Large Scale Central

Bluestone Southern's Basement OPS 2019

Indoor and Micro
#1

On Friday, 23 August 2019, The first operating session was held on the basement layout… The bottom portion

is strictly the freight yard for outside operations… The top layout is actually operated as a separate layout…

This provides playing with trains during rain, snow, cold and hot times during the year…

Below I am watching Ric as he works the yard setting up a consist for the Eastbound train.

the 2 tracks on the right is the mainline and a siding… The 6 tracks to the left are the inside freight yard…

The far right is an industrial park.

The yard lead comes out close to the passenger station… A tourist special is sitting at the station awaiting time

for it’s departure…

Mark G has his locomotive and caboose ready awaiting his train to be set on the siding so he can hook up and depart.

Getting setup…

Mark G getting his train in order behind the engine servicing facility.

#2

Ric working the yard…

The yard engineer is also responsible for work required at the Industrial park… Ric is working the Industrial park.

Ric setting up the Westbound train… Tmark is the engineer on that train… Locomotive and caboose are

awaiting the yard movement so Tmark can get his train together and depart…

Tmark’s first stop is at the Coke-Cola plant, switching out the plant.

His second stop was the Tank farm… Switching that also…

#3

Mark G’s eastbound train working the team track siding…

Mark G getting ready to enter the Military Mainline/Siding area…

The eastbound and westbound trains meet at Military Mainline/Siding…

Once the west bound train was clear, the eastbound train proceeded on its run…

As the westbound train also continued on its run…

All in all, the first operation worked very well… My thanks to the Operators testing it out…

Finished scenery will slowly follow, however mainline and sidings are functional to operate on…

#4

Nice going gents. Great paint on the sky backdrop Jane (https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-cool.gif)

#5

you do call that indoors? that looks enormous.

how big is the room?

are you going to landscape the layout?

#6

Pretty cool Andy! I get a lot of enjoyment out of my indoor too. My whole layout is about as big as one of your yards (https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-surprised.gif)

#7

Thanks for sharing the fun with us, Andy. Looks like everyone enjoyed themselves.

#8

Thanks for the comments…

Korm, it’s about 2/3rds of my basement… Approx 1700 SQ FT…

The other third is the ““crew rest”” room during Operations, both inside and out…

#9

Houses must be cheap where Andy lives. That 1700 sq ft basement is my entire 3 bed, 2 bath house!

#10

Good pictures of a great afternoon. The idea of “Indoors OPs” has always been on the table for in the future, but last Friday the FUTURE became Now! There was a lot of preparation to make this happen, including lift out and swing bridges. I think there was a constant thought of “Indoor Ops”, but it wasn’t suppose to impact the storage yards for the “Outdoor Operations”.

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The indoor yard is challenging! There are a couple of out of reach turnouts, that need to be handled by a “Switchman” or we’ve all got to get better at “Limbo” to access the lead to the “Industrial Park”. Think about it, that’s not a pretty thought. Most of the time, Andy or one of the Marks, was available to throw those switches for me. The “Industrial Park” has a couple of double slip switches, that really make you look at your track route. I got better as I used them a couple of times. I was kept jumping as I balanced the local switching duties in the "Industrial Park"with making up trains for the east and west bound freights. I ran the “Industrial Park Local” freight in 2 sections. and used the tail of the number 4 “Ready Track” to store the “second section”, while I got back to making up trains for the east and west bound freights. I believe these freights ran each way twice. It was a busy couple of hours. Like many small prototype yards, I kept the 6 tracks loaded with the different car types, but it changed as the “Ops” progressed as to what was kept on each track. I found leaving “Track 4” open for making up the “outbounds” and accepting the “Inbounds”, worked best. That way I worked both directions to and from basically the center of the yard.

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Great afternoon, ready to try my hand at the other jobs!

#11

Looks to me like you are chewing out Ric for something he probably didn’t do anyway!

#12

Get over the miserable old man attitude and let Ric enjoy his retirement as well! Besides at your age you should be wearing striped tube socks pulled up to your knees!

I cannot wait to retire !

#13

I know you are proud of your son but that don’t look like my garage!

#14

That’s awesome!