Windsor Modular Railroad Club

The New Permanent Layout

2007 marked the beginning of a new chapter in the history of the Windsor Modular Railroad Club. After much discussion it was decided to move forward with a permanent layout geared toward prototype operations. The following will document our progress constructing this new layout. The general track plan is in place and construction has begun... Ian D. has been taking photos of the progress from day one. You can view his photos here
Photo By: Fred Jr.	April 1, 2008 Chris has added some of the cardboard strip webbing around the branchline staging entrance. The cardboard serves as the base for the scenery. It will be covered with packing tape and then plaster cloth.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	April 1, 2008 The ties for the coal branch wye have been glued down. There will be a small mining town built around the wye with a station in the middle of the wye. The wye will not go anywhere and be used mainly to turn steam engines.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	April 1, 2008 Geoff using a Kadee spiker to spike rail along the coal branch.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	April 1, 2008 Here is the coaling tower for the helper pocket being test fit to the scene. The tower will be raised so that double stack cars can run under it.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	April 1, 2008 The summit loop track has been re-laid, so we have a working loop again!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 29, 2008 Most of the branch line ties are glued and sanded now. They have also been painted, a little too dark, but we'll address that with some weathering later on.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 29, 2008 Here we find Curt hand spiking some rail in the cement plant. Almost all of the rails are spiked in the cement plant.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 29, 2008 The facia board is inplace along the helper pocket. The openings cut into the facia are for access to the branch line track in case of derailments.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 29, 2008 Here we find Mike and Al working on the coaling tower track for the helper pocket.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 29, 2008 Vic and Geoff work on spiking rails on the coal branch.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 29, 2008 Larry stains ties on the coal branch.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 25, 2008 Part of the bench work committee hard at work. L to R John, Richard and Ron.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 25, 2008 The bench work committee has been installing facia boards along the edges of the layout. With these in place, the scenery team will be able to move in and get to work. The facia also creates a small lip around the layout to help prevent cars from visiting the floor!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 25, 2008 After a few weeks of discussion, the coal branch track plan has been finalized and track work has begun. Here we see some of the ties in place. The two tracks on the left feed the crusher building, the next track to the right is the arrival/departure track and the right most track is the branchline main. The single track extending up at the top of the picture is for a flood loader to load coal from the crusher building.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 25, 2008 The first ballast on the layout. This track is the coal branch main where it enters a tunnel and goes to hidden staging.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 25, 2008 Here we find a rare sight, Ian working! :) He is using our fast-tracks tie laying jig to make strips of ties to be glued down. Simply put ties into the slots on the jig and run a piece of masking tape along the tops of the ties and lift the strip out. The jig provides the proper spacing. Run some glue along the track center line on your benchwork and press the ties into the glue, when the glue dries, just peel the tape off and lightly sand the tie tops flat.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 25, 2008 More of the coal branch ties in place. The upper right of the picture is the crusher tracks and the switch at the lower left will lead to a small mine/coal loading track. There will be a road crossing the tracks between the switches.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 25, 2008 The upper tracks in the picture are the WMRC main line helper pocket. The lower track is the coal branch, it passes under the helper pocket in a tunnel. Here the support for the back wall of the tunnel is in place.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 25, 2008 Those bench work guys are a hard working bunch! Here we have Richard and Ron cutting masonite for facia boards.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 15, 2008 This is the spline for the branchline return loop on the hidden staging yard. Rather than trying to build this piece of spline in place, we clamped some wood together to make a jig and made the spline on that. Now we can sand this mush easier than if it was built in place under the existing staging yards.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 15, 2008 The spline on the corner here has been redone and sanded. Now the new cork is being glued down. Next will be painting it gray and laying the track back down.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 15, 2008 Here is what the added spline sections look like with the clamps removed. Next step: sanding.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 11, 2008 Construction was put on hold for a month as we focused our attention on getting the modular layout ready for the Essex Train show. To see photos from the show, look in the Gallery. Now that the modular layout is setup and running we've again begun to focus on the permanent layout. We will be focusing on getting the scenery base and facias in place for phase I of the project. Many different methods will be used to create the scenery base, here we are using a mesh created from cardboard strips.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 11, 2008 Chris is busy hot glueing cardboard strips together to make the scenery base while Geoff and Joe do some hand laid track work on the coal branch. The cardboard strips will be covered with packing tape to fill the gaps and prevent a huge drippy mess when the plaster cloth is put over it.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 11, 2008 Out initial test runs raised some concerns about the radius around the end of the fifth leg. It was messured and found to be egg shaped. To correct this problem and create a smooth curve, we've add spline to both sides of the curve. This is another benefit to using spline, it is very easy to add to.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	March 11, 2008 Here we see the other side of the curve with the extra spline glued on. This is why testing before adding scenery is good. Problems are easier to fix if there is no scenery to remove!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 21, 2008 A couple of Tortise switch machines were installed on the stagging yard and loop track switches. They still need to be powered, but at least they keep those hand made switches lined tighly.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 16, 2008 All members were invited to bring in there stuff to test run on the new layout. We tested some big power and long cars including this B&O E unit pulling a heavy weight passenger consist.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 16, 2008 We also took this oportunity to test some long trains. This train stretches nearly 40', about the length of one leg of the layout. The three engines on point needed some help getting this beast over the 2.5% grade to the summit.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 16, 2008 One F40 was all that was needed to pull this 6 car passenger train up the grade. These long cars operated with no problems around the layout. We discovered a few areas that need improvement during this test session, but the changes will have to wait until after the Essex Train Show.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 12, 2008 Chessie GP38 4829 passes by the coaling tower on the helper siding about to complete the first ever trip around phase 1 of the layout. It's taken almost one year to get to this point, but it has been worth it. Seeing the first train run around the layout is great!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 12, 2008 More cars were added for the second run, but the two C&O geeps stalled on the 2.5% grade on the north side of the mountain. Luckily, this is what we want to happen, so we can run helpers in this area.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 12, 2008 Here we can see WMRC GP38-2 #100 coupling on the rear of the train to help the C&O geeps get over the hill.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 12, 2008 The helper worked perfectly shoving the train over the crest of the hill. It cut off at the top of the grade and started coasting back down the hill for its next assignment. This is a shot that we won't be able to get forever, as we see the C&O train on the down grade temporary connection track in the background. One day that track will be gone and a back drop will be in its place.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 12, 2008 CP SD90MAC-H II coupled onto the head end for the next run. This unit is sound equipt, and boy did it sound great roaring up the hill in notch 8. The dynamic brakes on the down grade were almost as cool!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	January 5, 2008 Only one more switch needs to be installed in the cement plant. The number 6 switches off the main line are in place and all the number 5's except the coal track are done. The clean ties you see need to be sanded and weathered before the track is put in.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	December 20, 2007 The hand laid diamonds in the cement plant are almost done. The frogs need to be cut and isolated. The gaps will be filled with epoxy, filed and painted. Nice work Geoff!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	December 20, 2007 Track has been laid across the temporary bridge. Once the scenery in this area has been finished we will put the actual bridges in place. 3 85' Micro Engineering deck girder bridges with a 150' central valley Truss bridge in the middle. It is going to look sweet!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	December 20, 2007 Phase 1 of construction includes only about half of the bench work, so to create a running loop in phase 1 we had to build this temporary connection track between legs 1 and 5. The temporary connection will allow us to get some trains running right away to start testing track work before ballasting and scenery really get started.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	December 20, 2007 This bridge will pass over the branch line's wye track in a small, as yet un-named, mining town.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	December 8, 2007 This is the top of the mountain. On the left the track has leveled off after climbing a 2.5% grade, the helpers cut off at the siding and glide back down the grade to await the next job while the train continues around the curve and begins a gentle .75% grade back down the other side. Or at least thats what will happen when we finish the rest of the track work!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	December 1, 2007 All the main line spline for phase I is glued in place now. The next step is securing the spline to the risers with screws and then sanding the top smooth. We'll have cork and track on it in no time!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	December 1, 2007 Another view of the spine work around the summit of the grade. We actually ran out of clamps glueing this section of spline, over 30' of spline glued at the same time!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 27, 2007 Track work for the cement plant is moving forward slowly. All the Fast Tracks switches have been built for the facility and some track is in place. We have also started laying the first of two diamonds in the plant.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 27, 2007 Spline work for the main line around the mountain is moving along nicely. Most of the risers are in place and a single track width of spline is down. This section needs to be double width to accommodate a passing siding. You can see the spline for the coal branch below the main spline.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 27, 2007 With spline and track in place, some of the backdrop board is going up. We are using 1/4" masonite glued to 2x2 risers as our backdrop. The seams will be filled and sanded, then the whole thing will be painted. Some areas will use commercially available backdrops, but most will be hand painted. This is the first curved section of backdrop to go up.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 27, 2007 With the plywood in place along the south wall, we were able to lay some cork down for the coal branch main line. The final track plan has yet to be agreed apon, so no ties will be going down for a little while yet. But we will sand and paint the cork so we'll be ready.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 20, 2007 Some of us are getting impatient to run trains on the new layout, so we hooked a Zephyr up to some of the track and ran an engine back and forth a few times. We'll just say it was for track testing purposes!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 20, 2007 The first section of hand laid track on the coal branch! It may only be 3' long, but it is nice to see anyway. We are trying to get the track in this area down so that the scenery team can start working in this area. There are several bridges to be built, so the sooner they can get started, the better.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 13, 2007 The spline for the coal branch around the end of the fifth leg is in place. This section of track will be in a long tunnel under the WMRC main line. This track is on a 1% grade through the tunnel and levels off when it exits the tunnel and passes by a Pulp and Paper mill. After the mill it will start climbing again to the same level as the WMRC main line at an interchange yard.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 13, 2007 The section along the south wall is dominated by the coal branch, with the WMRC main line partially hidden by trees above. This section is mainly flat, so we used 1/2" plywood as a base to build the track and scenery on. The foreground of this picture will have a small mining town with a wye extending under the WMRC main. Further down will be a small yard with a coal mine and flood loader at the far end. All the track work in this area will be hand laid.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 13, 2007 We plan to hand lay the track work for all industrial areas as well as the branch line. Our club is all about learning and having fun, so this is a great opportunity for our members to learn about hand laying track. This is the cement plant, the plywood base was built first and the track centers were drawn on it. Next we glued down our fast tracks laser cut switch ties and then glued the standard ties following the center lines drawn on the plywood. The next step is a light sanding of the ties to ensure a flat even surface to spike the rail to and staining the ties. The track goes on after the ties are stained and ballast comes last.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 10, 2007 We have been using Fast Tracks jigs to build our own turnouts. The jigs are very easy to use and are going to save us a ton of money on switch costs. They also eliminate the availability issues we had trying to get Walthers switches. The switch building kits come with a scale billboard sign. We've temporary placed one of the signs on the Cement plant power station.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	November 10, 2007 All branchline and industrial track is going to be hand laid. Here we see the newly installed and stained ties on the coal branch climb from staging. The ties were cut by Curt, glued to the cork roadbed, the tops were sanded smooth and then they were stained. The next step will be spiking the rail down.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 30, 2007 It is official, the Windsor and Midwestern Railway Company is born. Geoff did some lettering and weathering on the small bridge next to the Cement Plant. The scene is a long way from finished, but every small step forward is great.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 30, 2007 The first building has made its appearence on the WMRC. This is the power plant that serves the cement plant and nearby town. The raised section behind the plant is for the coal unloading chute.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 30, 2007 The spline is finished for the coal branch climb. Sanding and cork are next, with ties for hand laid track soon to follow. You can see WMRC GP38-2 100 posed with a coal train on the helper siding in the background as well.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 30, 2007 The spline for the coal branch at the other end of the south wall is also in place and awaiting sanding. The area between the corners will be flat and have a coal mine, small town, small yard and a wye. The sub-roadbed here will be made of 1/2" plywood.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 30, 2007 This is WMRC GP38-2 #100 posing on the helper siding with a string of loaded coal hoppers. I look forward to the day it can be Running instead of posing!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 23, 2007 The spline is nearly finished for the coal branch climb. The clamps will soon come off and the sanding will begin.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 23, 2007 Some of the hard working Benchwork Crew taking a much deserved break. This is the fifth leg of the layout and is main mountainous scenes. The main line has reached its summit and is starting back down gradually, while the coal branch will start a gradual raise to meet the main at an interchange yard on the fourth leg. The benchwork for phase 1 is basically finished now. The other teams have some catching up to do. Track work isn't far behind, as we hope to have a functional loop before christmas.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 23, 2007 This is the coal branch bridge being test fit. The WMRC Main Line crosses over a large trestle here with this small branch line bridge under it. There will be a small roadway bridge over the river here as well.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 23, 2007 The pink insulation foam is the beginnings of a coal ramp for the power plant. There will be a hopper for dumping coal into under the tracks here with a conveyor into the power plant.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 23, 2007 The first section of backdrop has been put up. This is the divider between the north and south stagging yards. We are starting to get the backdrop in place so we can begin some of the preliminary scenery work.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 20, 2007 The support brackets and risers are now in place for the coal branch as it climbs from its hidden stagging yard to the first coal mine.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 17, 2007 The riverbed next to the cement plant is really starting to take shape now. The stone work on the bridge abutments was carved into the plaster base and then given serveral washes of black paint. The river bed and banks are also plaster with serveral washes of brown and black paint. This is only the base coats of paint, there is still a lot of work to be done before this scene will be finished, but it is nice to see some colour appearing on the layout!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 17, 2007 The cork roadbed has been glued down and painted from the helper pocket at the bottom of the grade to almost the top of the grade. We have also started laying track along this section. This is the mainline track in the helper siding at the base of the grade. The siding track will be added soon.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 17, 2007 This shot is looking south up the 2.5% grade to Summit (actual place names have not been decided yet, but we always refer to the top of the grade as Summit, go figure) This also shows the process of building sub-roadbed using spline. At the top of the picture you can see bare spline, still clamped to let the glue dry, as you follow the spline toward the bottom of the picture, you can see the sanded spline with no clamps, the painted cork glued down, and finally, the track glued down. Track weathering, ballasting and scenery are still a long ways off.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 17, 2007 Welcome to 'Summit', the highest point on the railroad. This curve is about 6.5" above the staging yards and climbs a 2.5% grade to get here. The grade south of here is a much more reasonable .75% and starts at about the fourth clamp from the left. You'll notice we've used '7' shaped risers around this corner, this is to provide more room for the coal branch track that runs through a tunel around this corner underneath the main line.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 17, 2007 This shot illustrates how we are creating super-elevated curves. For those of you un-sure what I mean by that, a super-elevated curve is one where the rail on the outside of the curve is higher than the rail on the inside. This is a prototype practice with a number of benefits including faster train speeds, more comfortable ride and less track maintainance. The benefits to the model railroad are mainly cosmet, but those large three axle engines are less likely to jump the track. We super-elevated the outside rail be glueing a piece of strip styrene between the cork and ties under the rail. You can see the white styrene strip under the bottom rail in the picture. We used .020" styrene, which is about 2" of elevation. Prototype super-elevation can be over 4" depending on train speeds.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 9, 2007 Spline work on the Helper Grade along the south wall of the room is nearly done. We put in over 20' of risers and spline in one evening. Using spline made it very easy to incorporate gental curves in the track work. The next step is to screw the spline to the risers and then sand the top of it smooth. Cork and track will be going on soon!
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 9, 2007 This shot shows the small bridge between the South Staging yard and the Cement Plant being test fit. More plaster work and carving needs to be done before this section will be ready for paint.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 8, 2007 The first section of spline sub-roadbed leading from the branchline staging yard under the large bridge is now in place. Part of the spline will be cutout to make room for a small bridge over the river but under the large main bridge. We started this section of spline so that the scenery team could start creating the river bed and gorge walls.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 8, 2007 This picture shows the spline for the siding track being added to the main line spline. We first glue the inside pieces for spline in place and then glue more layers on working our way to the outside untill the sub-roadbed is wide enough for the tracks. It is time consuming, but gives very nice curves and lots of flexability for scenery.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 2, 2007 We used cloth dipped in plaster to create the sides and bottom of the river bed. Wood blocks were positioned to support the bridge. The wood blocks were then covered with plaster and will be shaped to look like the bridge supports.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 2, 2007 This is the main line sub-roadbed extending north from the cement plant around the bend. After the spline was completely dry, the clamps were removed and screws were put in to secure the spline to the risers. The top of the spline is not very flat, so a handheld belt sander was used to smooth out the top. We ordered a large roll of cork and cut it into strips to make roadbed. 2" wide strips are used on the straight sections of track and 1" wide strips are used in the corners because they bend easier. The cork is glued to the spline.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 2, 2007 We put some of the risers in for the helper siding curve. First we roughly drew the track centerline on the cross supports to have a general idea where the track would go. Next we attached the risers along the centerline. We messured the run between risers and calculated how much rise was needed for our grade. Once the risers were in place, we clamped some spline together to determine the actual curve. We put screws into the top of the risers along the inside of the curve and build the spline out from that. One of the nice things about spline is that it creates easments by it self. In this picture the mainline spline is glued, but the siding track is not done yet.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	October 2, 2007 The tables and supports for the branch line staging yard are done and in place. The tables for the staging yard are not attached yet so we can lay the track before putting them in. This will make doing the track work much easier than trying to reach into that narrow gap. The branch line runs from this staging yard, under the WMRC main line twice and will interchange with the WMRC on the fourth leg of the layout. The branch line is mainly a coal line.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	September 22, 2007 This is the spline road bed for the north siding switch for the helper district at tbe base of the grade. We are experimenting with how to best spline the switch area. This is our first attempt, and we've learned a lot. We plan to make some minor changes for the next switch as the roadbed here is wider than needed.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	September 22, 2007 All the staging yard switches are in place and spiked down. We chose to save money by not powering the switches here. Instead we mounted hand throws into the facia of the layout and used metal tubing to guide the throw wire to the switch. This picture isn't very good, but you can see the hand throws in the foreground and the metal tubing arcing up to the swiches.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	September 22, 2007 The first scenic element to be started is a small river and bridge between the south staging yard and the cement plant. Here you can see the cutout for the river bed. The switch to the left leads to the south staging yard.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	September 22, 2007 With the sub-roadbed finished for the cement plant, the main line could be extended into the inside curve. This curve will eventually be 180 degrees and lead back up the next leg of the layout, but for now it only goes halfway and will be connected to the last leg temporarily. This will alow us to get this section of track up and running before we have to remove the modular layout to make room for more construction. It will also allow us to test the track work before adding ballast and other scenery.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	September 3, 2007 The benchwork along the south wall is now done. This area will feature a branch line serving several coal mines with the main line elevated along the back drop climbing the mountain. The main line and the branch wrap around the corner with the main continuing its climb and the branch stub ending at another mine.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	September 3, 2007 We are going to experiment with 'Spline' sub road bed. This small piece of spline is the approach to the large bridge that the main line used to cross over a river, road and the coal branch.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	September 3, 2007 After waiting all summer for switches to come in from walthers, we have given up. We decided to handlay our own switched using the Fast Tracks Switch Building System. Please visit our Fast Tracks site to learn more about this easy to use system. The switch in the fore-ground leads to the staging yard, while the one behind it is the siding/loop track. The switches are Code 83 #8's
Photo By: Fred Jr.	September 3, 2007 This will be our portland cement plant. The plant was drawn to scale on the computer and then transferred to cardboard in HO scale. The cardboard template was cut out of plywood to create the sub road bed. The plywood cut out will be fastened to risers on the bench work and then we can start laying the track. You can see the scale drawing of the cement plant here.
Drawn By: Carl M.	July 20, 2007 This is the basic track plan for the whole layout. Most of the industrial tracks have yet to be added. Most are still in the design phase. We have decided on industry types, just not track plans yet.
Drawn By: Fred Jr.	July 20, 2007 This is the Limestone Quary track plan. The quary is served by two railroads. The WMRC will serve most of the facility, bringing in coal, fuel and equipment and lifting hoppers full of crushed limestone of various grades. A second railroad will switch from the right dealing only with hoppers for crushed limestone. The plant includes crushing and washing buildings as well as large storage piles and a coal fired power plant. The main line passes over the edge of the open pit on a large curved tresle.
Drawn By: Fred Jr.	July 20, 2007 The Cement Plant occupies an area nearly 16ft long. This plant is HUGE! The plant is a dry portland cement supplier. Limestone and Clay, Gypsum and Coal all arrive by rail. Dry cement is packaged and shipped by Truck, Boxcar, and Covered Hopper. An small on-site coal fired power plant provides electricity to the facility and to near by homes and businesses. The front edge of the scene will be an old run-down dock. The facility was also serviced by ship in the past. The main line will cross a small bridge over a river to the left of the scene. The river will serve as a scenic divide between the plant and the staging yard to the left.
July 3, 2007 The double track loop around the staging yards is glued down now. We used thin strips of styrene to elevate the out side of the curve. The electrical team has begun soldering feeder wires to the rails in place now so we can start weathering the rails and ties in preparation for ballasting.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	June 23, 2007 This is the Southeast Corner of the layout room. This is the start of the helper district and the grade up the northern side of the mountain.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	June 23, 2007 This is the first leg of the layout. Each leg is 48" wide with a divider running the length of it. This leaves about 23" of space on either side to work with. The divider will not always be centered to allow more or less space on either side depending on the needs of the scene. The right side of the leg is the northern end of the layout and the left side is the southern end.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	June 23, 2007 This lowered area on leg 1 will be a large trestle over a river and road. There will be a second smaller and lower bridge below the trestle where one of the interchange railroads crosses the same river. The red wire marks the location of the trestle.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	June 23, 2007 This is the north staging yard. Each yard track is 12' long. The yard tracks are Atlas Code 100 on cork roadbed. We paint the cork grey to seal and blend with our ballast better later.
Photo By: Fred Jr.	June 23, 2007 This is the loop track and passing siding that run around the north and south staging yards. These tracks allow for continuous running when not operating. The main lines and sidings are Micro Engineering Code 83 track. We will be using walther's code 83 switches on the main lines. (if our order ever arrives)