Hello,

I showed my Southern Railway layout in the layout board. It's a shelf layout with 10.5" deep and approx. 12' long.
The last days, I made some photos and movie clips and you can watch them on my website at

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I hope you'll enjoy the stuff. Here are some appetizers.


Click on thumbs for large pictures.

Cheers, Gerd

Really well done! I like the details around the layout. Looks like you have some good angles to take pictures from as well. The selection of engines are really interesting. That RS3 must be the cleanest around...I've only seen pictures of that engine when it really needed washed. It seems Southern didn't mind letting those engines look filthy. The FM engine is a nice one too. (Now if Atlas would only make a high hood GP30, many Southern modelers would be happy!)

Good job!

Great looking layout Gerd!

Well, I've to weather my rolling stock one day, but I'm not sure how to do that.
A friend of mine has a custom build GP30... A very fine locomotive.

Cheers, Gerd

Nice! Love the trestle!
Ralph

Just curious...

What made you choose to model the Southern Railway? I model that one too, and although I didn't grow up where it ran, I like the history and locations of the railway and that it changed to the Norfolk Southern. But I'm curious how you decided to model the Southern?

Oh...and weathering the rolling stock is a fun and rewarding thing to do. There's some great examples on this forum. I'm certainly no expert...but I like using chalks instead of paints for the subtle color possibilities and control over the color build-up. Many use an air brush to add a thin coat of color where desired, and an air brush probably does the best job. I've tried that, but my air brush skills are not that good yet. Plus for me, I don't have the time to use an air brush and clean it properly, so I stick with chalks that can be used quickly and with minimal preparation and clean up.

Once again...really nice layout and photos.

Hello Mark,

my choise to Southern Railway has fallen some years ago, when I was looking for a loco and some cars to build a Inglenook switching layout. A friend sold me a Southern GP38 from his collection and I really like the paint scheme. The history is also intresting. At least, my favorite locomotives are Shays and I was happy by spotting the Graham County Railroad, that runs Shay locomotives and interchanged directly with the Southern Railway.

So this is the reason why I setteled my layout to the south of North Carolina.

I'll take a try on weathering soon. I've 5 locomotives and 36 cars, so this is not to much to get them all weathered.

Cheers, Gerd

Hello,

yesterday, I founded the freelanced "Southern steam friends" club, located just a few miles away from Topton. This club is lucky to own an original 0-8-0 Southern steamer in operational condition. They held tourist trains on sundays and two times a year a photo special with steam hauled freight trains.


Click on thumbs for large pictures.

Well, I'm just kidding ;-) I recieved my Walthers 0-8-0 yesterday and I needed a good story, how to operate this "oldtimer" on my layout. I just couldn't resist this little engine. Since my layout is set to 1970, only diesel locomotives are used in regular service. But this little story allows it to run the steam engine as well.

There are also some news about my layout.
Since the Graham County Railroad is set to the rear of the module (normally placed against the wall), I can't go forward to build GC related modules and connect them to the Southern modules. For this I decided to rebuild the old GC RoW into a quarry loading spure and I'll build a new GC-Junction module with the GC RoW running to the front of the layout. Once this steps are done, I'll start with some Graham County modules, including the interchange yard, some "miles" of track and a freelanced Robbinsville as terminus.

Cheers, Gerd

Gerd that area is where I live. For the record neither the Southern nor the CGRR ever used a 0=8=0 but the CGRR did use a standard gauge Shay up til 1985. Atlas makes a N scale 2 truck Shay while the CGRR was a 3 truck but hey, close enough! Also neither the Southern nor the GCRR served a rock quarry in this area (although there is a rock quarry serveral miles east alongside Southern trackage) however over by Marble N.C. (several miles west of Topton the Southern did serve a marble quarry). That said this is a hobby and if you want a quarry and like the 0-8-0, no problem! The last regular (none excursion) passenger train on the Southern (never was any on the CGRR) was around 1947 or so and while my layout is set in the late 1960's the Southern does have a passenger train still running. If you can call an F7 and a lone combine a train!
If you are interested, in your time period the CGRR was still shipping a little lumber and furniture and receiving some fuel oil. If you want to use a quarry, in real life the tracks in the quarry at Marble were so bad that they couldn't support the weight of the loco so a gate was put across the tracks at the entrance and the loco would leave the cars there where a front end loader would come and get them then take them into the quarry to be loaded. Once loaded they were picked up by the front end loader which would then push them back out the gate to be picked up by the loco on the return trip from Murphy. All you could see from the mainline was a spur disappearing thru some trees with the gate across it at the tree line, none of the quarry itself could be seen which makes modeling this industry a snap!

Hello Mike,

many thanks for your details about the area around Topton. Since I live in Germany, I can't step out and have a look on an area like Topton to get details for correct modeling. This year, I was in California for vacation and I plan a trip to the east coast in 2 or 3 years. Maybe I'll come down to the Topton area during the next trip.

As my layout is totally freelanced except for the railway companies and the area around Graham County, I've no problems with some extras, not matching the prototype. The layout is designed as a fun layout to operate trains at home and to show the layout on conventions and module meetings. So please be patiend with me 8-)

Yesterday, I started construction on the new junction module. I'll post details in the old progress log at ->
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Cheers, Gerd

If you ever get this way let me know, I'll be glad to give you a tour! I also work at the Lionel Museum owned by the GSMRR (which operates on the old Southern trackage) and can give you a tour of that as well.