I could use a little help figuring out how to arrange my service facilities I’m going to really show my ignorance here–I don’t even know what buildings/structures I need. Figure that it is going to be 1880’s, Western, & Coal for fuel. I know I need an engine house for mechanical service.
What else?
Supposing I pull into a yard and drop my freight for a switcher. Can someone explain to me what has to happen before I get back out on the track?
My simplistic view would assume the two main requirements would be to repleni***he water in the tank and also the coal in the tender, coffee and beans for the crew and a means of turning the loco around, ie, turntable or wye, or maybe it will just run out in reverse.
have fun & be safe
Karl.
Components of a basic steam engine service facility:
Enginehouse/roundhouse to store engines not in use or being worked on. Steam engines are not really supposed to be left outdoors in bad weather, so they were for both storage when not in use and minor repair.
Turntable to turn them around.
Coaling tower (or big wood bin, if your engines are woodburners, or oil spigot, if your steamers burn oil.) Considering you are modeling the Northcoast, you’d be using wood or oil rather than coal.
Water tower, to refill water tanks. Water towers are also found generally once every ten miles or so–steam engines use a LOT of water.
Sand tower, to refill sanding dome
RIP track (Repair-In-Place) for minor repairs
A pit track–essentially a pit between the tracks–for engines to dump ash from the firebox and where crews can work under the engines to scrape out a***hat can’t be dumped (as you might guess, an extremely unpleasant job.)
Yard office/ready room building where crews can hang out and the shop foreman works, as well as for engine hostlers (crews whose jobs is to move engines around a service facility.)
A couple assorted shanties/sheds to store equipment
If it’s a major facility you could also use shops buildings, transfer tables, and lots of repair tracks but for a “drop your freight off and stock up” type place you won’t need more than one outside track with some rusty parts and tools around it to represent a repair track for light work.
What happens when you stop: Engine disengages from train and moves to servicing facility. If the engine is going to start back up soon, fill water tanks at tower and load up on fuel, engineer and fireman check fittings and do some periodic lubrication with a tallow-pot (an oil can.) Fill up sand if needed, change crews if it’s time to do that, turn the train around if it’s at the end of the line and has to go back the other way.
For
Chip,
Well, it looks like Jetrock pretty much covered it all. I will add that MR came out with a good resounce in the last 6 months or so entitled, “The Model Railroader’s Guide to Locomotive Servicing Terminals”, by Mary McGuirk.
The book contains a good balance of history, information, facts, and pictures - covering a wide variety of both steam and diesel servicing capabilities. Here’s what they list on the contents page:
SECTION ONE - Steam locomotive services
1 - Fuel for Steam - Modeling coaling towers and trestles
2 - Water tank and columns - Detailing the Atlas water tank - Building a laser-cut tank
3 - Ash pits and cinder hoists - Modeling an ash pit
4 - Wash racks, inspection pits, and sandhouses - Modeling sandhouses and towers
5 - Turntables - Modeling turntables
6 - Engine houses and roundhouses - Modeling roundhouses
SECTION TWO - Diesel locomotive servicing
7 - Diesel locomotive servicing
SECTION THREE - Modeling servicing terminals
8 - General design considerations - Building a steam-era terminal - Building a diesel engine terminal - Weathering track with ground foam
They even highlight and walk you through assembling a few particular kits in each section. It’ll run you $17.95 MSRP. Hope that helps…
Tom
Chip,
Obviously I wasn’t around in the 1880s, but I wonder how many of the things listed were around. I am curious as to how common it was to see a roundhouse or a turntable back then. I would think that there would just be an old wooden engine house (somewhat like a large barn), possibly with a service pit in or near it. For turnarounds, I am thinking that a wye would be much more common for that era. The only reason I’m questioning this is that I can’t remember seeing roundhouses or turntables in any of the old westerns that I’ve watched, and I know that there is some attention paid to the details when they make these pictures.
As I’m sure you are aware, water towers are very common and can be seen in just about every western movie that has a steam locomotive in it. Sand and fuel are also, of course, necessities, and therefore would be appropriate facilities to model, although I don’t know how common coal burners were in the west at the time. You might want to have woodburners for authenticity, but I’m not sure, since I am no expert.
Have Fun!
That’s some of the things that are brought up and discussed in the above-mentioned resource by MR. Although not a quintessential treatise on the topic of servicing terminals, it does give a decent overview of what was used and how and why certain aspects of it came into being when it did.
Actually, Fig. 5-1 in the book shows a photo* of a 4-4-0, sitting atop a turntable in Jersey City, taken in 1885. Don’t know for sure about roundhouses. I would imagine that engine houses were at least around during that era.
Tom
*I looked at the book again last night. The photo of the 4-4-0 also contains a shot of what appears to be a round looking buidling in the background. It looks strikingly similiar to a roundhouse of some kind…
jdavid: Yes, turntables and roundhouses were common at engine service facilities. The turntables tended to be of the “Armstrong” sort (pushed around by muscle power) and the roundhouses were often wood (but many were brick.) Especially in mountain country, where there might not be room for a wye, turntables were common. Engines were generally shorter and lighter then, so a turntable wasn’t that much trouble to build.
Older roundhouses were sometimes completely enclosed, with the turntable in the middle. And some roundhouse-shaped buildings didn’t have a turntable–they used switches to move engines onto a number of short stub tracks that ended up in a fan-shaped roundhouse.
Most old westerns don’t feature engine servicing facilities prominently–typically the main interaction with trains in a western is either someone arriving at the railroad passenger station (at high noon or otherwise) or a train robbery out in the boonies. Engine service facilities wouldn’t generally be near either of those places, and they’re big expensive things to make–and Westerns tend to be more particular about the cowboys & horses parts than about trains. I’m not exactly an expert either, but I have done some research on the subject (1880s engine service facilities) for a past diorama project.
You are correct in that 1880’s west coast locomotives burned wood rather than coal.
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Mouse,
In general, Jetrock’s right on target. I feel that I just need to add my take to a few of the items he’s described.
Roundhouse: these are for the maintenance of engines, NOT for their storage. Roundhouses are not garages. In many cases, enginehouses DID “store” active engines, but that was usually the result of bad (overly-optomistic) planning by the railroad, and they ended up with excess capacity. Usually, if the facility was busy or cramped, or if there was a relatively quick engine turnaround rate, there would be what was known as “ready tracks” somewhere in between the enginehouse and yard, to store serviced, steamed, and waiting engines. An engine coming off a train would head to the ash pit to dump, to the water penstock to add water, and into the roundhouse for a general lube and inspection. Once done, the house hostler would take the engine out of the house, turn it if necessary, fuel and sand it, and park it on the ready track. (this is a bit different than what Jetrock described. In general, most of the loading up of the engine came before the engine went out on the road, not before it went into servicing. The only exception is water, which gets used up quickly in steamers. Properly banked, a steamer’s fire wouldn’t have to be fueled all night, but if the engine ran out of water…)
Coal tower: by the 1880s, only poor railroads still used woodburners. Coal was used beause it was the most efficient fuel around for steam engines. But coal towers (usually called coal DOCKS) were still pretty rare. Remember, in the 1880s (and up to about the end of WWII) labor was MUCH cheaper than machinery, and effiencicy wasn’t all that important either. What you would most likely see instead of a “traditional” dock would be a coal ramp. Gondolas (not hoppers!) would be winched up to the top of the ramp, which looked like a wood trestle, and the cars would be emptied into a shallow bin that wan the length of the ramp. The ramp itself would be high enough that the coal
Great info everyone. I know I should do my homework, but I needed a place to start.
Now I’m going to push my luck. I need to do some selective compression of my service area because of space. Here is what I am working with.
What you are looking at is the entirity of my yard/industrial tracks. The 18" track with the Engine house taking up half of it is my service area. Not a lot to work with.
The water tower is obvious, as is the sand pit. The sand pit can move down the track into the crossover area.
I have a few books on trains fromt that area, but most deal with history. I have no pictures of engine service area, as people liked to take pictures of groups of people standing on trains or laying rails.
If I understand correctly, I will need a coal dock and an ash pit.
You should have both sand and ash dump
BB
Thanks for the fact checking, orsonroy–I’m definitely still learning, just know enough to blow my foot off (or shoot my mouth off.)
SpaceMouse: Keep in mind that you’re really not obligated to have a full-service engine facility–in fact, you really aren’t required to have anything at all. A water tower and an enginehouse are fine (although I suppose it would be nice to add a spur so you can get two engines in that two-stall enginehouse, if you have room for a woodpile or coal dump. orsonroy is correct in that you wouldn’t find a coal dock–quite frankly, a gondola car filled with coal, parked next to the enginehouse track, would do the trick for this little layout–just add a few tired-looking miniatures holding shovels! Or just paint the “sand” black and bingo, a big pile o’ coal!
Coaling Stations and Sand houses were often combined. I believe the ashpit was usually the last service item (nearest the enginehouse), because, after dumping the fire, the engine would move onto the turntable and to the roundhouse on “residual steam.” You have more flexibility, because you don’t need that much steam. Dump the fire and move right into the house.
My thoughts: [i]MUCH{/i} smaller sandpile and sandhouse - for a small servicing facility such as you have, your current one is way too big.
You’ll need a way to get coal into the coaling station. Two possibilities - a “standard” style coaling tower where your sand pile is now, so that you can use the adjacent spur as the coal delivery track as well as an industry track (also makes switching more interesting - have to move the coal hopper to service the industries), or a “bucket” coaling station (MR had an article on how to buildone years ago), where you can use the enginehouse track as the coal delivery track as well.
Move the water tower over to the mainline somewhere, or at the entrance to the yard, and don’t even place one in the servicing area. You can put a small water tank beside the enginehouse machine room (the little annex to the right in the photo) and that provides a water supply for the enginehouse. Your servicing rules then become simply “all engines stop for water before entering the service area.” That was not uncommon. Or put the water tower nearby (again, beside the machine room seems convenient, though perhaps a little far), and put a water column and spout adjacent to the tracks - not too close to the sandpit!
Thanks. I can certainly cut the sand pit down. I’ve been thinking about building a gondola on a platform for coal. And as was pointed out, I can service it from the ajoining track. The sand house just fits between the the tracks and I can build the elevated gondola to fit.
I’ve not seen a model or a picture of an old style gondola. I do have a broken hopper though–I know, gotta be a gondola.
Jetrock, EZ track just won’t accomodate using the other bay in the engine house. I’m going to downsize this one to a single when I find the right one. In the meantime, the doors are broken anyway, I’m going to build a closed door.
You might want to have a waiting track where engines that are building up steam wait. I understand that it takes something like four hours for a steamer to get a head of steam. I noticed the water tower in your pic, mine is identical! Good luck on your construction! [8D][tup]
Chip, you might just see my arrangement in the pic below. My station house is arrived to first by a train backing (normally) down that spur, and it would go on past about 70 scale meters to either of the two towers, coal first, then water.
A more direct image follows:
I think Mark’s thinking has merit for your circumstances, although I most certainly like ever other contribution here…very thoughtful and helpful.
Could you use even one three-foot length of Flex-track to cut up and use around the engine house? They are only a few dollars and would go a long way to solving your problems in that regard. I used it in a few places where EZ-track didn’t allow, and the results were most gratifying.
Actually, the two outer loops (the grades) and bridge, are flex track.
The problem is that there is really no good place to put the turnout. Every piece going back is turnout.
Mouse,
If that’s all you’ve got to work with, don’t worry about any permanent facilities except for the enginehouse and water tank. Consider this a branchline facility, and you won’t have to worry about ash pits and coal docks at all. The ashes would have been dumped right on any local tracks with a low spot, and spread around as fill/ballast. Any sand needed would have been bagged and stored in a shed alongside the tracks (delivered by company boxcar once a month), and coal would have been dumped in a simple box across from the water tank (hand shovelled there, and carried by gondola). Minimalist facilities were all over the place during the steam era, and probably ounumbered “real” facilities!
As for photos of old freight cars (and old wood gons), you’re in luck. The Fallen Flags site has a couple hundred old ACF builder’s photos online, mostly of pre-Depression equipment:
http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/acfx/acf-h.html
Here’s an example of a good 36-foot wood gon:
http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/cbq/cbq85150asw.jpg
And here’s a few old steam facilit
Chip,
Tichy makes a nice 40’ gondola in a kit. You can choose to run it as either a gondola or, by removing the low sides, as a flat car. The brake detailing underneath is nice, too. The only down side is that it is ca. 1916 - a wee bit past the 1880’s.
Tom