New Layout Design

Excellent work Joe, I will go back and review the last few pages as I enjoy your thorough detailing of your work. Great layout. Happy Railroading Everyone

Just learned something new.
Guess I was never paying attention but one day I realized my 'Legacy' CAB 2 remote kept coming on showing 'CAB 1' I could find no way to change it to CAB 2 so was thinking I was limited in my available functions. Lionel tech support came to the rescue. The CAB 2 always defaults to CAB 1 on turn-on. If there is a Legacy loco programmed into the remote it will show the Legacy menu. However the remote is not a 'Legacy' device with TMCC capability but a TMCC device with Legacy capability.

Because of below I took the last two weeks off from the diesel shed build but will get back to it next Saturday.

I was running locomotives around the layout to double check power and ground. From a way earlier post I had talked about a half John Allen 'timesaver' track game I installed on the edge of the layout. The intentions were noble however with the number of turnouts and short track I came to the conclusion while running my bigger locomotives that the track game would work however the rest of the time I could not really do much with that section. Because of the position of the three double turnouts I had little room to maneuver the larger loco without having one truck on the point rails in some cases. I decided to modify the track design by deleting one double turnout. Technically the design is no longer a 'timesaver' but I have gained an spur for an engine shed plus a caboose track.

The old design is shown below. The crane is on the left side of the track design. It was impossible to maneuver the steam loco to the track where the cabooses are. Plus the loco's tender was sitting on top of point rails. I deleted the double turnout between the tracks with the cabooses and the steam loco, moved the double turnout from the lead track and the track  with with the loco further down the lead track.

The new design is shown below. The crane is now on the track closest to the lead track. The spur on the left side will have the engine house. I hope to fit the coal tower and a sand house on that spur. If I can then the track in the middle will have hoppers delivering coal to the tower. The other end of the track will be where the ash dumps into a gondola. The caboose track is where the UP caboose resides. A locomotive will be backed into the engine house track for 'maintenance'. A switcher loco will make up consists  on the yard track and pull them out on the lead track. It will then disconnect and move on the crane track. Another switcher will then push the consist out of the yard lead track to the main line where the steam locomotive will be re-positioned and waiting. Switcher 2 will then go back to the yard and switcher 1 will grab a caboose and attach it to the end of the consist.

An RR-Track design is shown below. Some diesels will be stored on the blue yard track at the bottom. If I want to use them for a consist I will roll one out to the main track first then repeat the building of the consist mentioned above. The shorted blue track on the lower right will hold the switch engines.

That is good you got to try out the old design and identify its shortcomings, make changes, and find a better way.  Too often we get too much built before realizing it doesn’t work so well.

Spent Saturday working on the diesel shed and most of Sunday completing the wiring of the turnouts for the redesigned yard.

I filled in the mold holes on the top panels of the walls since they will be seen once the roof is on. I also glued 40 mil styrene to the bottom inside of the walls to hide the depressions from molding (see photo below). I'm not sure why these depressions are there in the first place.

Right now my plan is to hide the seems between panels with Plastruct H-12 columns. I will then glue in Plastruct OWTA-24 Trusses to stabilize the structure and on top of which the roof will sit. With these in place all inside seams will be covered. All the walls are now assembled. I will be gluing them together next Saturday. I want to leave the H-columns black so will tape the seams before I paint the walls.

The two double turnouts are wired and work. DZ-1008 relays came in so I was able to wire two MTH dwarf signals to the 1008 relay /1000 switch machine to indicate turnout position

I need to replace some Atlas 200 snap relays with DZ-1008 relays which I will do next W/E. The reason for this is mostly the non-derail function for the DZ-1000 motor. The 200 snap relay would stay on and burn out if a long enough train consist rolled through the turnout.

I normally work on structures for my layout on Saturdays and the layout itself on Sundays. I was running trains at the mall for the kids yesterday so decided to make today Saturday part duo.

I finished cutting and gluing 40 mil sheet styrene to cover the molding depressions on the bottom foundation walls. The back end has a door so I had to trim stock away before gluing so the door would fit. 1/4 sq. styrene was glued to the top to act as a roof support. As mentioned before the black H-Column (H-12) is not glued in as yet since I want to keep it black. Styrene strips 80 x 250 were glued to hide a seam between panel pieces - see next photo.

I had to make sure the styrene strips would not interfer with window placement on the bottom floor so used the windows to position the strips.

This is what a finished side will look like on the inside.

Now the fun part - gluing the walls together.

To help try keeping the walls square to each other I clamped right angles where I could.

I ran into an issue gluing the end walls to the side walls. If you look closely at the end of the foundation wall you will see a tab sticking out. This is a placement tab when gluing two foundation walls together however I discovered the tab got in the way when trying to fit and end wall to the side wall so I had to cut it off. I left this one on as a show and tell. What you are looking at here is the front entrance. Since there are no foundation walls here the entrance comes to an end above the foundation wall. I will be filling in the corner spaces with corner trim and the middle piece with styrene on the inside and trim on the outside. Things will be more clear next week.

Now for the 20-20 hind sight. The building measures 28 inches long. It will fit over the track where I want it to go but as usual I fell victim to rule #2 - never think you have to fill in all the space. I forgot about sand / water / fuel structures on the outside of the entrance.

It’s looking great, Joe!  I always forget about something.

Joe, you have an amazing layout coming together here. I have skimmed the other pages and I really like what you're doing.  I have learned some things too.  I am definately going to try to modify my Gargraves uncoupling tracks the way you did.  Keep up the great work.  I'll be following along!

Michael

I'm late to the party (not sure how I missed this thread), but it looks like you're making great progress.

One question, and sorry if it's already been covered in the previous 7 (!) pages of posts, but it looks like you have some areas that require a long reach - how do you handle it?  Topside creeper, lift-outs, etc.?  Thanks.

Nice tablesaw setup, BTW.

Mallard4468

While I have a corner cutout where two walls meet (by OGR buildings on left) and a larger cutout towards the top-middle of the layout this is definitely a layout I need to walk on.

Looks like my eyes were bigger than my stomach. There is no room at the entrance for stuff I want to put there. So I had to remove one panel from each side yesterday.

Removing the panels was easier than I thought (not necessarily a good thing). I reattached the structure - glued and clamped overnight. I also finished the entrance. I need to add some puttty to gaps, glue in some missing roof supports and the structure is ready for paint.

As mentioned earlier I am going to use Plastruct H-12 columns inside the shed to hide seams and glue in OWTA truss pieces. I want to keep these pieces black so will wait till the shed is painted then glue them in.

I am also thinking about installing a crane fixture. I have a Walthers "super crane" kit, I also have designed and built my own version for customers. I am thinking about pulling the wheels off the HO truck shown below and incorporating them into a motor housing design. I want to glue the crane track structure to both sides of the H-12 so  I believe my normal design is too wide - see last photo

I have the shed in paint.

The building will be painted black, then red oxide followed by desert bisque.

The windows and brick were painted with flat red.

When I had the kit put together by Rich Redman, he provided an abundance of detail parts. I am not going to use them all however I figured I would paint (dull nickel) every thing and store what I don't use for other projects.

After painting the brick panels flat red I used joint compound for mortar. I gave the compound one day to dry then sprayed with Dullcote. After letting the Dullcote dry I applied several coats of India ink/water wash. If you don't use Dllcote the water in the wash tends to soften and remove the joint compound. The results are shown below.

Before India ink / water wash

After several washes. It is hard to see in the photos but there is a marked difference.

The shed is fully painted. I glued in the brick panels.

I then glued in the Plastruct H-12 columns and OWTA-24 trusses.

I am reserving the middle columns for a crane-way. I elected to build my own design. The crane-way itself is:
BFS-20 I-beam (if I had the black ABS version I would have used this saving have to paint)
C-16 channel inserted on one side as a stiffener
C-6 channel cut to size and glued vertically to the other side of the I-beam
H-6 column to be used as 'track' for the motor housing I will build next W/E

Great work Joe. And I thought I had a lot of clamps!

Charlie

I keep itching to bring out the big guns - maybe over kill????

I did not get anything done last W/E due to the monthly running of trains at the mall.

Made progress today.

The windows were installed using DAP Rapid Fuze (I am starting to like this stuff a lot)

I cut and painted 1/8 inch thick hardboard for the roof

I then glued on all those Korber detail parts I built earlier

Next W/E I will build the crane motor housing then I will be start the design for the 'concrete' base.

Looks great.

Chuck

WOW Joe, that looks Outstanding! I really like your updates!

Had some time yesterday to build the conveyor motor housing. This is not anything super detailed since no one will probably ever see it.

The sides are 60 mil styrene which fit very nicely inside the H-8 columns. I drilled 1/16" dia holes into both side walls, inserted the rods and glued them in place. I made small side covers and glued these over the holes. I won't be rasing/lowering the hook and will most like glue the conveyor motor housing in the center of the overhead track again since I doubt no one will see it unless they look real hard.

I cut and glued a top cover then a smaller piece to look like a lift up lid to get inside. I then glued a ladder to the H-12 column on one side of the building so some one can get to the motor. I will glue some HR-8 railing later today.

Joe, the conveyor housing looks really slick!

With the shed finished I built a concrete base to surround the track inside the shed. I started out with a sub-base of 3/16 MDF to bring it up to the height of the cork roadbed then I glued on offsets to bring the base even with the track ties.

Once satisfied with the fit I took the individual pieces and painted them 'concrete'. I used an awl to make the expansion lines and the cracks. Once the concrete color dried I went over the expansion lines and cracks with an India Ink/water wash.

I had two platforms I bought from Crescent Motor works a while back. I added a brown wash to them then glued on details from a box of 'nick knacks'. there is some Preiser and some Woodland Scenics in there. The platforms are not glued to the base. I will wait till I can back in an locomotive to ensure nothing hits.

The shed will not be glued to the base for maintenance reasons. I still need to add some tanks (as the guru Alan Graz says 'a building ain't a building without a tank or two'.

Looks great!!

Joe, I'm really impressed by your craftsmanship and attention to details.  Thank you for sharing your processes.  Great work!

Almost done with connecting signals to turnout switch motors for position indicators. I still need to buy 4 more DZ-1008 relays (2 new ones and 2 replacements). The last two signals were placed on the Ross Double Crossover. For this I chose the Z-Stuff DZ-1012v detector over the DZ-1011R because of its low profile.

For me this is new but the detector has been around a while. I found an old OGR post that talks about using the detectors and DZ-1008's relays to control the movement of two trains on a single track.

https://ogrforum.com/...trains-on-1-mainline

Since I am using the 1012 to simply indicate turnout lead position I placed electrical tape over the sensors and used the diagram below. In this diagram the toggle switch controls the turnout position. The 'wire terminals' are European terminals. I may not have mentioned this before however I have a dedicated power supply set to about 14VAC for turnout switch motors with ground common to track power ground.

Once the DZ-1008's arrive I can complete connecting signals then it is on to making more buildings and installing various lighting. Power for all lights is a Megawatt 12VDC S-350-12 30 amp power supply (10-14V) with three outputs.  I am using each output to control different sections of the layout. See the attached pdf file.

I am finishing up on the refurbishing of an old custom built grain elevator I had on a previous layout (photos are posted on various Sunday Scenic posts). Next up will be a grain mill and a one stall locomotive shed from my product lineup.

Back in 2003 I bought the Atlas O Signal system (three signals). For this layout I did not like the idea of cutting the outside rail in sections to make this system work as I did on the old layout.

Though not explicitly stated in the instructions I decided to try connecting the Atlas PC board to a Lionel ITAD. I then played around with connecting the second then third PC board to the board before it. As a result of the diagram below the ITAD causes all three signals to go red. Once the ITAD is clear the signals go yellow but the signal down line stays yellow longer than the one in front of it.

This is not perfect since there is only one ITAD but it is better than buying two more ITADS. I have no doubt this will work with the Z-Stuff DZ-1075 detector.

The atlas signals have been connected to a Lionel ITAD and work.

The ITAD is in the back along the curve

However 1 issue which is the reason I got away from Atlas O signals. Bench top testing all three signals worked. Once installed the first signal no longer turns red. The connections are proper. I believe I blew the board with handling while installing it.

I had 4 boards. One would not work while bench testing and the second one stopped working during installation. I'm not buying a new board so I need to figure out what to do. Right now I have com wires running from Din/Dout to the next Din/Dout. The board that does not work is at the end of the line.  I may try connecting the Din on this board straight to the ITAD. If this does works then the problem in the Dout on the second board. If this does not work then it is the Din  on the third board so I am out of luck.

If I cut the connector off the third signal to expose the wires does anyone know the 'connection' scheme for them.

Hey Joe....

The layout looks AWESOME! The buildings really make the layout come alive.

So....maybe you could post a short video of the signals in operation....maybe? I realize that may require you to run a train.... but it would be awesome to see!

I have lots of Atlas signals on my layout. The main problem with lights not working was the quality of the phone plug connection to the wire. I had a batch of rather poor plugs, most of which I had to remove and reconnect using a higher quality phone plug. I use a test wire that is known to work to troubleshoot this issue, confirming that the phone wire/plugs are not working properly.

Another cause of signal lights not working is having the wire colours in the wrong order on the phone plug.

Make sure your Din wires do not break at the screw terminal. I had this happen a few times, and you cannot see the broken wire, you have to pull at the wire to see if it comes loose.

If you connect the signal on the suspect bad board to a good board, the signal will work if the board is the problem.

I also have a few signals where one of the three aspects do not work properly. These had to be replaced, as I am not sure if it is possible to repair them. The wire connection at the LED is not accessible, or I was not able to figure out how to access it. Also not sure if you can reliably re-solder the wires to the LED.

Again, 90% of my fixes were wire plug connection problems.

What a nightmare. Nothing worse than successfully bench testing something and have it not work once on the layout. Especially if you have to crawl under the layout to troubleshoot.Do you think static damaged the one board while you were "handling" it?

I'm surprised by the phone plug issues. These used to be pretty durable (can't  tell you how many times I've yanked a phone plug out of the wall socket by accident. Just plugged it back in and all was good). I wonder if its a wire gauge/quality issue.

Nice looking job, Joe!  I agree, it is quite disheartening to get everything working on the bench test, only to have something not work when installed.  Wow!  I have not used Atlas lighting and signaling products myself.  I'm content to just get the track and turnout wiring working properly.

@Junior posted:

Hey Joe....

The layout looks AWESOME! The buildings really make the layout come alive.

So....maybe you could post a short video of the signals in operation....maybe? I realize that may require you to run a train.... but it would be awesome to see!

Junior - I have never done video but will make an attempt

My original assumption was static but reading other posts I am going to check out the plug today.

Joe

Hey Joe....

Static, hmmmm....I would've thought those boards would've been pretty robust. If your layout is on a carpeted floor that could be the culprit. You'll have to ground yourself out somehow to drain off the static charge or.....keep the board in the protective bag; then ground yourself out before installing it on the layout.

As far as the video....it doesn't have to be fancy....just whip out your cellphone and record away. I do it all the time; forum folks are happy to see videos (although stills are still pretty cool (pun intended )!)

I got around the issue with the Atlas O signals. I have a wire from the ITAD connected to the Din of the first board then a wire from Dout to Din of the second board then Dout to Din on the third board. I dis-connected the wire from the Dout on the second board connected the wire from Din on the third board along with the wire from Din on the second board to Dout on the first board. So bottom line both data wires from second and third boards are connected to the data out on the first board.

The lights work however the solution is not elegant. They all go green to red at the same time when the ITAD is tripped but the first and last signal go from yellow back to green a lot sooner then the middle signal. The yellow light stays on longer before going green. I don't see any way to vary the timing of the light on the signal nor the board.

Junior is right - I have carpet in the train room. Moving around under the table I am usually dragging my butt on the carpet.

I also moved a DZ-1060s from the position I have the Atlas O signals to another spot. I mention this because ZStuff has a new signal called 1060v (variable timing) and is selling out the 1060s at a heavy discount. I bought 2 more.

I will attempt a video using my phone later this week or over the W/E

If I cut the phone plugs off the cable for the Atlas signal does anyone have a wiring schematic. Maybe I can connect the signals directly to an ITAD and bypass the circuit board.

Let there be light - - - and nothing blew.

I'm using a dedicated 12VDC 30 amp power supply. It has three outputs so I have 10 amps for each output.

The interior lights are white LED while the lamp posts are Lionel yellow incandescent bulbs - just notice one bulb is out.

And now it is on - oh well

The interior of the engine shed with the crew hard at work.

Only 9,999 more lights to go

Wow, Wow, Wow Joe! Everything looks awesome! I love the sanding tower in front of the engine shed...a very nice touch.

The enginehouse looks great, Joe!

Junior - Mark thank you

Below is a photo of the opposite side of the shed. I have a siding where I located a flat car with some MTH 'motors'. I am making believe they diesel motors. The platforms (Crescent Locomotive works) are left overs from the longer ones inside the shed. I am probably going to remove them and build one of my plastic docks instead. On the left side is the back of the structure written up in the Dec OGR issue.

I am still going to take a video of the Atlas O signals. I need a friend to come over and hold the camera (I think it takes videos) or my phone while I operate the train since it will be heading into a dead end.

Oh yes, I see the structure from the great article you wrote.  It was very detailed on each aspect of the construction.

Thanks Mark