Alaskan Interior Railway: Tok Branchline

[AKNscale]

Had some time today after work and after dropping the wife off at the airport. I helped my friend set his lighting on his truck then back to the layout!

First I finished the yard lead:


Then I did the interchange track and started the yard:


Finally I moved to the industrial sidings:

This photo is of the power plant siding. The storage track is done, but I held off on the drop track because I'd like to model a coal dump pit and haven't figured out how I'm going to do it yet(I need to do a little research)


This is of the siding and team track.


I'm very excited with my progress tonight and hope to have the yard done by tomorrow!

[chuck geiger]

You have to model Fast Eddies.

[LIRR]

Re:  ...trying to drill switch rod holes through 2" foam ...
push an awl thru the foam. then open the hole by pushing a long Philips screwdriver thru it. I have one of these and its' about 1/4 diameter...

[AKNscale]

I can look into that Chuck, I should have enough space in the background.

I'll have to try that LIRR. Right now I've been marking the spot with a toothpick, pushing the drillbit through the foam, then drilling out the hole by hand.

[AKNscale]

Today's update for now:

The yard is almost complete, I just need to decide how long the track 3 extension needs to be, then lay the roadbed and track.


I finally remembered to take a good pic of my power drops for you guys, this is how I'm hiding them.


This is how they're wired up. There will be bridging wires connecting everything on the right side of the block.

[AKNscale]

So today I got a little done, not much, but a little.

I staged and set up the coal pit for Tok's power plant.


I also, a few days ago, stopped by our LHS and got these...

I decided I might want to add a tunnel to help with scene separation and for practice for the big layout. I'm trying to decide whether I want to go with wood, stone, or both.

[AKNscale]

Finally got to working on the layout again today. After leaving work early I was very motivated!

On Friday I decided that it was time to clean up the hobby room, including putting away all projects not currently being worked on, and finally cleaning up and organizing my work desk. So now I can work on stuff at my desk. Thanks to this, I was able to concentrate solely on the layout without having to try and find stuff in order to work on things.

The first thing I did was tackle excavating the spot for the power plant coal dump:

I won't be able to finish it until after I assemble the dump, paint it, and then paint the track.

And then I decided I'd attack the trackwork. It is 99% done now. The only thing left to finish it is the power plant drop off track! After basically completing the trackwork I set the layout up for an ops session test run tomorrow. Here's the "tour:"

Here's the interchange track(on the left), the Tok Branch Yard(middle), and the so far un named coal mine(right). The main things that have changed on here since the previous postings is yard track #3 was shortened and put back to being straight as the extra length with the curve really wouldn't benefit ops enough to justify it. And, if you look to the left of the layout, on the black table, you'll see the two remotes, the power supply, and the brain box. On Sunday I decided to set up my new system. It's the ESU Cab Control. I've played with it a little bit, and so far I like it.


This is the loco area. Up top is the coal mine lead, then the engine house track(middle), and finally the outdoor parking track(bottom).


Now to the other side:

Here's the power plant's area:


And finally here's the team track with the freight terminal occupying the single track in the middle and the oil and gas dealer occupying the two tracks on the right. The upper track is the oil drop off and the lower track will be the propane drop off, when I finally get my hands on some propane cars.


That was it for tonight, hopefully I can get back at it tomorrow!

[AKNscale]

Ok, since the wife is out of town, hopefully I'll be updating daily for a bit. Today I didn't do a whole lot that's report worthy. I started planning how I'm going to fit a 9X16MM speaker with a chamber into my S-2s(I'm sure I'll find a way). I also reprogrammed the S-2 that's operating on my layout now(I "upgraded" the file and set all the settings as I want them, since I don't like the way Atlas set them up.)

The main thing I did on the layout was finish tying in the power drops for the yard/sidings:
This block covers the yard and the coal mine.


This block covers the engine "facility," coal mine lead, and the power plant.


Tomorrow I'll hopefully get more done with the layout. I plan on laying out the building silhouettes then possibly moving in to painting the track, we'll see!

[AKNscale]

Between last night and today, not too much has been going on. Mainly I've been planning the layout of the buildings.

Here's the mine. I haven't quite decided how I feel about the truck loader, but, being that this is supposed to be pretty secluded, I'll probably drop it:



This is the engine house:



And on the other side of the layout, here's the power plant. I still need to finish the dump bay:



This is the warehouse:



And the final stop on the mock up layout tour is going to be the Oil and Gas Distributor. It will be a kitbash between these two kits:

I was originally only going to put the oil company in but a friend of mine recommended adding gas too. It was an excellent suggestion! Here's the mock up:

The lower track will be for propane unloading, the upper for oil and fuel. Essentially everything from the oil company kit will be there. From the gas company kit, this will have the unload rack, pump house, distro house, and 1 tank.

[Chris333]

Love it when a plan comes together 

[AKNscale]

@Chris333 : I completely agree!

A little has been done today. I finally finished building the coal dump for the power plant:



Then completed the excavation and staged the install:


After that I mocked up the track and ran an ops session:


After the ops session I set the cars and buildings for the fuel, oil, and gas industry to a more realistic(I think) staging. Hopefully this will be the last revision until the buildings are complete:

[AKNscale]

Last bit for the night. I decided to start working on some buildings just because. The buildings can still be disassembled enough for painting when that time comes.


Now I just have the fuel point and office to assemble. I'd also like to find some much better scaled scaffolding, ladders, and stairways as the propane tank walkways are way too thick for my liking.

[AKNscale]

Progress has been slow as of late. Tonight I did a little paint work and added a new rolling stock addition to the layout.



Here's one of the cars with wheels complete:


The new addition, an Atlas propane car. I body mounted the couplers, put on MTL trucks, then installed painted FVM 33s:

[Chris333]

I stick a whole pack of metal wheels down on a 1x2 with masking tape sticky side up. Them mix up the color for the air brush and shoot the whole pack of wheel at once. If you keep the air brush square with the wheel face you can keep the treads clean.

[AKNscale]

Good to know, I'll remember this for when I get my booth, thank you