As a pile trestle fan - they are ALL OVER down south - well done sir.

Where'd you get these bolt plates?

[mark dance]

Where'd you get these bolt plates?

Hi Philip...0.010"x0.080" styrene strip, cut to length on a Chopper and painted.  Grandt Line HO 1 3/4" NBWs added afterwards.

md

[coldriver]

thx for the feedback...and I appreciate your compliments as to its appearance but what is most important to me is that the layout try to be *amazing* to operate.  Normally for "glamour shots" like magazine publications I take the tags off however I have an ops session coming up next week and the layout needs staging. 

I am primarily interested in operations not modelling and the layout has thus been built primarily for operations and secondarily for appearance. To this end I will air on the side of what makes it easier and satisfying to operate rather than what makes the layout look more "realistic".  The primary customers I would like to please are the crew.

I have studied car forwarding systems extensively and compared many approaches under the specific circumstances of the C&W (many many similar cars (60% are CPR box car red 40' XMs) , non unique car numbering, 5:1 fast clock, tracks on 13' centers and deep scenes).  My estimates - verified by N scalers who use other systems on their layouts like Al Frasch and Scott Sabo  - is that car cards, switch lists and other systems that require cars to be uniquely identified and referenced to off-layout paperwork might well add as much as 20% to the overhead of operating the C&W.  I define overhead as time spent by operators dealing with the car forwarding system and thus delaying the movement of cars during a session.  This OH is worse for yard operations and less or zero for through freights, but we don't have many throughs and those we do have don't get tagged.  For a switching job like the Kraft switcher which serves the Celgar plant I think 20% would be a fair estimate of the overhead which tags eliminates.

I also recognize that in photos tags can cause a negative reaction.  I tend to look through the tags now and actually think it is more accurate to portray the layout as an operator would see it in a session.  This may well be the same reason I don't like the "deception" of photo shopped model photos.  The occasional negative reaction caused me to seek data so, 18 months ago, I surveyed *all* of the operators who have ever operated on the layout and got back about 60 replies.  About 60% of the replies were from HO modelers and 40% from N scale modelers.  I think I published the results on Railwire at that time but to recap: 

92% of respondents felt the tag system is easier to use than other Car Forwarding systems would be in [the C&W’s] environment and 81% felt the appearance of the tags on the cars did not detract from their operating experience.  I think when you operate most people are pretty much impervious to what is happening away from their immediate tasks and therefore not struggling with a car forwarding system makes the session easier, less stressful and in the end more fun for them.

So thank you again for the comment.  It is something I struggled with previously but I won't sacrifice my primary objective in the hobby and the survey results indicate to me that until something better (easier *and* less noticeable) comes along we are on the right track.

md

I use car tags as well and my feedback from operators echoes Marks - it's near unanimously positive.  And, having been a real life yardmaster, car cards don't begin to replicate the operating conditions I faced in the real world and I definitely agree that using car cards significantly slows down classification (which is a serious issue on many of the layouts I've operated on) .   That being said there are some tips I can offer Mark (keeping in mind that my car tag system was based on Mark's system) . 

#1 - Any cars that stay on the same train from staging to staging don't need tags (looks like your doing this...)

#2 - I have a pulp mill on my layout that is the destination for every loaded chip car (which is probably the same case for Mark's layout?).  There is no need to put tags on those cars - just put it in the blocking instructions that loaded woodchips go into the Castlegar block.  No one is going to be confused by the destination of a loaded wood chip car arriving at Castlegar.   Likewise I have a mill that is the only destination for loaded log cars.  Again, no need for tags...

#3 - Where possible I try and match tag color to roof color - i.e. I have a switching zone where the major industry is a fruit loading warehouse.  Most reefers have silver roofs.  The tag color I use for that switching zone is solid silver.  Same with my cement plant (gray tags).

#4 I paint the sides of my tags to match the roof color of my cars.  For the most part I treat my tags (which are double sided plastic I-beams) as two-cycle waybills and merely flip them between sessions.  I've even gone so far as to weather tags. 

These steps are greatly beneficial in minimizing the negative aesthetic impact of using car tags.   

-Dean

[Cajonpassfan]

When I operate on layouts using car-card systems, the ops crews often props the car-cards against each corresponding car while blocking or switching cars. You think that tags are bad? You should see how a layout looks like with relatively giant car-cards are standing up on the layout, hiding the cars behind them!

You mean like this?


Mark's tag system makes a lot of sense, especially in N scale where reading car numbers can be annoying, or impossible, depending on the car's location and one's eyesight... and particularly in yards where the yard master quickly forgets about realism as he gets gets overwhelmed and focused on getting the job done. Out on the road, it's much easier....
Great railroad Mark, but you already knew that
Otto K.

[Ken Rice]

I'm finding this car routing discussion just as interesting as the photos.  I have to admit I was so focused on the larger industry appearance and track layout I didn't even notice the tabs until they were pointed out.

I've had a PICL list sort of thing in mind as the upltimate goal for operating my rr, but there is no software that does exactly what I want, and I've slso had some misgivings about visitors trying to mark up the list to keep track of the current state of the rr as well as the plan,etc.  Car cards work reasonably well, but only if you have plenty pockets to hold them and racks to sort them on, and I've been trying to keep the facia completely clear of stuff.

My temporary solution so far has been card stock tabs for the cars, which solve all the operating problems.  Reading what you guys are doing, I'm suddenly feeling a lot better about just sticking with it, and making something a little more durable like styrene pieces or something.

[Santa Fe Guy]

Great stuff as usual this weekend everyone.
Myself and several of my friends have been using car cards during operating sessions on our N Scale RR for many years. To solve some of the Id issues many of us have taken pictures of all of the cars and locomotives on the roster.
We have racks along the fascia so operators DO NOT put the cards on the RR. The way bills are slid into the pockets. (I use 4 way, way bills). We then have car card holders that hold the cards that are in the train with the train orders printed on the back cover. All held together with a spring clip so that they are easily looked at when switching.
We have all become very used to this style and just doing it another way.
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] [ Guests cannot view attachments ]

Rod.

[nkalanaga]

Mark:  Just out of curiosity, what is that on top of the CN caboose?