Rather than hijack a different thread, I thought I’d start my own. I’m getting ready to add telephone poles to my town area. I changed my era to 1920’s/1930’s recently. What I’ve noticed is the rediculous amount of overhead wires in a town of this era. The thought of trying to run ten wires per cross beam with two to four beams per pole is intimidating. Do any of you fellow modelers add the wires to these poles or just install the poles for the general idea?
Stringing wires on poles near the front of the layout is asking for problems - even with the “elastic” wire out there. Stringing the poles to the rear of the layout may add enough effect, without the danger of snagging them by accident![:)]
When looking at a full-size scene, utility wires tend to vanish (which is why it’s always a shock to find one angling across that carefully composed railfan picture.) That’s why I propose to model the poles, crossarms and insulators - and let the viewer imagine the ‘virtual’ wiring that isn’t there.
I’m going to do the same thing with my 1500VDC catenary - which would ordinarily be a lot more visible than 1920-era telephone wire.
(For those modeling recent/present day communication systems, those thick cables are NOT invisible, and should be modeled.)
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Good to hear! I’m thinking that I’ll put in a few poles with the option of adding wires later. I didn’t know if you could really see the wires anyway.
You’ll see 'em when the dust settles on 'em.
Corey,
I have line poles on my layout but have not added wires to them for the reasons already mentioned. I still have way too much to accomplish on my layout. I sure don’t want to be working around lines just to add scenery.
Laying wires would probably be the last thing I’d do before completing my layout. Even so, just the sight of the poles standing next to the track really adds a tangible dimension to the layout that I didn’t expect.
Tom
Stringing telephone poles are “elbow catchers” and can cause a lot of headaches. I do not wire telephone poles. I will however wire the high voltage lines from the power plant I’ll install one of these days on my layout. They will be in the far reaches of the layout so that they won’t get bumped into…chuck
Corey,
If you do decide to use wires (I chose not to), please do not pull then tight as a guitar string. I see a lot of these in photos, even in MR. They look all wrong to this electrical engineer and really ruin the believability of a layout. No wires look better to me.
Real wires are installed with a certain amount of sag or droop so that they don’t pull the poles over when winter comes around. Take a look a real wires from a high vantage point and you’ll see that they are all arcs, not straight horizontal lines. [soapbox]
Just one of my pet peeves. Good luck.
Karl
I haven’t installed the poles yet but when I do, wires will be strung. When I do string the wires, the poles will be positioned either on the far side of the tracks or near the backdrop where there will be far less chance of them getting snagged by a reach in. I guess we all have different ideas about what needs to be there and what can be left to imagination. Passengers in my coaches and building interiors are for the most part things I don’t notice if they are not there. To have poles without wires seems to me it would stand out like a sore thumb. I would be more inclined to leave out the poles than to plant them without wires.
I don’t string telephone line but I do string power lines; this is because I charge my lines with 25000 volts. I haven’t had cat problems in twenty years.
With as many times as I have seen the tall trees become laying logs due to a random elbow or T-shirt, I can only imagine that wiring your poles would be asking for trouble?
I don’t model very much (at all) but I have looked at many, many layouts with my hubby and just having the poles themselves creates the desired effect, from an on-lookers point of view anyway.
Although, there was one layout I saw where a section of the town was extremely detailed, with wires and lights and everything. That was a very pretty scene to look at, but I could easily understand why the entire layout wasn’t done as detailed.
S.W.B.C.'s Wife
I thought about it once but I sat there trying to think of how I would make it without the wires looking too thick. Plus I know myself or somebody else would probably snag them and wreck something So in the end it just didn’t sound like a worthwhile goal.
Hmm-maybe that might be a solution to a minor spider problem I’ve been noticing in the new basement. [:-,]
I will string my power lines , but I do believe I’ll use the Bershire Junction EZ-Line. It does look good and sags realistically. And from their demo it looks to be forgiving of clumsy people like me.[:D]
I think it would look awesome to have all of the wires strung. However, knowing my attention span, I would try to do it too quickly, and make a mess of it. Then later I’d bump it and be pissed. I think I’ll leave the lines down for now. If I do install them, I think I’d try the flexible stuff. Thanks for all of your input.
If you are modeling the 1920s/1930s, I tend to agree with you about the huge numbers of wires that were on the utility poles back then. I used to work in the telephone industry, and can give a little background about why that was, but is no more.
Nobody really thinks about how their phone call gets from point A to point B. This explanation refers to “land lines”, not “cellular telephones”. These days, your phone call will go over a pair of wires from your home or workplace to a local telephone exchange office, which can handle 10,000 customers. That office is identified by the first three digits of your seven-digit phone number. The last four digits of your phone number are the number that identifies your telephone from the other 9,999 phones that can connect to that office (if you use all of the numbers from 0000 to 9999, that gives 10,000 different numbers).
Once your phone call is connected to the local office, that office automatically connects your call to another local office, or to a “toll” office (if it’s a long-distance call). Local calls might stay within the same office if the first three digits are the same as yours, or go to another local office if the first three digits are different. With that explanation, it stands to reason that a pair of wires has to go between your house and your local office to provide this connection (there are exceptions to this
Even though this really isn’t train related, it is something I do since my trains and workshop are in my basement.Both ORTHO and BAYER ( not the aspirin people) make products to help keep those little critters out of your house.I mix up a solution from CONCENTRATE and SPRAY it in a HOSE END SPRAYER around the exterior foundation of my house and also the window frames, etc, and it helps to keep spiders, and small insects out for about 3 months per application.
You can spray the eaves also, etc.
Being it is now turning cold, those little OUTSIDE CRITTERS and are looking for WARMER INSIDE accomodations.
This stuff does help keep them out.
I had a friend who had some real grievances when a tiny little spider crawled up inside one of his locomotives!
Probably wouldn’t hurt to keep a can of crawling and flying insect spray handy also near the layout.
TheK4Kid
Yup. And I model the drops to the buildings from the power poles. And the conduit and meters on the buildings. I worked for the electrical utility so my layout doesn’t look right to me without those details.
Are you serious? Do you have pictures?
Just a thought…
If your telephone poles come with three crossbars - you don’t have to keep all three crossbars thanks to ye olde utility knife and weathering techniques.
Many times, telephone poles only have one crossbar. This would reduce your elastic wiring requirements.