Progress Continues

Wow! I can't believe how long it's been since my last blog post. Though I haven't reported anything in the past 21 months, progress on the layout and the railroad room continues. Southport Yard is nearly complete from a track perspective. It's only nine tracks wide and a fraction of the prototype, but will still be an impressive yard in S-Scale. The yard is more than 24-ft. in length without the engine terminal. The view on the left is looking north from the south end of the yard. The engine terminal will be located at the far end of the yard in the corner of the room. The flextrack is by Tomalco, with all turnouts and crossovers hand built on wood ties. All tracks are wired for DCC.

This scene shows the north end of the yard. The turnout in the foreground is the same crossover shown in the video from my last post. The real challenge was to paint and weather the track so that the plastic flextrak matched the coloring and texture of the stained wood ties on the turnouts. Photos of Southport Yard, as well as most of the Elmira Branch itself, show the ballast being very dark most likely due to all the coal traffic and cinder ballast. I'm pleased with the track weathering and ballasting results. I will most likely complete the track detailing and weathering before installing the layout to the wall. It'll be much easier to work on the rear tracks while the layout is free standing.

Right now I am focusing on completing the railroad room itself. I recently read Brooks Stover's book on modeling the Buffalo Creek and Gauley Railroad in S-Scale (It's highly recommended and more info can be found here - http://www.buffalocreekandgauley.com/ ) and learned that you really need to finish the space before building the layout. No matter how anxious you are to build the layout of your dreams, it would be a mistake to try to work around a partially completed layout while trying to build the layout room. So, until I get more of the walls and room environment completed, updates on the layout itself will be somewhat limited. However, I have been busily working on locomotives and rolling stock for the branch and my upcoming posts will highlight progress in that area.