Well me and a couple of other guys decided to get together and build a model railroad in my basement…The Ralston Midland…the setting of the railroad is in the northeast so we plan on hauling a lot of coal hoppers…equipment on the railroad will consist of road names of railroads that ran in the north east…well with the exception of NYC…1920’s steam locomotives will work along side modern diesels on the layout…(yeah think about it…) I think we start planning like 6-7 weeks ago and we are already laying roadbed and track…so i say its going pretty good…if I say so myself… oh yeah…its HO scale…
Here are a few shots of the cork roadbed that has been laid…
looks good dude. you just might want to check that kink in the first picture of your 2nd post. Murphys Law says that any little annoyance will maximize its annoyance of you and provide as much operational interferrance as possible.
Rough Scenery
Extension to bench work…where the engine servicing facility will be located
yup, took care of it since the picture was taken…
Siding…
Rough Scenery
laying cork for the main line…
Passing Siding
Turntable pit for the engine terminal
Finished coal mine sidings and passing siding
The layout
Pennsy GP-38 passing a K4
GP-38 attacking the 2 percent grade
Topping the grade
Geep and mixed freight entering mine passing siding
Crossing the bridge at track speed
Heading down grade
Ralston was the name of a real company that built railroad freight cars. Santa Fe had some Ralston hoppers it converted to “roofed hoppers”. Maybe you8 could have some Ralston cars on your Ralston Midland.
Nice! Can you post a track plan? It looks like a fairly big layout.
OK, this bit of information is from my own experience.
Your cardboard strips should be glued to the sides of the WS foam grade forms, and not the top as you show. The reason is that once you lay the plaster cloth or plaster soaked paper towels on it as you have them, it tends to bring the “ground” scenery up to the level of the track, almost hiding the cork roadbed. The better solution is to glue them to the sides with the tabs or ends pointing down, then bend the strips horizontal right at the top of the grade foam or a little below it. I think that you will find that will look better once the plaster cloth is applied.
Well, i know its a little late but a few weeks ago the a 130 foot turntable was installed on the Ralston Midland.
And since someone asked for a track plan, here it is. Didn’t use a special program, rulers, or anything but paper and pencil, so as you imagine we had to changed a number of things along the way, but its all good…
Well i guess this should go in a live steam forum, but what the hey… here’s me running a 15 inch gauge steam locomotive…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eN8tofF_Des
