Andy Clarke said:
Thanks guys…
Randy, was 66 Saturday, 67 today… Balmy tomorrow, high of only 51… It’s a rough winter… (http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-cool.gif)
It was pretty mild here too, but there’s still a 2’ drift all around the shed.
A great way to end the last day of the first month of the year. Progress at Okawville looks great!. Fantastic track plan, that will take some work to execute. Sounds like the weather gods are being favorable to your work schedule. See you in a couple of weeks.
Andy, the yard lead here for the elevators is very short, unless you only plan on switching one car at a time. You might consider relocating that turnout closer to the elevators to give you a longer yard lead.
Steve… When the railcars get to Okawville, the rail wheels will be replaced with road tires, and a farm tractor will move the cars into the siding for loading…
(http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-sealed.gif)(joking)
The tracks will be extended, with the siding track joining the mainline on the right, and the switching lead is after that… There is about 18 to 20 feet of track left to be laid starting at the bottom of that picture… The actual 1/1 track at Okawville has about a 25-30 car switch lead…
I inherited a section of H-beam that will eventually make up the switch lead, after the siding and mainline are joined…
Google earth/map Okawville, IL, look at the south side of town, and that’s where the elevator is located…
Google maps doesn’t show the sidings, guess they’ve been pulled up. I’ll be interested to see how this plays out.
Thanks, Ken…
Steve, Ken shows the Elevator… From bottom to top are Bottom: EVWR mainline… Next track is the EVWR siding… The next track up is a new siding that they just installed within the last year & 1/2… I am not modeling that track…
The top 2 tracks are the elevator siding loading tracks…
To the left is west bound, which is the end of the line maybe 1/2 a mile further along from where the picture ends, and becomes the switching lead… To the right is eastbound, which is where the trains come from and go to, eastbound, back to Mount Vernon, Indiana…
OK, cool. I’ll just keep my mouf shut till I see the final product. (http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-innocent.gif)
Steve, No reason to ““keep your mouf shut””… If I can’t explain it right, I can always make up a story… (http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-sealed.gif)
My branchline on the layout, is loosely based on the real railroad thru town here… It’s the ““Evansville Western Railroad”” and they do have a website… The track plans at Nashville, Addieville and Okawville are the exact track plan at the actual elevators… Well, OK, Okawville’s plan is different now, since they added the new siding track at the elevator… I have 2 sets of Geeps that are painted in the EVWR colors, with the actual road numbers… When we operate, the train even is called "“MCL-1"”, just like the 1/1 railroad…
My goal was to operate the branch line just like the real thing… For the most part, it has worked that way… From Woodlawn to Okawville, The elevator tracks, and the Interchange at Woodlawn are the exact configurations of the real railroad…
Any other questions, I’ll be happy to answer/explain…
Why is there air?
To blow up basketballs and volleyballs.
I always wondered about that.
Steve Featherkile said:
Why is there air?
David is partly right…
Air is really there, so that dolphins, whales and submarines have to surface so we can track them… (http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-cool.gif)
¿ ɹəʇsooɹ said:
I gotta get out there
Just start heading west. Make it to my place and i’ll drive to the next place. Then we’ll just camp out in their yard. 
T
Terry, your welcome, anytime… Better during an Ops session…
Andy Clarke said:
Any other questions, I’ll be happy to answer/explain…
Why are you spending my inheritance on your railroad and when are you sending me the Amtrak stuff?
¿ ɹəʇsooɹ said:
Andy Clarke said:
Any other questions, I’ll be happy to answer/explain…
Why are you spending my inheritance on your railroad and when are you sending me the Amtrak stuff?
Cause I can, and Never… (http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-cool.gif)
STEVE… for you…
With temps on the 20th of February at 75 degrees, we thought we would do some work at Okawville…
First up, was to install an inherited H-Beam as the switch lead… (thanks Ric)…
The Goal was to keep it elevated, so the water drainage off the hill would flow under it… As the retaining wall at Okawville was complete, we needed to build a new wall at the left side of the picture below, to hold the west end of the H-beam…
The new wall built today can be seen in the center of the picture. The H-beam also is the switch lead for the elevator at Okawville, and the End of the line…
The below view is taken at the end of the line, looking back thru Okawville…
All the track has been laid… Settling is required, then minor work to level the track area…
As you can see, the grounds supervisor to the right of the tracks, is not interested in the completed work…
Plants will be planted at the top of the retaining wall on the left, and also in the small wall area at the end of line…
Nice, sure looks like it turned out good. Knowing the switching on the prototype, this is going to be a challenge to switch. Should be fun!
Why would one build an outdoor RR of that magnitude if one wants to create a switching puzzle? Why not just build a “Timesaver” ?
