switching layout question (dumb newbie question)

[hoboblues75]

Do people run cabooses on pre-1980's switching layouts? I am talking the small 1'x6' HO shelf switcher layouts? Would it have been prototypically correct to do so? How often would the caboose have to be actually working with the locomotive, etc?

Please forgive me in advance if this is in the wrong category.

Andy

 

[tooter]

Hi Andy,

While I can't answer your question because I know nothing about prototypes... I can recommend Small Layout Scrapbook. It's chock full of switching layouts from all over the world.

Greg

 

[CSXPAID]

Prior to the 80's every train had cabooses road or yard they had five man crews my switching layout is set in the late forties and cabooses will be on the layout

 

[Photogdad]

I know my lil switching layout will have them. It is set in the late 40's- early 60's so I can have a wide range of motive power, But yes trains did infact have cabooses back it the day. Hope to see progress of the layour

 

[steinjr]

Man is not asking if cabooses were used for over-the-road movement. He is asking whether the caboose will be pulled along even for switching moves on a small 1x6 foot switching layout, or whether you just postulate that "the rest of the train" was left with the caboose "over there" (i.e. off layout).

Smile,
Stein

 

[wright2626]

id say the train had to come from somewhere, and had to have a caboose. even though your layout is 1x6, it is still part of a bigger line.

 

[alpha_1]

Hi Andy! Most guys I know run cabooses. I've got some excellent Canadian Pacific Railway reference material (books) and any short line or switching situations seem to use a caboose. My interest is all steam, but the idea of a caboose was certainly prevalent during the early diesel era as well.

 

[Dameon]

What exactly are you modeling?

In a major freight or classification yard the switchers don't run around with a caboose. You'd only have to deal with a caboose when breaking down or making up inbound and outbound trains. From an operational standpoint, you can have what is called a "caboose track", which is a track designated for storing caboose. You can remove the caboose from the incoming freight train, shove it on the storage track, and place one onto a train once you have it spotted on the outbound track. This is also a shameless way to display your caboose collection.

If you are modeling a smaller yard or a small town, someplace where you have the situation of a local freight arriving and doing the switching itself, then yes since the train had to move over the road it should have a caboose as well.

 

[DougC]

Andy:

I was an extra-board brakeman on the MoPac in Bismarck MO in the mid-1970s for about 1.5 years. I worked on a lot of traveling switch engines up and down the line switching local customers.

However, for each trip we had to build our own trains in the yard, and the caboose was handled as little as possible to get it to or keep it on the back end of the train. (Monday thru Saturday there were two daily traveling switch engine jobs. They used the same locomotive and caboose, but one went north and the other south.) The caboose was just in the way if attached to the engine when switching, so it never was.

Also, if it was attached to the engine when switching it would get banged around a lot, and that causes messes in the caboose - like knocking the kerosene-fueled heating stove loose (that actually happened but I wasn't on that crew at that time; I think the caboose wasn't tied down real well and a firmly kicked car banged into it.)

DougC

 

[hoboblues75]

Thank you both. Dameon, you hit the nail on the head! I am doing a short-line railroad that just goes around a town or maybe a few "simulated towns". (one town where a few laps of the track suddenly change it to a "different" but similar close by town.

 

[steinjr]

Thank you both. Dameon, you hit the nail on the head! I am doing a short-line railroad that just goes around a town or maybe a few "simulated towns". (one town where a few laps of the track suddenly change it to a "different" but similar close by town.

Question: how do you do "a few laps on the track" in 1x6 feet in H0 scale?

In the context you asked about originally - a pretty small switching layout, I'd say it depends on what you want to simulate:

a) Starting the simulation with a pretty short train, consisting of an engine, a handful of cars and a caboose, having just arrived in town, and ending the simulation with the train about to continue onwards to the next town, or

b) Starting the simulation with the engine switching a handful of cars in that town, having just left "the rest of the train" and the caboose on "just up that way", i.e. somewhere else nearby not modeled on the visible layout.

Either way would work, IMO.

Smile,
Stein

 

[hoboblues75]

thanks everyone! This has all been very helpful.

The reason I put a 1x6 switching layout into the equation is because I wanted to know the scope that cabooses would be used. To me, that represented the smallest possible layout.

Basically I am re-doing my layout mid-stream because I saw "The Morgan Valley Railroad" Layout from a special addition of Model Railroader Magazine and on the Atlas site and had that Eureka moment where I said this is exactly what I want. My layout different but the point was it had the industrial switching feel but also had the continuous running of an oval.

I figured I might be able to work in the card and waybill system to it as well, renaming the town for each stop.