Need ideas

[RRManiac]

I'm making a small mining town not far from my main town. I wanted to know if anybody had some ideas as to how I could make a mining area on my layout. If you can help, that'd be great.

 

[RexHea]

We really need a little more information as to what kind of mine (coal, gold, iron,etc,). what time period, size for the area, and will it be an underground or open pit. Mining can generate a lot of rail traffic and is fun to model.

 

[UP2CSX]

Oh Chip! One of members, Chip (spacemouse), has done a layout just like you're wanting to do. Take a look at http://www.modelrailroadforums.com/forum/search.php?searchid=273841 and check out all the Rock Ridge threads. I think you'll find some ideas there.

 

[RRManiac]

Well, I recently visited a model raiload club. They said that rather than model a time period, I should try modeling a season. I wanted to do a Coal mine in the early autumn. I honestly wanted a little bit of both as to whether it is open-pit mining or underground. Sort of like, have an open-pit and an underground tunnel. I don't have anything to start this project yet due to the fact that I wanted to carefully plan this before I set out to do it.

 

[RexHea]

I'm not sure that I understand that club's advice. There is a lot of difference with a club layout and a home layout. The club has to be flexible because of all the members equipment and support, where your layout can be more specific to your desires. Most all layout focus on an time period, either loosely of strictly. This helps to choose types of locomotives, buildings, autos, etc. For the mine, a time period should be used to match the other parts of your layout. The equipment used varies greatly from one decade to the next.

One of the first things that can help you get started is to Google mining. I would recommend coal. Coal will have a lot of customers particularly up to 1960: powerplants, coke processing plants, factory boiler houses, coal loaders for steamers, etc. Read about all the different methods and equipment used and look at photos on those sites. If your area is small, then a deep (underground) mine would be the best, as the shaft goes straight down and doesn't take much room. There will still be areas for coal storage. Some of the buildings would be the elevator shaft, coal conveyor out of the mine, coal conveyors to loading bins, tipple for processing coal, maintenance buildings, offices. Another type of mine that wouldn't eat up space is the slope mine that goes into the side of a hill. This type would also have a lot of exterior support buildings.

Walthers web site has a lot of mining kits that you could browse. They may help you focus more on the type and time for your mining operation.

 

[RRManiac]

Thank you for all the advice. I will go google mining. Please keep the advice coming. More updates as the coal mine progresses.