Night operations

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

When designing my layout, the plan was to eventually do 24 hour operations. I think night photos of model railroads are some of the most dramatic. I have only recently begun normal daylight operations and already I can see many pitfalls in doing full fledged night operations. Depending on your operating scheme, you would need to be able to read waybills and/or switchlists and you aren’t going to be able to do that just by the lights on the layout so already your night effect is going to be compromised. Since yard switching is a big part of operations, that would require having a lighted yard, something I planned but have not yet been implemented. Then there is the problem of trying to read a control panel to set turnouts and also being able to even see if turnouts are set properly. Naturally, you are going to want to have lighted structures and street lights but even that isn’t going to be that simple. Streetlights would be on from dusk to dawn but what about the structures. Homes and businesses aren’t going to be lighted all night long so you would need at least two levels of lighting. What about automobiles. The ones that aren’t parked should have headlights on. There’s more time and expense. Then of course overnight there wouldn’t be nearly as much automobile or pedestrian traffic or passengers on platforms waiting for trains. I’m sure there are other challenges I haven’t even thought of yet.

The more I think about it, the more I’m leaning toward just doing a limited amount of night operations. Right now my schedule commences at 6:00 am and the last two trains are overnight passenger trains that will pull into my main passenger station after dark, swap sleepers, and then continue on. One of them will pick up a preboarded sleeper in route several towns away and that is the last scheduled train. I just don’t see night operations progressing beyond that. I will have enough lighting on the layout to do some selected night scenes that could be really cool and

2

I have tried it and all the things you say are issues I too experienced . I did find however that using blue light bulbs gave me the effect of night time plus I got plenty of light to work by . Lighting buildings and autos is always an issue but you could use it create specific scenes

3

I will only address two of your issues. First, reading documents would be pretty easy with one of those little head lights like Peggy Hill uses to read in bed.

Second, all the years I worked nights on the railroad, we never had much light except for what our lanterns gave us. The carmen used lantern light to inspect cars and to run the air when a train was made up. Clerks used a lantern to read car numbers etc. I found it much easier using a lantern to give hand signals when flat switching cars. Much better visability than hand signals given in the daylight.

Charlie

4

Second the blue (moon?) light. It can be quite bright without breaking the ‘night’ feeling.

Car cards can be read under a shielded light set into the fascia.

Control panels can be edge-lighted. If made of lexan, they can be backlighted.

Even with light towers, 1:1 scale yard hands resort to flashlights to read reporting marks and switch lists. So scale down to a pen light and carry on.

Structure lights can be on several different circuits, turned on and off by a gizmo like a music box cylinder connected to the scale time clock - or simply a row of toggles with marked ON and OFF times.

Granted that going from daylight to moonless night entails a good bit of thinking outside the box, and completion of the necessary lighting arrangements. Pilots have flown aircraft at night for a long time. If they can do it, so can we.

Chuck (Retired aircraft maintenance tech modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)

5

One thing I wouldn’t advise is using blue lights. [swg]

I know it’s often done (adapted from live theater) but I don’t find it that realistic. I use LEDs from Evans Designs that come with the resistor and diodes already attached so you can run them on DC or AC - even hooked right up to 14V DCC. I use an old Tech II power pack, and keep the bulbs spaced out maybe 3’ or so apart. I use the ‘regular’ ones rather than ‘sunlight’, so they are a little bluish, but it’s very subtle.

I keep the power very low, just enough to give the effect of “starlight”. I use the other side of the dual power pack to run building and streetlights, also kept very low. Usually the LEDs are on 20-30% full power, the street/building lights maybe 50-60%.

DON’T just hook the lights up direct to a 12V power source, they’ll be too bright and not look realistic.

6

I have 4 ‘room’ lights, in addition to the layout lights. I turn off the layout lights and just use the room lights. There is a small light fixture by the waybill/car card spot for each town. Even then, it has been hard to read reporting marks, and I have had to use small 9 LED flashlights(Harbor Freight) to read the reporting marks. there always seems to be miss-routed cars! After three attempts, I gave up on night operation. Running trains for visitors has worked OK in night mode…

Jim

7

I think the blue helps keep visibility while keeping the night effect. anyways… why superbright LED’s should be used… This is my DM&IR (Union) 0-10-2 which has been given a major workover, and runs slow and smooth now, changed motor, reworked universal to gearbox, QSI sounded. Yes them super tiny LED’s are a fun one to wire…

8

The Sierra Pacific Club in Pasadena http://www.pmrrc.org/ automatically switches to night every half hour for a few minutes. The effect is pretty cool.

In both television and live theatre control rooms we have small work lights which light up the boards so we can work. You can buy similar units at your favorite music or DJ lighting store, http://www.pssl.com/Gooseneck-Task-Lights/Littlite-12-In-Gooseneck-Light-WPower-Supply-25W or make them yourself. There are cheaper battery powered versions. You can place them above your control panels. You can use small flashlights or lighted reading glasses to see the numbers on the cars.

Blue Christmas lights work fine for night with an occasional yellow light to represent the moon. Position the lights so they shine on the back of your models not the front so the side you see is in the shadows. Block the light so it doesn’t shine on the backdrop. Keep that dark. For added effect you could use red, orange and yellow lights on the background sky to create magnificent sunsets before changing to night.

There are plenty of street lights and yard lights available to light up your exterior scenes. The problem is lighting structures and vehicles. Not only do the structures have to have interior lighting, it can’t be universal in every room unless it is a factory or office. “You heard your mother, turn off the light when your not in your room!” They also require porch lights, lights for signs and light from televisions, fireplaces and more. With most structures the light shines through the plastic walls and the structure seems to glow so yo

9

I use blue LED rope lighting, not the blue light bulb type. The blue LEDs emit part of the ultraviolet spectrum. Not everythings glows, but yellow and green seem to work.

I use toggle switches to control my turnots, so I put a dot of flourescent paint on the side of the switch which is the normal position. I also use a set of three beads on a pin as a tiny “switchstand” to mark the normal position of the turnout on the layout itself.

It doesn’t do a thing for operations, but the stars painted on the backdrop come alive with the blue LEDs.

10

The more I’ve thought about the challenges, the more I am inclined to do very limited night operations. Probably more for staged scenes and a little bit of night running. I hadn’t even thought of porch lights but that is something we would expect to see and which I haven’t seen done but it would look pretty cool if done well. Maybe a single LED would work.

Any structure that I planned to have interior lights in was given an undercoat of black paint on the inside of the walls to prevent turning the structure into a lantern. For the most part, those walls are not visible and those that are can be painted over.

11

Yes, a good habit to have. I started paying attention to this in my builds several years ago, not all get lights, but they are ready if they do.

For retrofitting, etc, I’ve found black construction paper works well. Cheap, easy to fit and attach (mostly), it sometimes is just easier to control than paint can be. And it doesn’t let the light through at all, so long as you cut closely to the windows, doors, etc when fitting it.