Loco Bill's new indoor layout construction.

[Loco Bill Canelos]

NOTE: FOR THOSE WHO HAVE SEEN THIS BEFORE, THE NEW POSTS AND UPDATES START ON PAGE 2.
Hi Bachmann friends!
 
I have had several requests for photos of my new layout under construction.  So I thought I would send out a little report of how things went thru Mid February.  If you have any interest I will go ahead and do a second report through March.

As some of you may know I have moved to Colorado.  Tore down both my indoor and outdoor layouts in Missouri and have a new railroad under construction in the basement and crawl space of our new home.  Tough starting over at the tender young age of 75, but it has been interesting meeting new challenges.  Moved into the new place in late November 2014.  

The first task was to finish the basement exterior walls with sheetrock and add electrical outlets every 10 feet along the walls.  I also brought in a new circuit for the new overhead lighting and a second for track lights along the aisles (someday)  I them surfaced the unfinished concrete floor with a gray epoxy paint.  I got this part done by Jan 15th.

I was anxious to unpack my tools and set up a workbench and add some shelves for my trains.  I found some good used base cabinets and added a laminate countertop which can be seen in photo 1.  I also put up some one by six shelving for trains as I unpacked them and set my parts cabinets up (on the right).  This was complete by Jan 21st.

Photo 1:

With this done I wanted to get some track laid so I could at least test my many loco's even if I could just go 10 feet.  Since I had my trackplan was ready, I went ahead and put up some benchwork to the left of my workbench which will eventually become my engine facility.  Currently it is in use as a very very small yard for test trains.  I use OSB board for a base and closed cell foam  and sound board for the roadbed.   I had to sort out all my salvaged track an make repairs to some of it.  After 15 years in the ground some of the ties on my outdoor track deteriorated very badly. and had to be replaced.  It was great to have a workbench and test track in place and really great to unpack all my tools I got this far by the end of the month.

Photo 2:

In early February I finally got going on a thirty three foot extension along the south wall of the basement.  It is shown with my Annie #97 some of my custom painted tank cars and a kitbashed shortened Bachmann 8 wheel caboose

Photo 3.

I had to make a removable bridge so I could get access to the water softener, Radon removal system, and basement sink shown in Photo 4.  It simply lifts out for the access.  I also had to make a lift out in the south east wall window well seenn in the distance for the fire escape access.

Photo 4:

I got this far by mid February and hung the mountain view poster as a reminder that some day there would be scenery instead of a wall mural.  Couldn't resist a photo with my version 6 #97 Annie posed in front of it (photo 5) and another of Missouri Western early RS-3 diesel at the same spot

Photo 5:  

Photo 6:

That is it for now, let me know if this is worth your time and I will post more.

Loco Bill

[Wade Colyer]

Hi Bill,

Looking good! Glad to hear you've got the plan already for the new layout. I've seen guys move and the trains stay packed up for years. Let me guess. No duck-unders and everything within reach I'll bet. So nothing outside for now? Remember those LGB adjustable track sections I used for my liftout bridge. They worked very well.

Keep us posted

Wade

[fhenn]

Looks great thank you, keep it up the news

[Hunt]

Update when you can. Let us know when all is finished -- then some can tell you what you did wrong! 

[Loco Bill Canelos]

Hi Guy's

Wade,   I do have a plan for outside and even a plan to get from outside to inside using a helix in the crawl space.  I am not sure I will ever do it because I would like to get the inside layout more or less finished before going outside.   I will not have any duckunders, but will have two either hinged liftups or maybe liftouts.  It has been a long time since I saw your layout, but I do remember those adjustable LGB track sections.

Fhenn, thanks.

Hunt,  As you know a model railroad is never finished, so I won't be surprised if folks start telling me what is wrong right away

In my own mind doing an inside layout has already forced me to do some things wrong.  I wanted to keep the minimum radius at 5 feet, but where there is double track on a curve I was forced to make the inside curve 4.4 inch radius in one place.   Also in my written plan drawing I thought I could keep the grades to 2.0 percent, but if I want to run my 1:20.3  I will be forced to make the grades 2.5 percent.  The K27 and C19 are short enough to keep the grade at the lower level, but the stack on the long caboose was higher than even those two.     I am considering lowering the grade by not running my 1:20.3 goodies on my layout, but at my son's instead.  I must admit I am unhappy about the 2.5 percent grades.  I need to  make a decision on this before I get too far along.

I hope some of you with inside layouts will post some of your good tips and ideas along the way.

[Dale Loyet]

Glad to see you are getting settled in and find time to get the railroad started. That mountain view looks GREAT !

[Loco Bill Canelos]

Thanks Dale,

Things are slowing down on the construction now that the weather is better and I have a huge backyard mess to get on top of.   I will post part two in a few days time.

Hope to see you and some of the old gang at the national Convention!  I will have an open house during that time.

All the best,

Bill

[Loco Bill Canelos]

Having finished the track along the south wall by late February I decided to open the portal to the crawl space and bring the track out to spot where it would cross under the track from the south wall and enter the south side of the soon to be center island.  So I started by building the benchwork along the east wall.  I added two sidings which will eventually be completely hidden by the scenery. Photo 7 shows the tank cars being pushed onto one of the siding tracks.

Photo 7  

Photo 8 shows one these tracks entering the crawlspace.  I am thinking I might do the Moffat Tunnel east portal here.  I extended the track into the crawlspace far enough to give me a long switch lead so I can play around switching cars on the new sidings.   The blocks of wood with the blue circle are my version of the real railroad blue flag rules.   I use them to remind me not to pass a blue flag and risk a serious derailment.

Photo 8

In this view(Photo 8A)  you can see how the track comes out of the crawl space(left center slightly hidden under the upper track)  and under the track from the south wall onto the south side of the center island.  I got this done around the 4rd of March

Photo 8A  

Photo 9 shows the south center island benchwork and tentative track support where it will begin the climb to the north side of the center island.  In this view the track support OSB board has not yet been lifted up on the risers and I have not yet installed the roadbed under the track.   I started out using a foam insulation product and cutting it to shape with a utility knife.  It was terrible to work with and left behind lots of little pieces of the white insulation over everything.  I questioned the idea of using this, but the idea of using foam was the latest and greatest way to go according to what I read in Model Railroader magazine.  What I did not realize was there was more than one type of foam insulation.   I learned from a friend that I needed to use a closed cell foam insulation available from Home Depot or Lowe's in 4 foot by 9 foot sheets. the product at Home Depot is purple in color and the other brand at Lowe's is blue in color.   I was invited to visit a big Bachmann customers layout in northern Colorado.  Mel M has a really great layout in his basement and models the Rio Grande.   He has all the K-27's, c-19's and 1:20.3 rolling stock,  I thought I was in a Bachmann display booth!!!!   Anyway I digress, Mel used a homosote like fiberboard insulation product for all his roadbed.   He got it at Home Depot under the product name "sound board"   I bought a sheet and made roadbed out of it and liked it very much.  I also bought a panel of closed cell foam insulation board to try.  Of the two it was easier to cut the foam with a utility knife over the sound board.   So while I liked both products, I will use the closed cell foam for all future roadbed.  I got to this point by March 8th and decided to go ahead and build the North center island benchwork which can be seen in the background of Photo 9.

Photo 9

The north center Island benchwork was next to go up and I found I was getting pretty good at building the benchwork. With the benchwork complete by March 11th,  I cut the OSB board base or the track and installed the risers for it on the entire center island.  It is at this point I realized I could not get away with a 2 % grade and have the necessary clearance to operate all my 1:20.3 loco's and rolling stock.  I re-did the risers and  increased the grade to 2 1/2 % to get the necessary clearance.  It was March 13th when I finally got the risers done and started cutting the roadbed.  Photo 10 shows the newly redone risers and OSB board base in place.  I should mention that I made cardboard templates of the curves to lay on the OSB board in order to mark the cuts.   I used OSB board gussets under the OSB board to join sections together using screws.  The little red roller cart which I purchased at a Harbor Freight store is very hand for holding my screws, drills, and track laying tools making it very easy to roll it to the place I was working.

Photo 10  

I finally got the roadbed cut up and in place on the center island by March 18th.   One the roadbed was installed I painted it an earth brown flat color to serve as a base color.  Once dry I was able to start laying the track.   At this point I took the time to unpack all my track, since it was all mixed up from both the old indoor and outdoor layouts.  I sorted the track into serviceable and unserviceable piles.  I decided to repair the unserviceable track sections as much as possible and to use the worst sections to cut for fit where usable.   Some of the outdoor track ties were ruined by the sun in spite of the fact that they were supposed to be UV stabilized.   It was not Bachmann track, and the track involved had been outside for over 14 years.    I finally joined the track at the bridge over the lower section by March 22nd.  Photo 11 is an overview of the center island with the roadbed and track installed.  Visible are the diagonal OSB diagonal stiffeners  I screwed to the underside of the benchwork  to make is very stable.  I used some 1x4's to connect both sides of the island to the metal beam support which really made the benchwork very solid.   By the time I got all the stiffeners in place it was the end of March.

Photo 11  

In the closer view in Photo 12 you can see the painted roadbed. This photo also gives a pretty good picture of how the rails which were outdoors compare to the unpainted new rails from the indoor layout.   One of the more miserable tasks will be to paint all of the sides of the rails a prototypical color. Both sides of the island will have view blocks using painted backdrops.  The curve on the north end (photo 11) will have scenery which goes to the ceiling and a short tunnel will be used to break up the curve and serve as a way to join the backdrops from both sides of the island.

Photo 12  


This is where things stood by the end of March and progress has been slowed by the Easter holidays and a need to get some outdoor work done here on the new home.    I do plan to have an open house during the Denver Garden Railroad Society sponsored National Garden Railway Convention.   Any of you coming out for this great event let me know if you would like to visit and I will email you the details of my open house.   My layout will not be on the tours as it it is too new and unfinished.   

As always comments and questions are welcome!!

Bill

[charon]

Bill,
Photos and layout look great, please keep posting when you can.
Thanks,
Chuck   

[Wade Colyer]

Hi Bill,

Well, you've been busy. Looks like a nice run you'll have. Are you going to do anything to the ceiling?

Wade

PS I'd say that WP&Y was an OSH set till I find out other wise.

[Loco Bill Canelos]

Hi all Thanks for looking.

Wade,

I have not decided what to do with the ceiling. In the past I usually used 2 foot by 4 foot sound absorbing ceiling tiles.   I do plan to try to do some scenery to the ceiling and since I will eventually add trac  lighting I am thinking of hanging some blue cloth from the joists.   I saw it done in a museum in England many years ago and was impressed by the very open effect it gave to the room.  It even moved a little from the ventilation system and the effect was amazing.

Bill

[Loco Bill Canelos]

Hello all who are interested. 

I have been asked about my progress by several of you.   I have been lazy about updating this, thinking there was not much interest.  I have kept building and have since built a wye, added two sidings for industries, completed the double track mainline, and built a fair sized yard.  I still have to finish a hidden staging track in the crawl space.   Once the staging track is done, the track work will be finished.  I will then focus on scenery and structures. 

I am going in for repairs(outpatient surgery) tomorrow but as soon as I recover enough to get some pictures I will post some showing the progress.

Bill 

[Old John]

Bill,

Great looking layout (in progress).  We haven't talked since I gave you the JD info, but being a year younger than you I found that keeping up an 1100' outdoor main line on an island 250 yards from the ocean was too much. Getting down to do maintenance was easy, getting up was becoming a problem, so the outdoor line was moved indoors.  I look forward to seeing more on your layout and hope all goes well with your "maintenance".

[Ray Dunakin]

The layout is looking great so far! Very interested in following your progress.

Good luck with the surgery!

[Loco Bill Canelos]

Thanks John & Ray,

Surgery is done and I am working on the update during my recovery since the doc won't let me do anything else.  Forgot all the work involved in doing something like this kind of report.  I decided to try to do it because most Large Scalers are doing Garden Railroads, and indoor large scale is relatively rare.  Guys like me who started in the early 1980's and when crazy when Bachmann came along with their great U.S. prototypes in 1989 are getting too old to crawl around in the dirt on hands and knees maintaining the track. 

One thing I noticed when I did my small indoor layout in part of the barn on my farm was that I never had to relevel the track, electrical problems were gone, i didn't have animal damage, buildings and details remained in good condition, and I did not have a problem with junk on the tracks or leaves.  In spite of all these good things I still loved my outdoor layout even with the maintenance involved.  After tearing down both layouts and moving to Colorado I knew that at age 75 rebuilding two layouts was out of the question just from the total work involved.  We found a home with a half basement and a large crawl space so I decided to build indoors with the thinking that by avoiding all the constant maintenance associated with the outdoor line, I might have some hope of having a nice layout again in a reasonable time.   So far I have completed all the benchwork and track laying except for one siding in about a year.  So I am feeling pretty good about it since I had to sheetrock the walls, add electrical service, paint the floors, build shelves, and build a workbench, before I could even start the layout benchwork.   One of the reasons I am doing this thread is to show that you can have an nice indoor large scale layout and It need not be as large as mine.

Stay tuned!!

Bill