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Hello everyone

I've been building my layout for 7 years now. With my own small business and very busy family life, it's been slow-going at times but now I've finally achieved my first milestone: one complete trip up from the lower level staging yards to top layout deck and back down to staging.

I can't really build the scenic part of the layout until the lower level staging yards that feed the layout with trains are working flawlessly. It's a 6% grade and I need to make sure I have enough motive power to get each train up that hill. So now for the first time, I can start testing complete trains. The good news is that I've now confirmed that any two locomotives can easily pull a 20 car train up to the layout.  

Anyway, I shot a quick video to commemorate the event. I've included the track plan for the layout and the lower level staging yards below as well.

Attachments

Images (2)
  • Trenton & Western Trackplan
  • Trenton Staging 2.1
Videos (1)
Trenton & Westren - First Run
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Arnold D. Cribari posted:

Beautifully done so far. I love the way you have the train going through the wall and disappearing. Very good for dramatic effect.

Thanks Arnold.
That hole in the wall is below the layout height and is just there to allow for a gradual enough grade to get trains up to the top. Trains will enter and exit the layout underneath the overpass. The red line shows the height of the top deck

Hole In The WallLayout Deck Height

Attachments

Images (2)
  • Hole In The Wall
  • Layout Deck Height
Last edited by richtrow

Greg

I did a lot of testing with temporary mock-ups before I started building the real thing so I was fairly confident. I have a few very heavy trains with die-cast double-stack cars and such. I had my fingers crossed until this weekend when I finally proved I could drag that sucker up the hill with only two MTH GP38's. The locomotives don't get hot. There's no wheel slip. Things look good.

I may stock up on traction tires just to be safe!

Here's a clip of those tests from 2012 when I was considering creating a blog about the layout.

Attachments

Videos (1)
Grade Test 1

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