A new layout for the new house!

[Len]

Lights are looking good. Were you able to get your switch control wires rerouted?

I just discovered the buildings on the display layout I maintain have lights, but for some reason they were never hooked up. So I'm going to see what I can do with them, and if they work I'll post some pics next week.

Len

[Trainman203]

Have you considered painting and ballasting your track? Looks like it's not fastened down.  Pick up sections and spray it with "camouflage brown" from a can.  Clean off the railheads, put it back down, and ballast it as per dozens of on line videos.  I myself like earthier ballast colors more than gray, blends in with the rest of the scenery better.

[bbmiroku]

Which is why I like the steel track.  The base is black and a simple hard roller in grey paint gently rolled over the roadbed produces highlights and 'shadows'.

[Trainman203]

Painting the rails and ties greatly  enhances realism.  If you don't want to paint the roadbed, there are tie and rail painting markers which are good , but painstaking for over a lot of track.  I know, I've done it.  😬😡🤬. Next layout, I'm spraying the track brown first. 

[Terry Toenges]

If you decide to spray the road bed, rub the rails with a thin film of something. I use Bachmann's conductive lube. After you've painted, just take a rag to the rails and the paint comes right off. Pin striping tape works, too, but you have to go back over and make sure you get any sticky residue off.

[wiley209]

I am thinking of painting the track to make it more real-looking. I saw some tips on how to do so in one of the Bachmann Model Railroad Club online magazines without having to apply additional ballast (but maybe I'll try that for the in the rail yard to match the rest of the gray ballast ground cover.) It even mentions how to clean the tops of the rails after painting. As for fastening it down, I plan to use some double-sided tape underneath the track in a few corners to keep it firm for normal operation.

And yes, I chose the nickel-silver track due to its' better conductivity and being easier to keep clean. On my TYCO crossing gate, it had a removable straight track section when I got it so I replaced the original straight brass track section with an Atlas Code-100 nickel-silver track section to allow for better conductivity and electrical consistency when I last installed it on the previous layout.

[Trainman203]

Real ballast looks really good, Wiley.  Let it go down over your grass like in reality.  You'll wonder why you waited so long to do track painting and ballasting, I did.  The videos are good, follow their lead.

Use N scale ballast which is more gravel sized in HO.  Good ballast work takes practice.  Just do a foot or two at a time at first, do it on a out of the way spur , and don't rush it.

[Joe323]

I agree about the N scale ballast.  I wish I had used that on my layout as the HO stuff does look a bit coarse. Consider using real rock ballast like Arizona Rock and mineral or Scenery Express sell it tends to stay put better than the walnut shells Woodland Scenics sells.

Ballasting and painting rails are of course for us a coosmetic operation unlike a 1:1 Railroad so its your choice. I just painted my rails with cheap brown acrylic paint fron Walmart and wiped all the tops with a rag. It need not be neat on real tracks the rust goes everywhere. They I applied the ballast:

[wiley209]

Here's the Amtrak train stopped at the Arlee Station.


Doing some more realistic railroad switching/right-of-way operations here so I can move the trains from one loop to the other.


I am now placing the speakers into the drive-in theater layout (remember drive-in speakers?)


The BNSF freight stopped at the Plasticville freight station as a hobo sits in one of the boxcars.


People can board the Amtrak train from both platforms at the downtown station when it's on the inner loop!


The TYCO freight-unloading depot in action!


Here's the BNSF freight rounding through the woods.


The semaphore signal is adjusted to red so the BNSF freight can pass by here.

[Trainman203]

That's a nice big layout Wiley.  It reminds me of when I still lived back home so many long years ago.  On the Gulf Coast no one has a basement, we had a really large extra bedroom over a big shed out back.  For one wonderful summer I built a big L shaped layout on two 4x8's.  It never got finished. The first of several successive family members to live in the room needed it and that was that.  Your layout recalls for me those long ago  beautiful days when trains were fueled by dreams.

[Joe323]

The drive in speakers are long gone

At the drive inn I go to sometimes in Vineland NJ they use FM radio but the poles are still there.  I set up a loop that plays lets all go to the lobby... and other drive in intermission stuff. In your case Wiley I am guessing you might be able to do that on a tablet video and all

[wiley209]

Yep; I plan to do that once I can find my old Android 7.9" tablet that was misplaced during our move to the current house. If not, I'll just buy a used/refurbished iPad Mini 4 (probably with 32 or 64 GB; I don't really need 128 GB) and use that in the screen. I found some nice ten-minute drive-in intermission montages on YouTube; I'm thinking of running this one...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRXC8Nvyqgg

But anyways, here are some more new pics!


I thought this looked like a cool sight, seeing the freight cars on the Bachmann blinking bridge like that.


I now have a third train placed on the layout as well; an auto-carrier train! I took my Bachmann BNSF GP40 and matching caboose and hooked them up to my Athearn, TYCO and Life-Like auto-carrier cars. I know from the 70s to the 90s Bachmann made a tri-level auto carrier car, and I do have one, but it's much too big to run alongside the other auto carriers, and I need to find the appropriate knuckle couplers for it (it's not as easy as replacing the couplers on the rest of my older rolling stock.) I am not surprised Bachmann hasn't updated the tri-level auto carrier with knuckle couplers and such and is still selling it with the rest of their product line! Either that, or make a new auto carrier in HO scale.
As you can see in the background, I got out my Walthers Trainline BNSF "Fakebonnet" Dash 8-40BW locomotive to pull the main freight, along with a matching Trainline Santa Fe caboose.


Here I have the main freight train in the foreground. There's just something neat about seeing a much more modern diesel locomotive like the Dash 8-40BW pulling a freight train that includes older TYCO cars.


Here's a creative use for TYCO's old blinking traffic lights. They make great fire station traffic signals! (I haven't wired it up yet, but I plan to soon.)


Placed some cars on where the drive-in theater is going and put in another row of those old speaker posts. After Anime Boston and my next payment comes in, I'll buy a few more paints so I can build the ticket booth and the snack bar/projection booth structures (I hope I can find color photos of Brockton's old Skyview Drive-In for inspiration on how to paint it!)


I finally got around to replacing the burnt-out bulb in my Life-Like flashing light storage tank. I used a red Model Power blinking LED. It looks a lot more realistic now, too. When I first got it, the whole tank seemed to illuminate, so I painted the interior black except the red translucent dome on the top, and that helped a bit. But thanks to the new Model Power blinking LED, it looks more like the real thing!


I learned how I can drill slots to fit the Bachmann E-Z Track Simplimatic remote switch plugs through my control panel. It looks less cluttered now for sure. (But I am still having trouble trying to get it through the main platform with its' extruded foam. Any turnouts near the edge I will just run the wire to the edge of the platform and down, and then hide it with landscaping ground cover.)


It's hard to get a clear shot of my model trains in motion on my phone, as they look a bit blurry, even when running at a slow speed! But it does seem to create a neat motion effect.

[wiley209]

It's been a while but here are some more new pics!


I found that those holes I make when drilling to run the Bachmann E-Z track switch wires under the platform can be easily filled with leftover bits of insulation foam. (I have to make the holes be elongated and rectangular-shaped due to the rectangular plugs Bachmann uses for their remote switches.


Here is one of those filled holes after the wire is run through it, with the ballast ground cover sprinkled over it.


The two holes from the first image with ground cover applied.


For my most recent demonstration of this train layout for some relatives, I had my auto-carrier train be hauled by my Bachmann Bluetooth-equipped BNSF GP35 diesel! They got a kick out of that.


In the residential area and near the drive-in theater I've applied the Walthers SceneMaster adhesive roadway. It's actually made by Busch, but the paint job is modified to look more like an American roadway. Now they just need to make intersection roadway sections as well...


Here I've placed the Woodland Scenics "Cop'n a Kiss" AutoScene on the "Lovers' Lane" ledge.


A bit of leftover Woodland Scenics roadway placed in front of the TYCO Lighted Signal Crossing.


The main freight unloading crates from the TYCO operating boxcar as the Amtrak train passes by on the other track.


Another shot of the freight train having one of the piggyback truck trailers unloaded. As I said, one fun thing about these operating freight car accessories is how even though they were clearly aimed at kids, they do allow for being able to actually load and unload cargo on freight trains and make for a more realistic operation! Too bad Bachmann doesn't make anything like that anymore (I know prior to 1994 they had their own log-dump car and an electrically-operated "action depot.")


Both trains passing each other at the railroad crossing near the Lovers' Lane.


The BNSF freight is flagged down due to a switch problem. (I fixed it after taking this photo.)


I have my Model Power 3-light signal wired up now, currently set on red to prevent any other trains from crashing into the back of the BNSF freight.

[Joe323]

Will the Tyco autoracks handle 18" curves

[wiley209]

Will the Tyco autoracks handle 18" curves

Yes they can; same with the Athearn and Life-Like auto-carrier cars.
With that said, here's some more pics, which also include the auto-carrier train in action.


Recent picture of the control panel for my train layout. I now have six remote switches hooked up; I plan to hook up two more soon. Now if only I could find some kind of labels for the remote switches...


I reconfigured the track for the coal tipple siding so that the bumper isn't sticking up above the ground now.


Another shot of the woods on my layout, with a couple more trees "planted."


Another shot of the main BNSF freight unloading logs into the TYCO dumping bin. Now that I've got all the turnouts in that rail yard area wired up to the control panel, it's easier to do all the action just from the controls!


Trying out switching operations with the three trains on my layout. It did take a little planning, but I was able to get it done without much hassle. Maybe I'll shoot a video of it some day.


The auto-carrier train at the downtown station alongside the Amtrak train.


Another picture of both the TYCO freight unloading depot and the lighted signal crossing in action, now that the main freight is on the outer track line that passes through the residential area. Too bad Bachmann never made an action accessory similar to that freight unloading depot, and that their past attempt at a light-and-sound crossing was pretty lousy.


The auto-carrier train on the Amtrak's tail, now waiting for the Amtrak to clear the turnout and the switch to be thrown so it can move onto the outer loop and park there.