L&N Industrial Rail Spur

[Mike Kieran]

The secret to my happy marriage is that I married someone that's very near sighted.

[FCIN]

The secret to my happy marriage is that I married someone that's very near sighted.

My wife and I met on a blind date. She still wonders which one of us couldn't see...

[Mike Kieran]

Good one!!!

My wife and I also met on a blind date. As long as she has bad vision, I'm a stud!

[FCIN]

Although this thread long ago outlived its usefulness, I thought I'd post my current track plan and operating scheme, just to let you know that I'm still messing around with the layout when time permits. Now that the project that has occupied all my time for the past few months is about finished; I'm hoping that I can actually start doing something with the model railroad very soon. I sure need the relaxation!     Before anyone feels the need to mention it - yes, the current plan is a much longer version of Lance Mindheim's simple but elegant Palmetto Spur track plan, but without the everybody has one team/transload track. As before, layout size is 18in deep by 20ft in length. The switch on the left side of the plan is non-operating and just a scenic element to show that the spur connects to the outside world.

After trying plan after plan and never being quite satisfied with any of them; based on actual experience and observations it occurred to me that an industrial spur that is only about 1,600 feet in length would be very unlikely to have more than two or three industries located on it, at least not ones that would support several car spots. After carefully picking and choosing the industries that I liked and ones that would support most all of my equipment types, this seems quite plausible and operating this plan is working out just fine, with a typical one man session taking about an hour to complete - longer when two of us operate it. I certainly can't say right now that this will be the final plan for my switching layout, but so far, I'm pleased with the simple design and the amount of switching involved. It's also something that I feel I could get to a reasonable state of completion in a short amount of time.

The industries are:
Sherwood Foods - a food products distributor that receives general service tank cars of cooking oils, box cars of canned goods, sugar, coffee, rice, beans, and refrigerator cars of frozen meats. 4 car spots.
Blommer Chocolates - Name says it all - they receive covered hoppers and occasional box cars of cocoa beans, Airslide hoppers of sugar and Corn Syrup tanks of corn sugar. 2 car spots (more on that in a minute)
Midwest Distribution Warehouse: Receives box cars of various products. 4 car spots.

I should also mention that an idea suggested on some other posts about occasionally changing out the industries is also being contemplated. I'll have to see if I feel any real need to do that, but it's certainly something to consider and a good excuse to build different structures.

In regard to Blommer Chocolates: I was going to base this one on the Blommer facility in Union City, CA, which can spot up to 4 cars of different types at a time, but then after experimenting a little, I decided that basing it on their Chicago, IL, facility actually provides more operation. At the Chicago plant they can only spot two cars at a time on their street level track (they actually have two spurs on different levels and sides of the plant) so the types of cars vary from session to session and can be a mixture of different cars and commodities. Blommer must be switched each session and there are usually cars waiting to be spotted on the lead to the plant, which require spotting as instructed by the facility. Sometimes you'll spot two covered hoppers of cocoa beans, then the next time a tank car and Airslide or two of each or other combinations. All depends on what is received and how the plant orders them to be spotted. I'll change the name of this facility to something else, so it won't pin me down to a certain location as this is purely a free-lance layout.

The one thing that makes operations of a simple plan such as this more interesting and typical of what a train crew would encounter on such a spur is even though cars are blocked out in industry order when the train enters the spur, it doesn't mean that cars in the train spot in the order they are lined up in the train. Each industry has its own spotting instructions, which the crew doesn't receive until they arrive at the facility. So you often have to swap cars around and even leave some constructively placed for the next trip on the spur. Combine that with some cars that must be re-spotted and things can get interesting.

Well that's it for now. Didn't mean to get so windy and a lot of these ideas have been covered before so sorry if I bored you. I know a plan like this won't appeal to the vast majority of model railroaders, but it's certainly prototypical and gives you the feel of actually working rail served sized industries. I'll see how this works out after operating it for a while. I'm just completely out of ideas and sick of the constant planning and re-planning! When you get right down to it, the track arrangement is not the most important factor of a switching layout, but rather the industries and their size.

Of course I could wake up in the middle of the night and come up with something a bit different (Oh No!!) - so we'll see. At some point, when I actually (finally?) start building the layout, I'll start a new thread and bore you some more.

[postman]

Hi!. Like your idea. Any update?

[FCIN]

Hi!. Like your idea. Any update?

Thanks for your interest postman. About the only update at this point is a slight modification I've made to the plan as shown here:     Moved the chocolates plant to the end of the benchwork and added a 4th small industry, which really hasn't added much to overall operations and may be overkill. As noted in the previous posting, a prototype spur of this length wouldn't be too likely to be filled with industries and in fact might only serve one or two industries that would justify rail service.

Just my three main industries provide plenty of prototypical switching and have had a few operating sessions on the layout and am quite pleased so far, although I still can't say that this will be the final plan. I'm still toying around with some other ideas, but so far, none of them look quite right for a short industrial spur.

A typical "solo" operating session is taking at least one hour with no added time killing and when two of us operate it, it tends to take even longer when one of us is strictly engineer and the other conductor.

Undecided if I'll start a new thread once I begin final construction, as I don't feel there is really that much interest in my plan or ideas these days and there are several much more interesting threads you can find on here. Must say that many of the other layout threads have all been cause for me to stop and rethink my own plans! Just too many ideas out there!

[SSWUPinSA]

[/quote]

Track is laid out and in operation and since I don't have time to do much except operate it once or twice a week, I'm still considering this a test plan for now. Have made a few structure mockups which helps to give me a feel for how the finished layout might look and must say that I enjoy operating it when I need a break from the other project. So far, I'm pretty well pleased with how it's all working out.[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

[/quote]

I like this plan

[Justinmiller171]

I like this plan

So do I

[FCIN]

I'm still around and check out Big Blue once or twice or day, but tend to just stay on the side lines lately.; so I was more than a little surprised to see comments posted on what I thought was a long dead thread (hey! that rhymes). At most I figured it had outlived its usefulness a long time ago.

Not much to report other then to admit that I'm still playing around with slight variations to my basic plan and the industries on it. I may be the only person on Big Blue that comes up with a slightly different layout plan every couple of months; makes structure mockups; and operates it off and on for a while; while never really doing any real construction. I have to say that I actually enjoy making these changes and being able to operate the revised plan to see how well it does/doesn't work - while still looking for a plan that I find really interesting/unusual and one that I'll try to get to a finished state.

Now that it appears we're going straight from summer into winter like we did last year, it's time to put away the camera, say goodbye to the yard work and get more involved with the model railroading. In spite of spending much of my time out photographing trains and other things, I do operate the layout once or twice a week, and really enjoy being to spend a nice hour or so switching; but just haven't got involved enough to really start building.

With all that said; here is the current track plan (18in X 20ft HO Scale):     Industries on this plan are:
1) Frozen Foods Distributor: Inbound Refrigerator Cars of meat/produce/frozen foods - 2 car spots
2) Distribution Warehouse: Inbound Box Cars of various commodities - 5 car spots
3) Cooking Oils Distributor: Inbound General Service Tank Cars of assorted cooking oils
4) Car Storage and/or Team Track - 2 or 3 car spots
5) Another Warehouse Structure (undetermined business at this time): Inbound Box Cars - 3 car spots
6) Bakery: Inbound Airsilde Hoppers of flour - 2 car spots ***this can alternately be a small candy manufacturer that receives both Airslide hoppers and Corn Syrup tank cars although the C/S tanks I have are just a bit too modern for my era and have currently been mothballed.

I've been testing this plan out for about 2 months and seems to be fine for the most part. The main thing that I like about this plan is it allows for plenty of box car spots; something that has been missing from previous versions, while still allowing for most of my other equipment types. Since my modeling era is the late 70s to early 80s - plenty of box car traffic was still in use and also the colorful short line IPD box cars were plentiful. Also none of that horrid spray paint graffiti and cars that look that they are headed for the scrapper.

An operating session where I place/pull one or two cars from each industry is taking over an hour without any time killing; so not every industry gets worked every session and I end up with a session taking right at one hour, which is about right for me.

But, as previously mentioned, I still seem to be looking for another track/industry arrangement that keeps eluding me for some reason. I've also been having second thoughts about the number of industries and car spots and wonder at times if I'm over doing it a bit. I've found that just placing/pulling 2 to 4 cars a session still takes around an hour, so perhaps I need to scale things back a bit. Perhaps slightly smaller structures with fewer car spots and the industries spaced out a bit more? Just undecided right now, so more operating sessions are in order.

So that's where things stand with me for now. Maybe one of these days, I'll start a new thread when I actually settle on a "final" plan and really do some work on it. Then again, maybe having the ability to change things around now and then is the way to go for me?

[SSWUPinSA]

Looking back over your thread I reall like the first few designs you came up with. Probably not massively prototypical but I think with these ISL's one needs to make a compromise between real life and miniature life

Always been a great thread with loads of advice from you that relates to the real life operations of the branches.

[Mike Kieran]

Ed,
I'm glad to hear from you. How about a furniture company.

Inbound loads would be box cars (hardware, lumber, stuffing, fabric, pipe), flat cars(lumber, pipe), steel coil loads (sheet steel for furniture framework), gondolas (wire cables), tank cars (glue, lacquer and paint).

Outbound loads would be box cars (furniture), gondolas (scrap), and covered hoppers (saw dust bound for meat packers).

If I were to make an ISL/short line with just 2 industries, I would pick a food processing plant and a furniture company. They both have just about every type of freight cars being used.

[Justinmiller171]

Ed,

Have you thought about building a short-line and only having 1-2 industries? It would probably make it easier to get settled on a design.

[Brakie]

Ed,

Have you thought about building a short-line and only having 1-2 industries? It would probably make it easier to get settled on a design.

Allow me to but in..I went that route years ago with 2 large industries and found for me it became boring after 6 months-not enough spice in car types like a regular ISL with a transload or team track.

[Justinmiller171]

Allow me to but in..I went that route years ago with 2 large industries and found for me it became boring after 6 months-not enough spice in car types like a regular ISL with a transload or team track.

Ed made some nice track-plans awhile ago for shortlines that included transload tracks: http://bigbluetrains.com/forum/viewtopic...=46&t=6288

I especially like the track-plan for the Augusta RR, maybe something similar to that would work good in the space you have available.

[Mike Kieran]

A layout with 2 industries could work. A furniture plant and a food processor could allow for a wide variety of freight cars.