How to Block And/Or Switch A Local

[mkearns]

So I'm getting more into operations as I'm helping a friend put the finishing touches on his large model railroad. We're using JMRI Operations Pro for now and have it generally working right: it has us dropping off and picking up the right car types and quantities on the switch list. But one area where I am struggling is with the locals.

I think that JMRI has a blocking feature but I'm not familiar with it and for the sake of discussion let's ignore it for now. What I do get is a switch list for cars to be picked up from the yard and delivered to industries with the local. I have the freedom to organize those cars as I see fit. I think it's obvious they should be blocked for the dropoffs. What's not obvious is how to arrange the blocks in the yard and how to manage the pickups out on the track.

Say I have industries A, B, and C in order down the length of track and to keep things simple, all trailing point switches. When I leave the yard should the cars for Industry A be at the head end or the tail end of the train?

When I make the pulls from the industry, are those always supposed to go on the tail end? Backing down the whole local each time to pick them up?

Lacking prototypical understanding, my blocks currently have no rhyme or reason, aside from what was easiest to make up in the yard. And when I'm out with the local, I usually end up with the empties mixed among the remaining loaded blocks until the whole job is done and all cars are empties. But as I look to learn more about JMRI and operations, would like to get better here.

Thanks.

[Philip H]

Have you read Lance Mindheim's book on this? https://www.amazon.com/How-Operate-Modern-Switching-Layout/dp/1467956996/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=071Q6SZNF6KVE1GTN4EY

[mkearns]

I have not. Does it matter that I'm running a "transition" era layout? Cabooses and such?

[MVW]

I have not. Does it matter that I'm running a "transition" era layout? Cabooses and such?

Great questions, and I'm also looking forward to some answers, particularly in regard to transition era.

So far, my approach has been to do what seems most practical. In some cases, that means the caboose directly behind the motive power, as I've noticed in a couple photos of my prototype from the era.

Jim

[lock4244]

Your crew will decide how things are switched, and I would say that, in terms of pre-blocking the train, worry about blocking cars for each industry together and leave the rest to the crew. With the prototype the crew working a local tends to be on it as a regular assignment, having bid for this or that job at card change, so they'll develop a pattern that works best for them. A different crew will work the same job a little differently. Some curve balls can be thrown in for variety such as a particular industry will not allow a locomotive to operate beyond a certain point in their plant, so switching there requires extra cars coupled in front of the power to 'reach' into the plant for their lift and/or setout. Otherwise, the crew will perform their work in any order they see fit.

I have a temporary unitrack setup on a portion of my completed benchwork to give myself a little something to operate as benchwork progresses through my layout room. I have a mainline (12x4 loop), a four track stub ended yard with runaround on one side of the loop. Opposite side there's a large industry that loads covered hoppers with some mineral (not bothering to decide what it is) on two long tracks and open hoppers with crushed stone (overburden removed for mining) on one long track. There's also a short siding where bagged product is loaded into boxcars. Rounding out trackage are two long tracks used for storage and a runaround track off the main. This plant gets switched by train 563. Additionally, there's a spur off the main with it's own industries switched by a different train.

Keeping things simple, each switch sees ten loaded covered hoppers lifted, ten empty set out on the two loading tracks, five loaded open hoppers out and five empty in, and two loaded boxcars out and two empty in. All switches are trailing point as the train arrives, and switching is fairly simple, however as the train needs to change ends to return to the yard and the passing track is about two cars too short for the outbound train, there's a little work in getting the power on the headend and the caboose on the tail. The train switching the plant is pre-blocked at the yard for each car type to minimize switching at the plant.

I generally pull up on the passing track and leave all cars except the hoppers for crushed stone there (sometimes these are on the headend, sometimes on the tail so there may be an extra move or two to get the hoppers behind the power), and start work by pulling the loaded stone cars and setting out on the main, then spotting the empties at the plant. I'll then pull the loaded covered hoppers and shove them onto the main, pull empty covered hoppers and boxcars out of the storage tracks and spot them on their respective sidings, working the boxcar loading track last, then grab the inbound empty covered hoppers and boxcars and shove into the storage tracks. The with these moves completed, the caboose is now coupled directly to the power and two loaded boxcar tied to the caboose. This leaves 15 cars on the main filling the track between the passing track switches, and two boxcars and the caboose with the power. I'll now run around the cars on the main and shove them up a spur off the main, leave the caboose and boxcars on the main and run the power around those an shove them clear of the spur switch, pull the cars off the spur, shove onto the tail end, and head back to the yard where I must run around the inbound train in two sections and shove everything into the yard.

The earlier mentioned spur exits the main between the passing track switches and is facing point for a train arriving from the yard. This spur occupies an L-shaped portion of benchwork and is 5'x2' and 8'x14", and is used by 563 as part of it's runaround move to return to the yard. All sidings on the spur are facing point and requires the local to run around the train before starting their work. There are five shippers; a plant making cartons out of pulp - think egg cartons, and a plastic injection molding customer on the 5x2, and a paper warehouse, lumber yard, and a plastic pipe mfg along the 8'x14". Each customer has only a single siding. All product is inbound, with all outbound cars being empty. This is train 567.

To switch the spur, once the runaround is complete (train fits the passing track so only one runaround move required), the caboose is now coupled to the front of the power where it will stay, and I'll separate the cars going to the two sidings on the near end of the spur (5x2) and leave them on the plastic pellet siding (it's pretty long), shoving the remaining cars to the 8'x14" leg and switch out those three sidings in whatever order suits me. Returning to the 5x2, I keep the caboose with the power and leave the cars from the 8'x14" on the spur. I then switch the two remaining customers, and reassemble all outbound cars on the spur. Leaving the outbound cars there, I run the caboose out to the main and shove clear of the spur switch, then grab the outbound cars and pull them off the spur, shove onto the caboose, and return to the yard where I run around the train and shove into a yard track.

I vary the order I switch as my mood dictates, and sometimes will run an 'extra' switch that only works a portion of the large industry or only one or two of the customers on the spur. Example, I may choose to run 563 without inbound empty covered hoppers, and when 563's work is done there are no empty covered hoppers in the storage tracks. I'll then run an extra 563 with only empty cars for the storage. Or I may run a 567 that will, before working the spur, sets out empty covered hoppers into the storage. I may also run a very long 563 with double the empty covered hoppers. I have run some 567's with cars for only one or two industries, which may or may not grab empties off other sidings as well, which will make a following 567's work a little different than the norm.

Of course, the first few times I ran these trains I had no plan and just winged it, eventually coming up with a fairly consistent plan than worked. To me, pre-blocking the local and leaving the order the work is completed up to the crew is probably closest to both reality and how they'll wind up doing it during an operating session.

[Dave V]

Following!

@Ed Kapuscinski have been discussing if this type of operations is a good fit for my RGS First District. Pretty much any train that wasn't a stock extra (or a Galloping Goose) operated like a local.

I'd love to see how you flesh this out.

[Maletrain]

i think the best way to figure out how to block a particular train is to run the train and see where you have trouble, then figure out how to block the cars so as to minimize trouble, or minimize number of moves.  There may be some limiting conditions such as run-around lengths, switches facing in different directions, etc. that make order of cars and order of doing moves work out best in a particular sequence.  But, it is going to be very dependent on the track configuration.

One thing that you may or may not decide to try to "model" is the idea of limiting how far a brakeman needs to walk to do a certain move.  I don't think about that in my model switching, so maybe somebody else can address that.

I am working on a couple of switching runs to use as demonstrations for our club open house events.  I want people to see that you  can do ops with N scale.

One is simple, a switcher with a 9 loaded hoppers and a caboose comes to the industrial area and runs around the train, then shoves the train into a siding, comes out and goes into an industry and grabs 9 empty hoppers, pulling them out and then backing them onto the caboose end of the train in the siding. It then pulls all 18 hoppers and the caboose out and shoves the loaded hoppers into the plant where it picked up the empties, uncouples the loaded cars from the caboose, so that the caboose is now the rear end of the train, and the train heads back to the yard the way it came from.  Besides being simple, it is somewhat impressive to see the little Atlas Alco S-4 pulling 19 cars at once.

The other job is more complicated, and involves 2 locations.  The first location involves swapping 4 cars using a trailing point lead to the industrial area, but one facing point pickup inside the area.  There is a runaround inside the area, but only the loco fits on it, so the car to be picked up and its replacement need to be placed from one end and then run around to be able to reach that one industry.  The runaround is through another place a car must be spotted at another industry, so that has to be pulled first and spotted last for this part of the job. 

But, that is just the start.  At the next switching location, there is one car that needs to be at the head of the train to deal with the one switch that is trailing for the arrival direction.  So, the cars picked up at the first switching location need to be inserted behind that one car before heading to the second switching location. 

Once there, this first car is swapped with the empty in the appropriate industry, and that empty is then added to the string of empties picked up at the first location.  Then, the loco runs around the whole train, grabs the caboose and puts it on another siding.  The rest of the pickups can then be pulled from the rest of the industries and added to the caboose.  Then the loaded cars from the arriving train are distributed to the appropriate industries, leaving only the empties pickup up from the first switching location sitting on the arrival track, plus that first empty from the second location.  Those empties are then pulled and run to the string of empties from the second location that that have been tacked onto the caboose, so the train of empties is now complete, with the caboose on the rear and the train is ready to return from whence it came.  This demo is intended to show a complicated switching job done with forethought.  It uses a Bachman GP-7 and 4 cars for the first location plus 7 cars for the second location.  The number of cars is limited by the length of the runaround at the second location.

If the cars were not blocked in a manner to facilitate this complex job, it could quickly become a nightmare trying to sort things on-the-road where there really aren't enough sidings and spaces to make it easy.  Thinking through and planning ahead are the keys to being efficient in time and moves.

[nkalanaga]

If possible, try to find a place to leave the caboose, rather than moving it with every switching move.  The conductor will thank you!

[wm3798]

Following!

@Ed Kapuscinski have been discussing if this type of operations is a good fit for my RGS First District. Pretty much any train that wasn't a stock extra (or a Galloping Goose) operated like a local.

I'd love to see how you flesh this out.

Be careful with that one... @Ed Kapuscinski likes to run a yard to keep trains moving through.  What happens once they leave the yard isn't any of his concern!  His usual advice to dispatch is "Fu%k 'em!!

Lee

[mkearns]

I appreciate the detailed responses thus far. Good food for thought. I had never even considered the idea of a double run around!

However, we may have ventured a little into the weeds. I suppose my question was pretty vague, but I was doing my wondering at a pretty macro level for a switching scenario.

Given a sequence of trailing point switches, no other “gotchas”, would it be usual to work the set outs from the head end or the tail end of the train? In the yard do I  try to block the setouts Power-A-B-C-Caboose or Power-C-B-A-Caboose? Either technically works but what would a real railroader do?

When I pick up empties, can they go anywhere in a short local or would real railroaders always keep them in the back? I’m aware of string lining, but didn’t know if that comes into play with a dozen cars on a local.

My references and period materials provide only photos and glimpses of what’s going on without understanding the bigger picture. Thanks again.

[Maletrain]

I THINK real railroaders would try to minimize the number of coupiings and uncouplings to save time and steps for the brakeman.

But that can get you into pushing a long string of cars, which can be an issue on a MODEL railroad.

I try to work out a procedure that minimized derailing model cars.  So, shoving a long string down a straight track or through one switch isn't a concern, but pushing a long string of cars with mixed lengths through double S curves can get me into a lot of unprototypical 5-finger rerailng.  So, I learn to push only short strings where the trackwork is an issue.

[lock4244]

I appreciate the detailed responses thus far. Good food for thought. I had never even considered the idea of a double run around!

However, we may have ventured a little into the weeds. I suppose my question was pretty vague, but I was doing my wondering at a pretty macro level for a switching scenario.

Given a sequence of trailing point switches, no other “gotchas”, would it be usual to work the set outs from the head end or the tail end of the train? In the yard do I  try to block the setouts Power-A-B-C-Caboose or Power-C-B-A-Caboose? Either technically works but what would a real railroader do?

When I pick up empties, can they go anywhere in a short local or would real railroaders always keep them in the back? I’m aware of string lining, but didn’t know if that comes into play with a dozen cars on a local.

My references and period materials provide only photos and glimpses of what’s going on without understanding the bigger picture. Thanks again.

I'd say that so long as the cars are blocked per industry, it really doesn't matter what order they're in to the crew doing the switching. A block is a block, more or less, but if they have to arrange the cars before they can ever start their day the yardmaster may start catching grief. All things being equal, you may not be able to arrange ABC or CBA if there are particular marshaling rules that need be followed (no hazardous cars coupled to occupied equipment, no empty flats coupled to the power, etc).

Individual block placement may be more of a concern on a road freight to make setting out blocks a little easier, but on a local you may be overthinking this. That said, there's nothing stopping you from arranging in an order that makes more sense, but, like so many other things, any plan you come up with may be quickly discarded once it hits the real world.

[lock4244]

...but what would a real railroader do?

Complain no matter what you do 

[mkearns]

Individual block placement may be more of a concern on a road freight to make setting out blocks a little easier, but on a local you may be overthinking this.

I may certainly be guilty of overthinking. But if you’re willing to keep playing ball, how would it matter more, or what might I do better in this scenario for a road freight? Using same example, swap Industry A, B, C for a series of yards, interchanges or what have you along a route with set offs and pickups. Would it matter more now to work from the head end or tail end? All empties in the back?

[lock4244]

I may certainly be guilty of overthinking. But if you’re willing to keep playing ball, how would it matter more, or what might I do better in this scenario for a road freight? Using same example, swap Industry A, B, C for a series of yards, interchanges or what have you along a route with set offs and pickups. Would it matter more now to work from the head end or tail end? All empties in the back?

If a road freight is dropping a block at an intermediate yard it may be better to marshal it at the headend of facilitate an easier set out, i.e. only handling cars being set out as opposed to the block being mid train. Conversely, particularly in cabooseless days, a tailend set out works better for a quick in and out, having the train pull through the yard and dropping the tail and having a car knocker on an atv or in a pick up drive the FRED upto the new tailend, attach and off they go. CN would do this sometimes at their yard supporting the big GM plant in Oshawa, Ontario.

You'd think putting loads up front and empties at the rear would be a natural marshalling plan. However, the reality is that a block will contain a mix of loads and empties unless there are specific rules on a particular RR requiring specific placement on a train. I know the SOO Line had a rule that empty 89' flats were to be placed on the rear of a train or not in front of loads after a derailment where empty 89' flats buckled when near the headend in front of loads during an emergency brake application. There's rules for cars carrying hazardous materials as well. In the 1950's and earlier there would've been a preference to place stockcars and cars carrying fleshings as far as possible from occupied equipment (for obvious reasons).

In the end, I feel it's best to actually operate the local and see what actually works, then use that info in jmri. Start with ABC, then CBA, then BAC and so on.