Jonestown Yard Completion

Three weeks ago it was an empty space, but yesterday saw the completion of the track laying for Jonestown Yard.  

The yard is a 6 track arrangement that is connected to a triangle at one end and has a dead-end head shunt at the other end, effectively making this a terminus yard (and also acts as staging).

I've already been thinking about getting my Wisconsin Central stuff out and using it like a classification yard, running locals to other parts of the layout, and through trains around the layout, only to return and to be classified as per the waybills.  

Currently the frogs are not powered, but I have a hex-juicer to install and test out, along with a PSX circuit breaker.  

Sorry about the lack of prototypical trains scattered on the layout.  The kids are having fun! 

Jonestown Continues

A few hours on the weekend working on Jonestown Yard.  This is the only significant yard on the layout, and acts as a working yard, plus open staging, having a total of 6 tracks in a 3+3 configuration.  The front 3 are common roads (mainly for steel and intermodal) and the rear three are the grain roads as they have access to the grain unloading tracks in the foreground.  

Each yard track will be around 3800mm long although the tie in at the far end will be a bit of a challenge.  All the roads will run to a single head shunt about 4 locos long, to allow run-around moves.  

The control panel was a bit of a tester to see how things fitted, and safe to say, the wye/triangle needs to be bigger to allow a better fit for the route indicator lights.  I'll also split the panel so the far right end of the yard is located near the points (about 8m away from this panel).

With the 6 yard tracks, I'll square them all up so they start as the same length which will make it a lot easier for wiring, as I can put all the droppers in the same place.  I learnt this after doing Nathans Point with staggered joints on the main, loop and grain road.    

By the end of the week, I will hopefully have 6 fully laid and powered yard tracks, but they'll be stub tracks for the time being.

Enjoy!

Starting on Jonestown Yard

Having worked the track aruund Jonestown Junction last weekend, I made a strong start on Jonestown mainline, to the terminus station, plus started the planning for the main yard.

The main and loop tracks are laid, and wiring will happen over the next few days, and then onto the yard.

The yard ladder is difficult as I am trying to get good length sidings, but basically run out of room at the far end of the photo, where the trains all converge and run to a head shunt which needs to be about 1m long.

I'll get the main and loop operational, plus install the Tortoises and do the control panel, and then start planning out the yard arrangement.

Enjoy!