The B&O Delaware Avenue Branch

[Ed Kapuscinski]

By single truck electrics I assume you mean battery electrics? I haven’t seen any trolley wire in the provided photos unless I’m missing it,, but there almost needs to be otherwise there would be no way to charge batteries.

I would use either tank engines or new fangled oil electrics. .

Sorry, I was talking about in Baltimore instead of Philly.

This is one of the electrics I was talking about: https://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=401524&nseq=76

[TrainCat2]

Ed,

That electric is going to need a very long extension cord!   

Although I never did find a evidence of trolley poles, I did find that CPL's were on Delaware. This pic is just north of the B&O Perishable Terminal.

[sd45elect2000]

Sorry, I was talking about in Baltimore instead of Philly.

This is one of the electrics I was talking about: https://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=401524&nseq=76

That is certainly a trolley car. I can see the base but the pole itself is gone. The two hooks for the pole are visible as well.

[TrainCat2]

Randy, isn't that the pole on the right being held down by a rope or line ?

https://tinyurl.com/mr3wxedc

[sd45elect2000]

Randy, isn't that the pole on the right being held down by a rope or line ?

https://tinyurl.com/mr3wxedc

Yup, there it is hooked down. The rope was used to handle the pole without getting zapped. I didn't see it on the other photo maybe it's time to address those cataracts. It doesn't appear that this little motor had airbrakes. Certainly, there isn't a lot of room for a compressor. The lack of trainline hoses means it didn't have train brakes. I'd like to see it in person someday.

Randy

[TrainCat2]

Question for you Fast Track guru's.  Got my first order in yesterday and I went right to it. Made a dozen frogs, two dozen wing rails and tried to make a stock rail with the Stock Aid tool and something did not look right. After filing, I noticed that my C55 rail had only 1/2 of the rail base filed away. This was in direct contrast to the video that showed all of the rail base being filed for the point notch. The insert in the tool does say Small 40-55, but I wonder.

So all, after filing with your Stock Aid tool, is all or just half of the rail base filed away ??

[dem34]

Should be half, its only to make a notch for the point rail to sit flush against the stock rail while maintaining the rail profile on the other side.

[TrainCat2]

Perfect!! Now I can continue production tonight.

[TrainCat2]

So .... I was looking around on the ol'e Interweb and found this pic. Right across the street from the Philadelphia U.S. Army Supply Base at Pier 98, Bisbee Linseed Oil Co and the shipping area of Publicker Alcohol was the Delaware Ave Lumber Depot.



Whoa! A new customer to model. After some rethinking of the right rear module, I added a small loco shed and the Lumber Yard. Towards the bottom center of the module will be Penn Battery Reclaimers along with an Auto/Truck Repair. That should complete the rough design for the two rear modules.



The last mandatory module is the arrival/departure from the staging with the classification yard. The drill track is also the entrance to the branch to make the yard more compact nor require a double slip. Next to the yard ladder is the caboose track and a runaround for the loco to get to the servicing area. The final industries and their trackage are still a work in progress. Once this module design is done, I should be able to start construction after the new year.

[Cajonpassfan]

Back to the backdrop question....in context of designing a workable track plan with large structures.
Putting a large body of water on the backdrop can be very effective, but tricky. The water level/ horizon line needs to be as close to eye level as possible, otherwise perspective tends to play funny games. This tends to push the track base to be relatively high. If you haven't seen it, I would highly recommend John Petrovitz' layout videos illustrating his treatment of San Francisco Bay on his backdrop. It's a spectacular N scale layout with a lot of useful lessons. Just Google John Petrovitz N scale layout, couple of screen shots below.
Thought it may be helpful while playing with design of your layout, Bob.
Regards, Otto K.

[John]

Great point Randy, I can add a small one over on the rear right module. As for the staging, see below. I have not designed that area yet but it will have a service facility as well.



As far as operations, I am really a lone wolf. There is only one other person in my area that I could invite since he is into N as well as RC planes at the same club as I belong. I did get a hold of a B-Man 0-4-0T this morning (B&O #98) and we shall see what I will do with it. I also got an Atlas 0-4-0 Shifter, 2 DCC Ready MILW VO-1000's that will get stripped and repainted and I'm watching another B-Man DCC loco to see where the price ends up. I have "0" experience in loco rebuilding and conversion so I guess I'm gunna get a crash course on that too. Just hope you guys don't mind stupid newb questions.

I suggest you drop one of the piers .. the space between the two needs to be wider .. you need more space for maneuvering the ships ..

[TrainCat2]

Interesting John. The original thought behind the current design is that the ships and the piers hide the backdrop when viewing from a lower realistic standpoint during photography of scenes. The ships and piers are orientated at 45deg so that the piers will hide the rear of the ship that is not there. The ships hide each other and the fact that the end of the piers is not there. To Otto's point, if I show the river, then the water backdrop and the Camden shore must play a major role and their perspective can be tricky. Right now, the only place I will have to deal with it is behind the T2 tanker instead of the entire 11ft. Not defending anything and I do have an open mind to everyone's suggestions. I'm just pointing out my original thinking. I am toying with removing at least one ship and replacing it with tugs/barges tied up to the pier. Probably the leftmost slip so the river would not be seen.

I will have to find a good way to add the BF Bridge in on the far left. That will be a must.

[John]

boB -- Rule 1 applies .. it just looked crowded to me from the drawing

-- a typical liberty ship was

Length   441 ft 6 in (134.57 m)
Beam   56 ft 10.75 in (17.3 m)  (4.2 Inches or ~ 110mm )

I know if I was on the bridge, I would want at least enough room to get away from the pier 20 feet or more to maneuver out ..  ideally get a tug or two in there as well

The attached from Google Earth shows the present day piers are at least 240 feet apart ..

the SS United States pictured might be more typical of a larger freighter

Length   

    990 ft (302 m) (overall)
 Beam   101.5 ft (30.9 m) maximum






further north, around pier 68 the width is about 150'

[wm3798]

You can also trick the eye a little with some proportional scaling.  Since the piers are to the background, you could reduce the 240' perhaps to 200, and proportionally scale down the size of the ships.
You're building a theater set.  Take advantage of the viewing angle to create some illusions.

Lee

[TrainCat2]

The liberty ship plans I bought were in 1/175 scale. Was not aware of the difference until they arrived. But, I had originally drawn them in 1/160 so the liberty ships and the T2 tanker have now been redrawn to the smaller scale. That does place a couple of inches between the ships.



Just down Walnut was the Westinghouse facility and next door was a white lead works. Both are getting modelled.



The facility is in the upper left corner. I have not decided if I will compress it or not so the building outline shows single width and with an added section. Several business I have cataloged from the Philly Public Works photos make up the remaining buildings. The yard changed a little bit with the ability to reverse the direction of the switcher like I did on the other module. Bottom left I added a #6 curved switch to create a crossover for the loco to better access it's bypass of the ladder and caboose track. I threw myself a curve with a crossing where both tracks are curving. This would have been prototypical and I could always use another challenge. The engine house and coaling tower have not been drawn as I have not made a decision yet what to use.



Operations: (Yes Pete, I will be running trains!) My continued thought on this is that an operating session will last over several evenings after work (lone wolf here) with each evening some part of the switching process will take place. There is a lot going on here with no possible way of me getting bored with this. One evening will be the arrival of cars from the staging, loco servicing and the yard goat breaking the arrival and classify it for the different sections (areas) of the layout. Each subsequent evening will be the transfer of cars from the yard to the appropriate area and switching of those customers. Empties will be collected and pulled back to the yard where the next area will be processed the following session. I'm hoping to throw some wrinkles in where empties from one section will have to be set out for other customers in a different section. I will need to make use of the municipal storage yard for that. Two customers may get switched every session. The B&O Perishable Products Terminal and Publicker Alcohol. At it's heyday, Publicker was shipping 6000 cars a month.