Gibbon, Cozad & Western - "The 100th Meridian Line"

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Ditch the branch.

[C855B]

That's where I'm headed at the moment. Another LDE I wanted on that peninsula was US30, pretty much running the entire length between Sinclair and Gibbon between the tracks and the background. Possible only without the nolix.

An alternative that popped into my head was moving the nolix. Going back to the plan:



The peninsula on the left (yellow) represents Meadow Valley Wash, a climb from the flats around Las Vegas into the High Desert of southern Utah. What I could do is start a 1% grade up at Moapa (near the top), then the left split at Lynndyl would continue up at 2% to the upper deck, while the right leg of the junction descends at 1% into Grant Tower. In the 1:1 both legs end-up at Grant. Also, eliminating the bottom lobe at Egbert would allow adding 2-3' to the yellow peninsula, further mitigating the grades. Several advantages to this - the second level could extend down the entire east wall if I so wished, moving the nolix to mountainous terrain makes more sense relative to reality, and I don't have to commit any time soon since the Meadow Valley peninsula is a year off or more.

Sounds like a plan to me!

EDIT: Even better yet, 100' steep rises make complete sense in this section of the RR. Lots of photo documentation of this on our trip there last spring.

[GaryHinshaw]

That sounds like a good plan.  Does Egbert go away completely in that case?  What about the second (left) wye at Grant Jn?  Is that a signature LDE?

[C855B]

Yeah, the Egbert lobe is shortened and there is no room for the wye. Illustration pending, I'm still touching-up the AnyRail plan and will post it once it looks right. Non-urgent head-scratching about filling the resulting corner space with something since that will be the first thing you see when walking into the room.

The left wye at Grant Tower was a minor LDE representing the former WP and/or D&RGW connection into SLC, but the reality for the layout was trouble in resolving conflicting grade changes on the descent from the yet-unnamed mine tracks to the right of Moapa (over the hill from that scene). So using that branch out of Lynndyl for the rise to the second level solved several design headaches.

[C855B]

Here's the revised plan:



The only thing not as discussed was stretching the peninsula. I figure two feet, not decided where it goes yet.

Random scratchings for the upper deck:



Primary element for the upper is going to be that wye for the up & back. The rest is whatever suits my fancy at the moment, essentially a switching layout to toy with.

Other developments:



All (or most of) that clutter in the middle of the layout room is going here. Figure done by next week barring weather interfering with pouring the driveway.

[C855B]

Train show today, and my friend in the club working on the 3D-printed Kelso station brought these for my review:



Photo doesn't do it justice... just incredible on the Spanish tile detail. They look and feel just like any injection-molded Walthers structure kit pieces. He just upgraded his (filament) printer setup and is in the process of tuning it to do the main building and the colonnade. I told him to take his time, the section of the layout needing the station is a year away.

The show was a break from a busy week. The final leg of Phase 0 is (frustratingly!) close to done. All turnouts are in and ready for electronics, the roadbed for the grain elevator is down, and two out of three tracks are finished to Gibbon. Technically, the way things are setup I could finish one loop of the east dogbone and run trains on the full circuit without backing anything up. However, I now have too many trains on the layout which I stored on the mains when they were stub-ended. So it's either finish the triple-track and both loops on the dogbone for places to stage things, or start taking rolling stock off the rails. I'm going for the former, if only to force my hand on finishing the wiring for the two complex junctions (nine turnouts each), near Sinclair, and Gibbon. I figure about two weeks away.

Went sort of crazy in a planned Walthers structures purchase at the train show today. Two refinery kits to start the build-up at Sinclair, a second ADM grain elevator to double the kit for Cozad, and a roundhouse extension kit. Even though the roundhouse at Cheyenne is at least four or five years away in the plan, we know how Walthers is with kit availability, so the on-hand bits, a turntable, base roundhouse, new extension and two more to be acquired soon will be squirreled-away for that time.

Speaking of structures, the new building (heretofore a/k/a "the barn") was finished right on schedule, still lacking final concrete for the driveway as predicted. This is at least two weeks away since the ground cannot be frozen, and the polar vortex nonsense has put a real kink there. We were lucky on pouring the main slab just in time. Lack of driveway doesn't prevent relocating detritus from the layout room, so the first of it was moved last night. I will have to pause the layout action to dig a trench and run power to the barn relatively soon since a couple of battery-powered tools such as the scissor lift shouldn't be left without a tending charger, and the main door should really have a power opener.

[Specter3]

Now thats some progress!

[Tom L]

I drive by the elevator at Cozad a couple of times a year for the past 20 years or so, always thought it would be a perfect scene to model. Looking forward to seeing it develop. I was scheduled to go by it in the Morning on my way to Rockford Illinois, but I cancelled the trip due to the snow and -25 or more (less?) temps out that way over the next several days.

Tom L
Wellington CO

[C855B]

I drive by the elevator at Cozad a couple of times a year for the past 20 years or so, always thought it would be a perfect scene to model. Looking forward to seeing it develop. I was scheduled to go by it in the Morning on my way to Rockford Illinois, but I cancelled the trip due to the snow and -25 or more (less?) temps out that way over the next several days.

I'll do my best, modeling compression notwithstanding, and then there's "interpretation". Thank goodness my target is 1970, so at least I don't have to hassle with portraying the overpass. The brick-and-stucco station is going to be a challenge, so that's a long way down the pike and may result in a couple of trips there for measurements for a 3D-printed model.

"100th Meridian" sign is a must-do, however. Don't know if it was there or looked like that in '70, but it will be on my railroad.

EDIT: The sign over US30 has been there in some form for a long while. Here's an image from UNebr's archive, appears to be the '30's:

[C855B]

Much progress the past several days, including a sort-of-silver-spike at Gibbon Jct.:



All three lines are intact between the two major junctions on the east side of the layout, and one of the two dogbone loops south of Gibbon is operable, although it is a single reversing loop where the turnout has to be thrown to point the train back from whence it came. Technically, for the first time I can run a train over the entire Phase 0 layout, but things are so clogged on the west side of the layout I have to move a bunch of trains around (...awwwwww...) to clear things enough for uninterrupted running. That will have to wait until most of the junction control wiring is finished for the east side to make it possible to move trains to the middle or west track for staging.

I figure on the full double-track dogbone completed tomorrow or Monday. Wiring is on minor hold for a new detection board from Tam Valley to use at Gibbon. It moves board orientations on my "standard" double crossover controller design, but if it works it will reduce the spaghetti issues with the current wiring plan and I will revisit the other wiring panels.

Still waiting for the weather to clear up enough for the contractor to pour the barn driveway. He's thinking this coming week, but I'm not so sure given the forecast is such that he will be pushing around mud with his skid steer rather than finding anything firm enough to pour. We'll see.

[GaryHinshaw]

Congrats!! Managing that will be fun for the dispatcher.  

It makes Kern Junction look like child's play.

[C855B]

Thanks! Yeah, it'll be fun. Bear in mind the similar triple-to-double junction at the other end of the triple-track. When Phase 1 kicks-in that junction will have more of a DS puzzle since there will be real diverging traffic to manage in and out. Until Phase 5 (Cheyenne) is executed Gibbon will be simple loop traffic.

[...pause while he watches a CN stack train out the virtual window. That's the fourth train on CN in 25 minutes. ... Oooo! A mid-train DPU! ... CN DS has his hands full, and there's got to be at least one NS train stewing in their juices waiting for the junction to clear. Anyway...]

In poking around on Google satellite shots, my "Gibbon" is very close in configuration to UP's 1:1 at Ofallons, NE - triple to two diverging doubles. Crossover city, for sure.

[Cajonpassfan]

Too many turnouts😁
Otto

[C855B]

First train circumnavigated the full layout this evening. Once a couple of minor track bugs were squashed, four laps at ~8.5 minutes per, at 53 smph.

The superintendent has temporarily suspended Rule G for a celebratory beer. Then back to work.

[C855B]

I looked at this photo again and just realized the inadvertent capture of the essence of UP's triple track across Nebraska - no matter what train is passing you, there's another headlight on the horizon. Look closely and you'll see a headlight on a waiting train, to the right of the ore train's caboose.

Another bit of minor news with layout progress, in anticipation of enough done to truly run trains, I managed to snag a Digitrax DCS240. They were getting difficult to find since the damage at Digitrax' from Hurricane Irma. The plan is this is enough processing power to run trains on the fully-fleshed layout years from now. I wasn't having any difficulties to speak of with the old Zephyr "test" control station plus a couple of Tam Valley boosters, but control has been more responsive with the new box.