Model Railroad Blog

Switching Layouts, Design Lessons Learned

Through years of operating my layouts, rail fanning, and studying rail fan videos, I’ve gained insights I didn’t have before. This knowledge has changed how I design things, how I stage a layout for an operating session, and how I operate.

The more you understand the prototype and just copy what they’ve done, the easier your life is. They are in the efficiency business, not the entertainment business. Over time, they’ve developed the best track flow and operational procedures. No judgment, but at some point you need to decide whether you want a “model of a railroad” or another version of our hobby’s deeply embedded toy-train approach to design and operations (overly dense track arrangements, high turnout counts, runarounds, switchbacks, etc.).

Runarounds? These are virtually non-existent when a local gets deep in the bowels of an industrial park. If a park has a facing-point turnout, they can just work it another day when they’re heading the opposite direction. A standard-size switching layout doesn’t have room for runarounds, and trying to shoehorn one in is disruptive and compromises the design.

Modern switching operations are primarily an exercise in push/pull shoves.

When you walk into a modern industrial park, many (or even most) of the spurs are empty. The pros sweep things clean almost immediately after unloading. When staging a solo op. session, things are much easier if you don’t overload the layout with cars.

Taking these observations and applying them to my East Rail layout I’ve noticed:

Having super long leads such as A and B is extremely helpful. At the start of an op. session I always leave at least one of them totally empty or mostly empty. The most helpful tracks on a switching layout are these long sorting tracks, not runarounds.

Although it’s shorter, track C is also handy when you’re sorting cars out.

Watch your car length math when it comes to lead length. SALCO is a major customer. In note D. I mention the importance of making sure that the approach lead to SALCO is at least as long as the SALCO spur PLUS one engine length.

Important side note: When I originally built the layout, I really thought I’d need to make approach lead D much longer, to the point where I’d punch a hole in the wall to make a staging extension. I’ve since found, by running the layout, that this is totally unnecessary. No extension cassette needed, thank God!

Pay attention to lead E and give yourself some length here. It doesn’t need to be as long as spurs A and B but get it as close as you can.

For more thoughts like this, check out my book: How To Design A Small Switching Layout.

Sentry Industries – East Rail

Sentry Industries in Miami makes water treatment products. Don’t be misled by its diminutive size; it processes an enormous number of cars. The black tanker contains sodium hydroxide. The white car on the right is loaded with hydrochloric acid.

In some cases, we can create a high-value, sophisticated industry without doing much of anything. Free money, if you will. A simple label change on a track plan and “suggesting” the industry’s structures just beyond the layout’s boundaries is all it takes. That’s what came to mind this week while operating the East Rail layout.

Running parallel to the canal, on the fascia side of the layout, was a long lead that I had loosely labeled as a “possible” lead to a scrap yard. I’d never really used it. A simple change of perspective, one that entailed very little work, resulted in repurposing it as a plausible centerpiece industry: Sentry Industries.

The idea started while I was scrolling through Tolga’s East Rail videos. I came across one where he did a deep dive into work East Rail’s largest customer, Sentry Industries, a water treatment facility. (he has at least two others on Sentry). Link to their company website HERE.

Then it hit me. With very little work, I could make that little used lead represent Sentry. I added a gate and some unloading hoses and changed the label on the track plan. The structure, a surprisingly innocuous one-story affair, is assumed to exist just off the layout.

An aerial view of Sentry, facing west, on a slow day. It’s a fairly simple, unpretentious, and “not-huge” buidling.

What surprises me when I look at photos of Sentry is the lack of clearly visible unloading apparatus. Apparently, they do it all with hoses that connect to tanks inside (see the company video). You can see numerous unloading hoses on the ground under the large fan.

Rolling Stock

From what I’ve gathered so far there are four incoming chemicals, all in tanks:

-Chlorine (Atlas makes these cars)

-Hydrochloric acid. White with a red oxide band. (Atheran Genesis.)

-Sodium Hypochlorite. Usually, but not always, all white cars.

-Sodium Hydroxide. Usually (but not alway) white with a black band.

Placards

1791: Hypochlorite Solution

1824: Sodium Hydroxide

1017: Chlorine

1789: Hydrochloric Acid

Operations

From what I can tell, they don’t block the cars in any particular order when placing them within the gate. They appear to be in a totally random order.

Often, but not always, a buffer car is used. Maybe that depends on what chemicals are in any given train’s manifest?

Fusee’s are often put out when crossing 58th street.

It seems pretty common that they don’t have room within the gates for all the incoming cars, so they are temporarily placed “offspot” in front of SALCO or just outside the gate.

Shoving loads across 58th Street into the gate. Note the buffer car and fusees.

Loaded cars placed offspot in front of SALCO. Front to back I “think” we have: hypochlorite solution, sodium hydroxide, chlorine.

This photo, taken on a different day, shows more off-spots. Sodium hydroxide on the left, chlorine on the right. The gate to Sentry and 58th Street is just behind me.

The Sentry structure is “implied” just beyond the layout’s boundaries. Further evidence that there is an industry being served is the trackside unloading hoses made from .032″ solder.

Gates and fencing were added to further highlight the industry’s boundaries.

The takeaway is that a simple change in labeling and perspective creates more interesting and meaningful operating sessions, an opportunity to research and learn more about hazmat tanks, and the opportunity to model the different cars.

If discussions like this interest you, check out my book “Industry Planning for Modern Era Switching Layouts”.

East Rail Ops. Video

I just uploaded a new video showing a typical solo op. session on the East Rail layout. Typically, something like this would be highly cropped, with a focus on being entertaining. I decided to break form and show the vast majority of the session so viewers can get a sense of speed and pacing. I trust everybody knows where the fast-forward button is. The session actually ran about thirty minutes, and I did do some cropping to get it down to twenty.

-The session begins with an incoming train of cars for OMNI, Vision Candles, and SALCO.

-There are two pickups, an empty reefer at OMNI and a tank loaded with recycled oil at the team track.

-The first moves were scooping up the pickups and temporarily placing them on a nearby spur.

Now for spotting the incomings.

-The tank was placed at Vision Candles.

-The two boxcars were spotted at OMNI.

-Two boxcars of salt were placed at SALCO.

-Finally, the empties were collected and the train headed back to the yard.

The point is that the layout only has a handful of turnouts. Keeping things plausible and without any hokey “make-work” moves, this work plan spun off a relaxing half-hour session.

No Room at the Inn

On a prior shift, the Downtown Spur job, Y120, rolled down the line heading eastward. In the train was a red boxcar designated to be spotted at Family & Son. The problem was that when they arrived, they discovered not all of the cars at said F&S had been unloaded. There wasn’t room for the red boxcar. Rather than take it back to the yard, they just dropped it nearby for positioning the next shift. It becomes what is called an “offspot”. I’ve staged this scenario for an upcoming op session. What the crew will do is pull all four cars, put the three empties on the train, and then place the red boxcar in position.

While the scenario in the caption above doesn’t happen every day, it’s not that unusual. The crew arrives at an industry, and the work order calls for them to pick up the empties and replace them with incoming loads. However, sometimes not all of the empties have been unloaded, creating a situation where there isn’t room for all of the incoming loads. In these cases, they don’t take the load back to the yard. They’ll park it “offspot” meaning they’ll just place it nearby. The next trip out, when all of the cars in the way have been unloaded, they’ll move the “offspot” into place. It makes for an interesting and realistic scenario for a model op. session (as long as you don’t overdo it) and another example of how even a simple one-turnout industry can take time to switch.

Here’s an aerial of Family and Son facing north on a quiet day. The green building on the right is Northwestern Meat, which is no longer rail-served.

Here’s the same location facing south on a busy day. When the local came by with orders to drop the red boxcar at Family and Son, they found there wasn’t room for it. Rather than take it back to the yard, they parked it in front of Northwestern Meat temporarily. When space frees up, it will be spotted in its final location.

LAJ Extension Bridge

In my last blog on September 5th, I toyed with the idea of adding a removable extension of the LAJ main across the room entrance doorway. Although I’m still not sure how much I’ll use it, I decided to make it operational.

To protect against getting bumped and knocked to the floor, I added a removable pin (i.e., a nail) on the layout side to anchor it in place. A power feed and guard rails were also added. This may be overkill, as I wouldn’t use the bridge when guest operators are over.

Alignment blocks were added on the left. I’m not sure these are really needed, but they didn’t take much work to install.

Murphy’s law being what it is, if I didn’t add the pins and guardrails, sure enough, a month from now I’d bump into it and send things to the floor.