The December 1999 issue of MRR magazine came in todays mail.
The liftout in the article uses heavy duty cabinet magnetic latches, a total of 6 of them, and the power is wired to the steel plate on one of them on each side.
When the section is lifted out the pwer is cut and trains can’t nose dive off the end.
Very slick setup, two latches on each side hold the track section down, the third latch on each side holds horizontal alignment.
The issue has a lot of other great articles in it and pictures of one of the most detailed layouts and scenery I’ve ever seen, with floor to celing scenery-AWESOME!!!
Thank you Sir. Well said. I still have much to learn about the entire electrical side of the hobby. My hope is to go DCC and save myself a few aggravations, but I am as clueless of it as I am DC honestly.
Thanks for the info Sir. Yes Andy is a great guy from all I’ve ever heard… I may actually have that copy around here, I’ll dig through my back issues and check and if not I’ll see about picking up a copy of it and taking a look.
I have to agree that it does seem a good improvement to me as well. Thanks btw its been a fun and sometimes frustrating process to get here, I can’t wait to see it taker shape in reality and have a life off the piece of paper.
I accept the burden sir, and will see to it. Our bench work should be here by the end of next week and the painting should happen sometime around the same time, I’ll be sure and post up some pics for the gang.
My friend I would be honored and delighted to have you over anytime you’d like. It would be a real treat to get to meet you in real life. We will have to make a date of it and get her done.
Now that sounds important, but for the life of me having read it now three times I’m no
Unless I am crosseyed, originally it crossed a train from the outside loop to the inside (right handed operation - counterclockwise). Now it crosses a train running in the opposite direction (a clockwise train), or on the opposite (left handed operation) track.
I see what you’re saying now. I was looking at the turnout that went from the main table and moved onto the leaf. That turnout was a righthanded one to start with and it stayed a right hander. I didn’t even notice that the other one flipped 180 degrees! I’m with you now!
Ok, I’ll try again. Starting with the most basic premise of a double track main line. Assuming the trains are right-hand rule (just like cars) a train on the outside loop will be circulating counter-clockwise. Trains on the inside loop will be circulating clockwise.
The crossovers serve two purposes. First is to act as a run aound when there is not enough room for a third track. This is true of the town at the top. The town at the bottom has a third track on both the inside and outside loops, so run around is not an issue here. Plus in a run around move it doesn’t mater the direction of the cross because the train will backup through one anyway. The second purpose of a crossover is to allow a train moving in one direction to pass another slower train moving in the same direction. It is in this regard I like the original arrangment better. Let us be a counter-clockwise train running on the outside loop. When we get to the center top, we can cross over to the inside loop, stop, and let a faster train go by. After it passes we can take the crossover on the curve and get back to our track. Now if we are a clockwise train we can do the same thing, taking the crossover on the lift out to the outside track, and returning to our own track in the center bottom right under the wye. So as originally designed there are two sets of “passing sidings” one for each loop. If the crossover direction on the lift out is changed, then there are three crossovers from the in
Possibly a small point, but do you want to always back your trains into staging? Since there are no escape tracks, your engines will be trapped if you run them in engine first unless you intend to move them around by hand.
That’s fine if that’s what you intended and it is “just staging”, but it might be something to consider.