The question is fairly straightforward- for me I could probably watch my trains chase themselves all day long if I had the time to do it- there is something hypnotizing about watching them move and work as if it was the real thing in front of my eyes and not a miniature recreation. It (can) beat the heck out of TV and sure does beat the heck out of video games (for me).
Well, I’ve got a fairly large mountain railroad with a pretty long mainline and one of those DC Control Master 20 powerpacks with the 25-foot extension hand controller, so I can, because of the configuration of my mainline, follow a train all around the layout. And since I pretty much run my trains over long 2-2-1/4% grades at 25-40 smph, that can take a while. And since it’s Out West in the 'forties, I don’t have the huge multiple traffic that, say, Horseshoe Curve on the Pennsy would experience, so I can control two trains comfortably with my block system.
But frankly, I’d get a little bored just RUNNING them. So I always make sure that at least one of my trains is a ‘turn’ so that I can do a little switching in my yard, dropping off and picking up cars at the various spurs (which I’m sorry to say, aren’t as many as I’d like), and generally getting in as much action as I can, given my layout. Which can make one of my solo op sessions last several hours (assuming I don’t derail anything in the process, LOL!).
My problem, and it’s been so for the past seven years, is that I don’t yet have any ‘staging’ so that I can vary the trains that I run. Yup, have to stop them and run the locos into the ‘facilities’ and then 0-5-0 the cars off the layout so that I can add a new train. My major yard isn’t really that big enough to store another complete train so that I can break up and make up. Hey, I didn’t plan well, LOL!
But as far as your original question–I’m kind of with you. Once I get started, I could watch trains run all day. In fact, with all the shortcomings of my ‘empire’, I sometimes do.
Tom [:D]
I have to agree with you. While I like watching trais run around in circles it does get old after a while. I would much prefer for them to do what they do in the real world. Unfortunately, at the moment, I don’t have a place where I can operate my trains nor do I belong to club that has operating rather than run sessions.
Irv
I agree - it’s relaxing for me to watch a consist go around the upperlevel which is just on 48 feet of track around the walls of the room. With a tunnel, bridges, inclines and two tracks I can watch for hours. Oddly enough after converting to DCC I ended up spending more time on the lower level with sidings, industries and lots of switches. Often i ended up with the upper level running in circles while I used the switchers on the lower level. Best of both worlds? Sadly it’ll be awhile before I run again as I’m in the middle of tearing it all out due to water damage and the resulting mold but when I get back running it’ll be better than ever. J.R.
Depends on what mood I’m in. If I’m annoyed cause I can’t get a girlfriend or something like that (I’m a teen), or I’m really tired, then probably until someone or something makes me stop. If I’m happy or don’t have a reason to shut myself in the room, then 30 mins.-1 or 2 hours or so before I get bored. Now, if I can have the TV or some music playing in the background, refer to the second sentence’s time.
Hi!
Hard to answer that question, it just depends. There have been times when I would set my head down by trackside and watch a long freight come slowly by, car by car - with my eyeball about 6 inches away. Other times I like to watch the ATSF f units pull a long standard passenger train, and slowly accelerate or decellerate it at different locations. And I confess, I have been known to race them around as fast as they go to test the track quality. All of the above could last a couple of hours, or ten minutes. BUT, its all quality time for sure!!!
ENJOY,
Mobilman44
Well, see, mine won’t run by themselves so well…[:-^]
I do have a few pieces of equipment on the layout that run fine. I sometimes start one of them running, but since I can’t see the entire layout at once, I have to walk along with it and follow it. Kind of defeats the purpose of sitting back and relaxing…
true- it’s easier for me because I have a dinky 4X8.
Some days I have my trains running all day while I work around the layout.
I’ve tried different DC power packs… but everytime, I end up using my hands to make them go round and round [V]
My first layout was a loop. I’d get the train going and get bored in about 30 seconds. After I came to terms with the reality that it is generally not realistic or really interesting to me, I built a loop to loop layout (still not that realistic, but I did have to do something to keep the train running, next it was a point to point layout; with it I missed that feeling of the train settling in on the main line and rumbling along.
Finally, I arrived at this:
It’s a folded loop to point layout with a helix at one end and the reversing loop/terminal on the other. One trip through the layout starts at the loop and goes past the furnace to the helix then along the rear if the layout, behind the furnace to a terminal, there the locomotive is turned on the turntable and switching is done to get a new train ready for the return trip. It is very interactive, but it takes about 5 minutes for the train to go from the terminal to the loop, so I do have time to watch my shays settle in and whirr along (they sound like they are stuck in first gear). For me, I need a mix of running and switching to keep it interesting.
Based solely on the club: I can run for about four hours, or until:
- Parent drags me away
- Knees give out on the hard concrete
- People get annoying.
I usually try to leave having parked the train, not having had to fix it because of power problems, gremlins, etc. It really helps.
the new york and seven has railroad co softwere, and votage drop blocks, singles and computer routes when im watching trains when its going on the softwere now thats cool greg
I am just now developing a card card/waybill system to do a little operating, meaning that up until now my layout has been solely a railfanning setup. I could get a couple of trains going (it’s laid out so that I can separate it into two independent loops), turn on the tv or some music, sit down at my work desk with a project, and spend entire evenings dividing my attention between the three as my whim sees fit. Not a bad way to spend a night by my reckoning. If only I had a free evening to do it. [sigh]
'Til they run out of coal!
With a little background music, I could be out there with the big layout all day and all night.
When I am running loopy de loops at the Bucyrus club I am bored in about a half hour.At the other club I never get bored because its point to point plus you have other jobs such as dispatcher,yardmaster,passenger terminal,the hump,engine terminals and locals to run.I am happiest working a yard or passenger terminal.
My ISLs…Suffice it to say I can spend 4 hours a day switching the industries.
At train shows I’ve run trains for over 7 hours straight. At home I usually spend the afternoon in the basement during my modeling months. A cooler full of beer always adds to the enjoyment, lol.
If… I… only had a train…do do, do do do do do.
Sorry for the Wizard of Oz reference! I have trains, just no layout yet.
Not very!
Of course, one thing driving that is that I have not yet, ‘Closed the loop.’ Like John Armstrong, half a century ago, half of my train miles are run marker-end first to the present end-of-track, then run locomotive first the two scale kilometers to the other end of track (which is physically located right next to the first close to the current end of benchwork - and a couple of scale kilometers short of the portal which will surface to the visible world at the far end of a peninsula across the room once I build the intervening shelf and long, narrow table across the garage door.)
However, once I DO close the loop, the only time a train (or trains) will simply orbit will be if I am showing the layout to some mundane visitors. At any other time, I will be operating a wide variety of trains to the schedule dictated by the fast clock and the employee timetable.
The difference? I am a wannabe dispatcher, not a passive railfan. Getting trains over the road on time, changing engines at the main modeled station (Steam is NOT welcome in the long tunnels between Satsuki and Minamijima, thank you!) having the branchline passenger arrive so the passengers have time to cross through the underpass and get to their commuter connection to… I think you get the idea that I’m a ‘hands in the machinery’ type.
When I want to sit back and relax, I don’t run trains. I read a book.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - TTTO, 24/30)