My first "Real" layout(WIP)
- Thread starter lgh2000
- Start date
ModelRailroadForums.com is a free Model Railroad Discussion Forum and photo gallery. We cover all scales and sizes of model railroads. Online since 2002, it's one of the oldest and largest model railroad forums on the web. Whether you're a master model railroader or just getting started, you'll find something of interest here.
Affiliate Disclosure: We may receive a commision from some of the links and ads shown on this website (Learn More Here)
Wastrel
Member
Kind of hard to tell on the yard, but this is what I see in whats shown:
Sidings are to short, you will only be able to fit 1 or 2 cars cleanly on the shortest of them.
I don't see a run-around or escape track. This is a must if you don't want captured engines waiting on cars to be pulled to release them.
You would actually be farther ahead to make a smaller yard (fewer tracks) and increase your length. Save the unused turnouts for another location where they will actually serve a purpose.
As a suggestion, your yard should support as many cars as is required to make up as many trains as you plan to run. That is, if you plan to run 3 trains with 10 cars each, your yard should hold at least 30 cars. Ideally a yard is full when at 50% capacity, so a 60 car yard would be even better.
Something else to consider is sorting and staging tracks, that is an inbound, an outbound, and track leads to break, sort, store. While you are at it, a RIP track is a good idea. This gives you someplace to park stock that isn't quite up to standards so it can be easily located for repairs. And last, if you are running in a caboose era, you will need a lead for caboose storage that has immediate access to both the inbound and outbound leads.
Confused yet?, hehe.
Check out this site for a better understanding of yards and how they are designed.http://www.housatonicrr.com/yard_des.html
Sidings are to short, you will only be able to fit 1 or 2 cars cleanly on the shortest of them.
I don't see a run-around or escape track. This is a must if you don't want captured engines waiting on cars to be pulled to release them.
You would actually be farther ahead to make a smaller yard (fewer tracks) and increase your length. Save the unused turnouts for another location where they will actually serve a purpose.
As a suggestion, your yard should support as many cars as is required to make up as many trains as you plan to run. That is, if you plan to run 3 trains with 10 cars each, your yard should hold at least 30 cars. Ideally a yard is full when at 50% capacity, so a 60 car yard would be even better.
Something else to consider is sorting and staging tracks, that is an inbound, an outbound, and track leads to break, sort, store. While you are at it, a RIP track is a good idea. This gives you someplace to park stock that isn't quite up to standards so it can be easily located for repairs. And last, if you are running in a caboose era, you will need a lead for caboose storage that has immediate access to both the inbound and outbound leads.
Confused yet?, hehe.
Check out this site for a better understanding of yards and how they are designed.http://www.housatonicrr.com/yard_des.html
Wastrel
Member
How much room are you wanting to allow for your yard? Length, width. With a small layout you would be better served with an industry and simulate your yard with a couple tail tracks that disapear into the backboard or behind your backdrop. That allows you to simulate interchange, gives you another industry to switch, and allows you to add or remove cars from the layout in a plausable manner. Sure, you lose the impressive looks of a yard, but overall the operation of a small layout is better served by industries than a large dead space that a yard entails.
To give you an example, the yard on my layout has an 80 car capacity (167 chock full with 50's. Don't count anything as car storage unless it is actually in the yard spurs. Caboose tracks, RIP tracks, service tracks, runarounds, all that are not counted as capacity tracks.). This yard eats a massive 17' of spurs, another 18' of lead, and amidst all that another 8' of ladder space for a grand total of 43' of unusable or only semi usable space for anything other than yard operation. The lead can be nestled inside, above or below your main which effectively reduces yard size by almost half, as in my case. I ran my lead track as an elevated section crossing over the main and running along the backside of my helix. This allowed me to have a nice long drill without losing much running room as I couldn't really lay any track behind the helix for anything else anyway.
To give you an example, the yard on my layout has an 80 car capacity (167 chock full with 50's. Don't count anything as car storage unless it is actually in the yard spurs. Caboose tracks, RIP tracks, service tracks, runarounds, all that are not counted as capacity tracks.). This yard eats a massive 17' of spurs, another 18' of lead, and amidst all that another 8' of ladder space for a grand total of 43' of unusable or only semi usable space for anything other than yard operation. The lead can be nestled inside, above or below your main which effectively reduces yard size by almost half, as in my case. I ran my lead track as an elevated section crossing over the main and running along the backside of my helix. This allowed me to have a nice long drill without losing much running room as I couldn't really lay any track behind the helix for anything else anyway.
One thing to consider is the you've basically created a wye track with the new track arrangement. That's not necessarily bad since you can turn trains on the wye if you add an additional switch to crossover between two long tracks. You do need to be aware that the wye arrangement creates an electrical reverse loop and you'll get a short when the same train that goes into the why comes back out. You'll either need to buy a pair of automatic reversers for DC or DCC or you'll need to cut gaps in the tracks before they get back to the main and use toggle switches to control the polarity. If you don't have much experience wiring reverse loops, there's a good article about the theory and how to do it at http://www.loystoys.com/info/reverse-section-control.html.
Another concern I have is that it appears you have a large number of brass switches. All brass tracks are an issue compared to nickle silver because they oxidize more quicly and need to be cleaned more often. Brass switches are even more problematic because you need a clean electical path through the switch and brass switches have small parts that will need to be cleaned up frequently compared to nickle silver. If you're short of funds, the brass switches will still work (I've got a few of them on my layout) but, if you've got the money, I'd get some nickle silver switches and save yourself some elbow grease.
Another concern I have is that it appears you have a large number of brass switches. All brass tracks are an issue compared to nickle silver because they oxidize more quicly and need to be cleaned more often. Brass switches are even more problematic because you need a clean electical path through the switch and brass switches have small parts that will need to be cleaned up frequently compared to nickle silver. If you're short of funds, the brass switches will still work (I've got a few of them on my layout) but, if you've got the money, I'd get some nickle silver switches and save yourself some elbow grease.
The brass switches are older so I'm only using them as test subjects on the layout till i can afford some nickel turnouts. I am new at wiring so the article should help lots thanks. Good idea on the cross over I will try a couple different variations on that and see how it turns out.
hamltnblue
Active Member
It's your layout and you should do what makes you happy. I would however suggest that you feed the yard with 1 track and add an industry of some sort. What is the purpose of the yard? A fuel depot, a Freight yard, or whatever. Give it a theme and you'll enjoy it more because it has a purpose and not just thrown in.
Affiliate Disclosure: We may receive a commision from some of the links and ads shown on this website (Learn More Here)