A new thread for a new layout!
The last few months I really havent done anything apart from doing the odd hour up the loft dismantling the old layout. So with my day off yesterday I decided to get up there and get cracking.
Some of the old boards still need dismantling, but I am trying to reuse as much of the old boards as possible. For instance the old chipboard baseboards, all 4'x2', I've just flipped them upside down for the new layout !
The plan this time is utilize all of the space available, and have a straight run down each side of the loft, which is about 20' long.... Plenty of room for long trains, and having large sweeping curves rather than set-track.
After playing with some digital items in the shop recently I am completely sold on it. I'm planning on getting the Gaugemaster Prodigy system in the next few weeks, and will have to chip my locos!
I say it every time, but I am REALLY going to take my time with this one. Most of my time is taken up with the shop these days, and so I can only really do the layout on Mondays for a few hours. So hopefully this will end up being a long-term project.
Saying that, I've acquired some rather special locos recently, and am itching to get them running around the loft !!!
Anyways, heres a couple of photos I took tonight.
Lets start off with Kestrel
These are the boards I laid yesterday, messing about with a trackplan. 2 lines on the left are the mainlines, and to the right will be a TMD area
And looking back down from the other end
A nice long station will be on the opposite side of the loft
So this is one end of the loft, the board on legs in the middle still needs dismantling. The layout is running between the joists on the left and right, and will go right down to the wall.
And then same goes for the opposite end of the loft
And another one of Kestrel
And to finish, heres one of Falcon on the shelf downstairs. Its factory-weathered... but I have started weathering it further with the airbrush.
All of the points are Peco insulfrog... and from what I understand, I definately need to change them all for electrofrog if I'm going DCC. So thats something I've got to start thinking about.
Also, maybe someone could explain this a little better for me... Im thinking I'm going to have to run a DCC Bus wire under the whole layout, and have the track connected to it in as many places as possible using droppers. Could someone explain what the droppers are? Are they like little clips that will clip onto the bus wire?
Lets hope I can run some trains soon !
