26x17 Hi-Rail Layout - VIDEO UPDATE #5 May 2014

3rd day of bench work. Pretty much have the bottom level down. You can see the walk in aisle as you enter the room. You can also see where the 34" TT will go, although it will be up on the 2nd level.

Used an LED strip mounted under the top of the case for lighting, its not really that yellow/green color as shown, thats from the flash. We used a 3100k color temp so its a little brighter white, rather than a warm yellow light. We got a dimmer switch as well so we can turn down the birghtness when needed. I personally think we need an LED strip under the other 2 shelves for even look. 

Took down the dining light and living room light/ceiling fan and put up the track lighting. It's 2 seperate circuits, left side and right side of the room. Dimmer switches will also be installed. The light bulbs up there now are just a hodge podge of bulbs we had laying around and a few we bought to experiment with. We pretty much know what we're gonna use, just not excited about spending $18 per bulb when we need a minimum of 24, possibly 36. 

Masonite going up for the Backdrop Warehouse scenes already on hand.

Right side displaycase before the LED strip was installed. Its 8' long, 24' feet of storage.

The left side display case is 12' long for 36' of storage.

Left wall is ready for the backdrop to be installed. A little nervous to hang these suckers due to their cost. Can't afford to make a mistake!

Both display cases are installed (and filled up now)with LED strips and dimmer controls. The backdrop went up on the left side with some lighting adjustments and a little tweeking still needed.

After some great advice from Patrick (Glassblock) and Rich (Rich883) the backdrops are up and look very good. It wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be. We used 2 way carpet tape across the top and the ends, then used regular 2 way tape from 3M to join the seams. The bottom just hangs freely. Wrapping it around the curve in the back corner wasn't too bad either.

I THINK it's finally time to start laying some track. whew  

We got the 1st level of track in, wired up and testing it now. A lot of it will be hidden below the middle and upper levels. The BigBoy and 21" passenger car run fine in both directions, through the turnouts, and across both reverse loops without a hitch. Gonna test for voltage drops and current draw with a few different full lenght trains. The control area is under construction and wired in a temporary manner for testing. Tomorrow we'll most likely install and test the 5 Tortoise switch machines for this loop. Have to make sure everything works flawlessly before losing our easy access to all the track and switches.

Laidoffsick, You are making good progress. Keep up the good work.

Now that the lower loop has been installed and extensively tested, it's time to move on up. Main (middle) level construction began. Full sheets of plywood going in on the east side for TT and RH placement since everything else will evolve around those 2 items. Access hole will be determined and cutout later once we have track positioned.

Very impressive.  Your layout inspires me to do more on my layout!

Wow looking very nice. Awesome craftsmanship

Thanks, Alex

Layout is looking good

tortoises --excellent choice-looking good

This is a personal question...

How in the world did you get people to agree to take away a living room and dining room and build a terrific layout in its place?

We just asked! The rooms didn't really get used anyway, except for the holidays. There comes that time in life when you have to say, it's now or never. Get the trains out of the box, off the floor, and build the layout you always wanted to. 

Laidoffsick you are totally right, I waited 6 years for my family to use our basement and 

they almost never went down there, so then I told all of them it's time for me to build my

empire, and they all agreed . Life is short so we all must enjoy.

Enough of that, your layout is progressing just beautiful, your bench work and track work is superb love the background. Thanks for a great video I enjoyed it. These are the threads I love to see on the forum. 

Thanks again, Alex

Nice work. I really admire the structural engineering that goes into big layouts. I just don't have the "vision" to do that, but it definitely is the right way to do it.

I'm curious...do you guys have a budget?

Well technically no.... BUT......there's always the question from my wife or Mom....well how much is that gonna cost?..... why do you need that? $$$ is just a number anyway! :-)

Outstanding layout work and results. Using Tortoise is an excellent decision---I supply 17 on Ross/Curtis turnouts from a 12 VDC[fixed voltage] wall wart and have my old HO DC Power Paks if back up is needed. 

I found a wall wart laying around in the electronics junk drawer in the garage. It puts out 12 vdc with a max load of 1 amp.... plenty of power to control 30 switch machines, considering we'll only throw 1 or 2 at a time anyway.

Ok I have a question. Are there          any more videos of the start to finish wireing videos?  I am starting to build my layout soon and would live to watch them

Part II... about 8 mins cuz I couldn't get it squeezed in the 1st part.

The layout's terrific, and built like a deck. 

On another thought in looking at the Lionel Post-war F3s... Since I grew up with that engine and owned a 2343 set, I was convinced that this was an F3. Lionel's height is too short and this is best seen by the "squinty" front windows. But, for most of my life, that's the way they were supposed to look. When I made drawings of F3s as a kid, it always had the Lionel look. Now I have the latest scale Lionel F3 ABBA and the MTH N-S restoration with the real height windows. While they're beautiful and real, they just don't look right to me.

Well they are toy trains designed and made in the 40's and 50's. I guess thats why they have scale sized versions now. I own the scale version F3's and F7's in the Santa Fe Warbonnets..... BUT nothing says Classic Lionel Trains better than a set of Post War F units of any road name.... scale size or not  

The F3s were the singular reason why I loved Lionel and eschewed American Flyer. I didn't realize that the Alco PAs that AF featured were just as "real" trains as the F3s. I was a 6 year-old kid at the time.

Before I had my trains, my next door neighbor had 2 girls. Their uncle gave them two sets of Lionel trains that their father set up under the Christmas tree. We were Jewish so didn't have a tree of our own.

"What two sets did they get?" you ask. None other than the Santa Fe (with a B unit) and the aluminum passenger cars, and the Berkshire with a freight with operating cars. In other words, those girls got the two best sets in the 1953 Lionel catalog. And they were GIRLS for crying out loud!

Every Christmas morning I would make my way over to Joanne's house to play with those fabulous trains. As the years went by I added to my trains and eventually got my own Santa Fe 2343 that I bought new in 1958 even though it was 5 years old at the time. I didn't get those passenger cars until I added my own new Lionel super-detailed passenger cars five years ago. I get what I want, it just takes me a long time.

Looking good!!      

The Backdrop Warehouse panels look great. You're only the second person I've heard of to actually successfully order from them. I tried in vain to order their backdrops for my train room. Apparently I'm lacking the cranial capacity to figure out their website and the person I spoke to on the phone was annoyed that I was asking for assistance in placing an order (BTW he hung up on me without taking my order).

I had the dimensions (18" high x 50' long) and scene numbers, but couldn't find pricing or how to place an order. While I was poking around trying to find an order page, I lost my place and never could get back to the scenes I wanted to buy. I'm impressed, my hat's off to you.

Awesome layout. As others have said, the living/dining rooms, are you kidding? My Mother would have shot me for just asking.

Gilly

..." I'm lacking the cranial capacity to figure out their website"...

No, you're not the only one who can't figure out their website! It's a Chinese fire drill.

It took a bit of time to figure out the BackDrop Wharehouse website, but once we did, it s quite nice to see your options placed together on a smaple layout. Then after that, we just had to pick the sizes. They are somewhat tough to get a hold of by phone..... and we'll just say.... a bit lacking in the customer service skills  

I thought you guys were exaggerating.  Then I went to Backdrop Warehouse web site.  It is the worst I have ever seen.  Clearly this was not done by anybody working for Apple.

It's more than the website that is bad. When you hang up on a guy WANTING to spend a couple of $K something is flat wrong. I was told "if you're too stupid to figure out my website, then I don't need your business". Then he hung up.

Great layout! Thanks for taking the time to make and post the videos. Outstanding!!! Can't wait to see this one progress.

Your work looks excellent.Can't wait to see the completed result.

My layout measures about the same size as yours being 28' x 16'. The objective was to use all 072 curves but after being 75% complete it became obvious that this was not possible. In some spots even 031 curves had to be used but I tried to limit them to half curves. If you have to resort to tighter curves I believe that the layout will still look good.

Some recent progress. Roundhouse footprint and turntable waiting patiently to be put in their permanent home. Need to get the homasote painted, and some of the track laid behind the RH to determine clearances.

Got all the new CFL bulbs in. What a difference in many aspects. Energy, heat, brightness and color changed from the incandescents and/or Halogens.

Found the other 2 bricks at Mercer Junction. Thanks again Dave!

No more yellow toned bulbs. The Halogens were so hot, we couldn't turn the lights on to work in there. With temps 100 plus outside, the AC didn't help much inside with all those Halogen watts. No longer an issue with CFL's, and they're dimmable, so we can turn them down from full power. 

Just when you think you have a lot of space, put in a TT and RH.... poof! There weren't all that space! That's an 8' x 8' area that will be totally consumed when finished, and the diesel service area will be put in just to the front of that where the open space is currently. 

Nice progress on the layout. I can hardly wait to see your engine servicing area once everything is installed.

Finally... after a couple months of this massive TT sitting around, it finally found its permanent home. It leaves room for 17" from the pit wall to the front of the RH.

Great job, now all you need to do is get the roundhouse built

Well Dennis said I was in the next batch of RH shipping after he returned from York so I'm guessing it should be really soon now.

We wired up the TT this afternoon using the ERR DC Commander, tied into the AC track power, programmed the ID #, set it for 100 speed steps and .......man this thing will move so slow at 100 speed steps, you can't even tell if it's moving or not. Very smooth... using the Legacy Cab 2 controller, 1 notch in the dial will get it crawling.