Layout ideas and design

I was stimulated by conversations at a recent modelers’ get-together in my local area to reflect on how layout designs evolve and how they depend on the owner’s intentions — and how those intentions evolve. Many layout owners concede that they began without much idea of the final goal, however much they might have been inspired by what they saw in the model magazines. 

I should immediately mention that I realize a certain fraction of modelers are really inspired by building scenery, or structures, or complete layout scenes, without any particular interest in operations. They may well run trains here and there as part of the scenes, but without an interest in what a prototype may have done. That’s perfectly okay as a hobby, and some superb modeling has been done in this mode.

There is another subset of modelers who are interested in the locomotives and cars of railroads, and are engrossed with building superb, even museum-quality, models of them, without much interest in operating them in a prototypical manner, or necessarily even building a layout. Here again, it’s fine as a hobby, and the resulting models can be stunning.

On the other hand, there are modelers interested in operation before scenery and structures and rolling stock. I have often mentioned to friends, my experience in the Chicago area, years ago, visiting a layout which was entirely plywood track supports, Homasote track bed, and track. Not a hint of scenery or structures; stations were named with small cards at each location. But complex trackage was complete and running perfectly. We had a busy and interesting and challenging operating session because of the busy schedule, operated by timetable and train order (T&TO).

So where would my preference lie? I appreciate both extremes in layout and modeling choice. But my mind can’t escape recollections of Tony Koester’s comment (in the Foreword to CJ Riley’s book, Realistic Layouts), that modeling railroading implies that we model not only the material objects and environment of professional railroaders, but also “the actions they take to get cargo and people safely and efficiently from A to Z.”

This resonates with me. My own layout choices are primarily aimed at trying to reproduce what the actual railroading job of a local freight crew was like. I have tried to achieve as many components of that as possible, recognizing of course that a visiting operator who has never seen the layout before is in a quite different place from the prototype train crew, who in most cases did that same job every day.

But when a model railroad operating crew, following waybills and other paperwork, spot a box car at an loading dock, they are to some extent doing just what a prototype crew would have done. The photo below, from my layout, is the kind of thing I mean. 

The same goes for other actions that a crew might do in the course of their time on duty, such as spotting freshly loaded reefers at an ice deck to receive the first icing before departing on their journey (the tariff language for this is “initial icing”).

Of course, for a fair number of layout designers and builders, it’s also important that we direct our work in model operations with realistic paperwork, that is to say, prototypical paperwork. I won’t say more on this topic here, since I expanded on my ideas in this direction in a blog post last fall, part of a three-part series on “realistic operations” (see that post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/12/realistic-layout-operation-part-2.html ). The point here would be that layout design doesn’t much turn on paperwork, except in the sense that a layout builder may wish to include space for operators and a dispatcher.

It’s a well-worn piece of advice, to think carefully about what you really want to accomplish in a layout you are designing (or only dreaming about). But inevitably goals and desires evolve with time, and layouts can change with them. I would just encourage layout owners faced with such evolving ideas to grit their teeth, and modify the layout as needed to achieve those goals. You”ll certainly be happier in the long run.

Tony Thompson

A rail load for my Dry Creek ballast car

 I recently described completing a Dry Creek Models Southern Pacific Class W-50-3 Hart convertible ballast car, a fairly straightforward completion of a 3D-printed car body. In that post, I showed an example of such cars being used to carry rail, and mentioned that I planned to make such a load for the model (see the post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2025/03/another-dry-creek-ballast-car.html ). 

In addition to the photo I showed in that previous post, a second photo exists. (Both photos are in Chapter 3 of my book, Southern Pacific Freight Cars, Volume 1, Gondolas and Stock Cars, Signature Press, 2003.) This photo shows the men getting ready to move rail. At left are two men holding rail tongs, which each pair of men will use in moving the rail. This is 90-pound rail, a 39-foot length of which weighs 1170 pounds, and 12 men, in six pairs, will be needed to move it.

Enlarging the photo above to look just at the rail ends, and assuming that rail not visible with something over it will be at the same spacing as the other rail, leads to the conclusion that there were at least 78 rails still in the car, and four more out of the car, as the full photo shows. For a 50-ton nominal car capacity, the max load would be 85 rail lengths, though in fact overloading company cars was not unusual, so that more than 85 lengths would be quite possible. But if one isn’t compulsive about this, a lesser load of rail is perfectly reasonable too.

An important point is what size rail to use for the load. This will of course depend on your prototype and era. In the 1950s, SP’s Coast Division, which I model, was undergoing replacement of the last older rail, to bring the entire division up to 113-pound rail. Since HO scale Code 83 rail represents approximately 126-pound rail, that’s what I chose.

Part of the motivation to make this load is that the Dry Creek model is very light, and has few places that weight can be hidden on an empty car. So the combination of lengths of nickel-silver rail, and a slab of lead sheet under the load, can bring the car up to a weight that can be operated with confidence. 

I cut a lead slab to fit inside the car, and less than the 39-foot rail length. It’s 0.062 inches thick, handily less than 0.083-inch rail. Next I cut a piece of styrene sheet, 0.005-inches thick, slightly narrower than the car interior, and 37 scale feet long, to underlay the weight and allow the rail ends abutting the lead weight to be glued to something. Now I needed a way to get the rail ends exactly even. I decided to make a gluing fixture. I just used some scrap styrene, and glued barrier strips 39 scale feet apart.

I then taped the 0.005-inch styrene in the middle of this fixture, and with pencil marked the location of the ends of the lead weight. That defined the place where I would attach short rail ends to represent the bottom layer of rail in the load. Here are a bunch of rail ends attached with canopy glue, with the pencil boundary visible. It is very simple to align these rail pieces, simply butting the ends to the fixture.

Once all the short ends of the first rail layer were in place, I added the lead sheet weight in the middle, also with canopy glue. Then the next layer of 39-foot rail was added, again with canopy glue. I decided to add a couple extra rail lengths on top. Total weight is 3.5 ounces, very helpful in a “weightless” model. Here it is in unpainted condition.

New rail could vary considerably in color, from the medium gray of mill scale on freshly hot-rolled rail shipped from its place of production, to lightly rusted when outdoors for awhile, to a deeply rusted brown color if stored outdoor for some time. I chose a medium brown, Tamiya’s “Red Brown” (TS-1) and used artist’s color pencils to add rust patches.

This load not only makes this car without end bulkheads logically sensible, and creates an additional load that can be directed to MOW use, but adds weight to a very light model. I look forward to seeing it in a operating session.

Tony Thompson

Operating sessions for BayRails 10

 This year our bi-annual local operating weekend, called “BayRails,” had its tenth renewal, and it took place last weekend. Actually it began, not 20 years ago as you’d guess, but 22 years ago, because we missed 2021 in the pandemic. This year my layout hosted two operating sessions on successive days, and they happened to be my sessions #100 and #101.

The first day the crew was Al Daumann, Dean Deis, Mike Allee and Mel Johnson. Al had operated before on the layout. He’s shown below working at Shumala with Mike, and I was impressed he wore a very appropriate shirt for a layout with five packing houses and lots of reefer traffic. And you can tell he’s the conductor here, with all kinds of paper in hand.

The other crew was Dean and Mel, shown below figuring out their work at Ballard while running the Santa Rosalia Local. If I remember right, Dean was the conductor on this side.

The following day the crew comprised Joe Green and Lou Adler, who had been here before, and newcomers Tim Costello and Mike Cee. The photo below shows Joe (clearly conducting) and Tim holding the throttle, in the middle of switching Shumala.

On the other side of the layout,  Lou and Mike were sorting out the work they needed to do at Ballard. I think this was Lou’s turn to conduct, which is probably why he looks really thoughtful here.

When we were all done for the day, Tim wanted a photo that would include me, so he took the shot below, including his operating partner Joe. I hadn’t thought about getting a photo with me in it, so I’m glad Tim had the idea to take one.

Really nice sessions both days for the most part, though we continued to be bedeviled by the track issues at the Santa Rosalia throat switches. That is just going to have to be rebuilt entirely. I’ve spent several multi-hour sessions trying to get it right, and it’s true that the subsequent problems are often a little different than before, but the track just isn’t what it should be.

Of course, as readers of the blog will know,  I resisted as best I could, the threat of “Host Flaw Hysteria” (a malady originally recognized by Paul Weiss), in which problems in five percent of the session make the host think it was 90% ruined, while actually everyone had a good time. But that trackage does need to be fixed.

Tony Thompson

Handout for “SP freight cars you can model”

This handout is intended to provide the factual background, and information about further sources of information, for my talk with the same title as this post. First, here is an outline of the talk.

Introduction
    Proportions and characteristics of the SP fleet of freight cars

   The following graphs are illustrative; you can click on the image to enlarge it.

  SP’s car classification scheme

Modeling of individual car types
    Gondolas
    Tank cars
    Box and automobile cars
        A simple description of the six body styles among the 15 classes of box cars
        Models of each body style
        The same scheme for automobile cars
    Flat cars, of several types
    Hopper cars
    Stock cars
    Cabooses 

Throughout the talk, I tried to mention primarily currently available models, though noteworthy older ones, such as Sunshine kit, are worth knowing about in case you can acquire examples. Searching eBay from time to time can yield desirable results. Also, a number of the models I showed, though perhaps not available at the moment, are re-issued by their makers from time to time. My understanding is that the very nice Walthers SP wood caboose is among them.

I explained in the talk, and want to list here, the primary sources of information and photographs for both this talk and for my modeling. These are the five volumes I published about SP freight cars.

Thompson, Anthony W., Southern Pacific Freight Cars, Volume 1: Gondolas and Stock Cars, Signature Press, 2002.

Thompson, Anthony W., Southern Pacific Freight Cars, Volume : Cabooses, Signature Press, 2002.

Thompson, Anthony W., Southern Pacific Freight Cars, Volume 3: Automobile Cars and Flat Cars, Signature Press, 2004.

Thompson, Anthony W., Southern Pacific Freight Cars, Volume 4: Box Cars, Signature Press, 2006, revised edition, 2014.

Thompson, Anthony W., Southern Pacific Freight Cars, Volume 5: Hoppers, Covered Hoppers, Tank Cars, Signature Press, 2008.

Here are some additional sources that may be helpful:

Thompson, Tony, “Modeling SP Flat Cars,” Model Railroad Hobbyist, issue for December 2024.

My blog contains many, many posts about SP freight cars It is found at this address: modelingthesp.blogspot.com , and with the search box at the upper right of each post, you can search for specific freight car types.

Kitbashing the Class A-50-17 automobile car, https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/01/modeling-sp-class-50-17-conclusion.html 

Tony Thompson

Handout for “Jobs We Do on the Layout” clinic

The clinic is aimed at describing and illustrating my ideas of what we can do on a layout to reproduce some ideas of prototype railroad jobs that relate to operations. In the clinic, I show examples of  prototypical paperwork as developed for use by model railroaders; and show a number of real railroad jobs that an serve as prototypes for layout operating jobs. As a single example, one might think about the yard office clerk, chalking switching directions (not graffiti!) on a freight car. This photo is from the Richard Hendrickson collection. 

I briefly wrapped up my recommendations with some illustrations of how I have followed these ideas in developing the operating procedures on my own layout. Shown below are links to some blog posts of mine, with background about all this. In addition, I have included below a number of background links to internet resources, as well as a complete list of published material shown or mentioned in the clinic. As I usually do nowadays,  this handout is on-line only, so that the numerous internet resources are readily accessed.  

I will begin with links to some posts to my blog, which touch on the ideas I mentioned for railroad jobs, particularly the agent.

“Clerks, waybills and all that,” https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2018/05/clerks-waybills-and-all-that-waybills.html

“Waybills: the people involved,” https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2014/09/waybills-part-35-people-involved.html

“What’s a car distributor,” https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2020/12/whats-car-distributor.html

“Railroad office forces,” https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2021/06/office-forces.html

“The car-service organization,” https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-car-service-organization.html

“Waybills in service,” https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2017/02/waybills-part-57-waybills-in-service.html

Next is a listing of books and articles shown or mentioned in the clinic.

Armstrong, John H., The Railroad – What It Is, What It Does (Chapter 8, Railroad Operations), Simmons-Boardman Publishing, Omaha, 1982. [there are several subsequent editions with updates; the original is closest in time to the era I model] 

Bedwell, Harry, The Boomer, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 2006.

Chubb, Bruce, How to Operate Your Model Railroad, Kalmbach Books, Milwaukee, 1977.

______, Compendium of Model Railroad Operations, Operations Special Interest Group, Downingtown, PA, 2017.

Coughlin, E.W., Freight Car Distribution and Handling in the United States, Car Service Division, Association of American Railroads, Washington, 1956.

Ellison, Frank, “The Art of Model Railroading,” six-part series in Model Railroader, 1944; reprinted in 1964, August to January 1965.

Ellison, Frank, Frank Ellison on Model Railroads, Fawcett Books, Greenwich, CT, 1954.

Fisher, Ralph E., Vanishing Markers, Stephen Greene Press, Brattleboro, VT, 1976. 

Kalmbach, A.C. (writing as “Boomer Pete”), “Realistic Operation,” Model Railroader, March 1939, pp. 127–130.

Kalmbach, A.C. (writing as “Boomer Pete”), How to Run a Model Railroad, Kalmbach, Milwaukee, 1944 (revision of earlier book, Operating a Model Railroad, 1942).

Koester, Tony, “In search of the perfect waybill,” Model Railroader, February 2012, p. 82.

Koester, Tony, Realistic Model Railroad Operation, Kalmbach, Waukesha, WI, 2003 (2nd edition, 2013).

Morgenstern, Wes (Ed.), Working on the Western Maryland, Western Maryland Historical Society, Union Bridge. MD, 1999. 

Morgenstern, Wes,and Leo Armentrout (Eds.), Working on the Western Maryland, Volume II, Western Maryland Historical Society, Union Bridge. MD, 2011. 

Niemann, Linda, Boomer, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1990. 

_____, Railway Accounting Rules, Accounting Division, Association of American Railroads, Washington, 1950. [numerous editions exist; this one suits my era]

Rehwalt, Dan, Westsider, Grizzly Press, Oakridge, OR, 2004.

Roxbury, L.E., Let’s Operate a Railroad, High-Iron Publishers, Warwick, VA, 1957. 

Smith, Doug, “The latest word on card operations,” Model Railroader, December 1961, pp. 52–62.

Sprau, David, and Steven King, 19 East, Copy Three, Operations Special Interest Group, WoodDale, IL, 2013.

Thompson, Anthony, “Prototypical waybills for car card operation,” Railroad Model Craftsman, December 2009, pp. 71–77.  

Thompson, Tony, “Getting Real: A More Prototypical Waybill for Model Railroads,” Model Railroad Hobbyist, pp. 31–46, May 2012. 

Thompson, Tony, ”Getting Real: Operating with Prototypical Waybills,” Model Railroad Hobbyist, January 2018.  

Finally, several on-line articles by me, touching on the topics of the clinic.

Thompson, Anthony, “Contents of a Waybill,” The Dispatcher’s Office, Vol. 16, No. 2, pp. 17–24, April 2010.
[corrected version available at: modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2011/01/waybills-2.html ]

Thompson, Anthony, “Freight Car Handling and Distribution,” The Dispatcher’s Office, Vol. 17, No. 4, pp. 28–31, October 2011.
[corrected version available at: modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2011/09/my-article-in-dispatchers-office.html ]

Thompson, Anthony, “Progress with Prototypical Waybills for Modelers,” The Dispatcher’s Office, Vol. 22, No. 4, pp. 26–33, October 2016.
[corrected version available at: modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2017/11/yet-another-correction-of-dispatchers.html ]

Thompson, Tony, “Choosing and Modeling an Era,” https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2011/04/choosing-and-modeling-era.html

Thompson, Tony, “Handout: Operating like the Prototype,” https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2023/05/handout-operating-like-prototype.html

 I hope presenting these resources on-line in this way will be at least as helpful as a paper handout, and in my opinion more convenient to use.

Tony Thompson

 

 

Line-ups for operating, Part 2

A few years ago, I posted a description of the kinds of line-ups that I use for layout operating sessions, and explored several ways of letting local switch crews know of the expected arrival time of mainline trains. That post can be found here: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2019/01/line-ups-for-operating.html . Looking back at that post, I can see I left an incomplete expression of usage.

But before going into a clearer statement of my layout usage, let me show the Southern Pacific form used for line-ups. This is a standard form introduced in 1947, later modified a few times, and the example below was filled out in 1972. Now that’s a form that was in use for quite a time! Though it is intended for track cars (or speeders), it could be useful for a variety of recipients. (You can click on the image to enlarge it if you wish.)

My own line-up at present is more complicated than what I showed in that previous post, and I show below an example of a current typical line-up, as always for 1953. As I have seen in the SP prototype, for both line-ups and train orders, sometimes warnings such as the presence of the Division Superintendent’s car, can be included. Crews at Shumala have to consult the timetable for times at that intermediate location between Guadalupe and San Luis Obispo.

This particular form also includes a “high-wide” movement westward, Extra 2575, as I showed in a recent post (you can see the background at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2025/03/operating-high-wide-loads.html ). Below is a photo of this train, operated at a distinctly slow speed, as such train normally were moved.

 Also noted in the line-up, as I pointed out, is the Superintendent’s official car, Coast, SP 119, attached to a passenger equipment extra. I described modeling that car awhile back, in a three-part series concluding with this post: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/08/operating-sp-business-car-conclusion.html . Two different SP former employees I interviewed mentioned that no one took a chance on not performing perfectly when the Superintendent was around.

Some visitors have immediately asked, upon considering this topic, why a line-up is needed. The segment of Southern Pacific’s Coast Division main line that passes through my layout is at the town of Shumala, and is entirely within yard limits, on the visible part of that main line on the layout. That means, as many modelers know, that Rule 93 is in effect.

In the period that I model, the 1950s, individual railroad rule books differed in the exact language of many rules, even though the intent and rule number was consistent almost everywhere. In SP rule books, Rule 93 was modified from the 1943 rule book to the 1951 rule book, and further modified in 1955, so for exact language, one needs a specific choice of era. 

Since I model 1953, I use the 1951 language, which states that “Within yard limits, engines may use main track without train-order authority, clearing or protecting against first-class trains, and without flag protection against second- and inferior-class trains, extra trains, and engines.

“Second- and inferior-class trains, extra trains, and engines must move with caution on main track within yard limits, except where movements are controlled by block signal indication.”

This clearly places responsibility for cautious movement upon the mainline train if other than first class, and in most of my sessions, the mainline trains are second-class, third-class or extra. So what is the purpose of a line-up? It helps the yard crew know what to expect, even though any mainline train arriving during yard-engine use of the main track will simply have to wait.

So to sum up, I know from employee interviews that SP freight schedules in the steam era had almost the character of suggestions. It was not only routine but almost standard for them to run various amounts late. But it would be unusual to issue run-late orders to cover any discrepancy; the Coast was not busy enough to need that. That’s why, in my line-ups, I am assuming the dispatcher is just using the line-up to pass along what he knows.

Tony Thompson 

Restoring an Ulrich hopper car, Part 2

In the preceding post, I showed an old Ulrich twin hopper car that has been in my “some day” project box for quite a while. It lacks couplers and has some other issues, as I described in that initial post (you can see it at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/12/restoring-old-ulrich-hopper-car.html . 

As I showed in that post, by including the Ulrich instructions for the oldest version of this model, there was a pine wood center sill and balsa bolster supports. There are inevitably issues with maintaining these parts, let alone modifying them. 

After the post appeared, Dave Vos in Minnesota contacted me, mentioning that back when these cars were current, he too had had issues with the wood center sill, and had purchased from Ulrich some of the cast metal underframes used in later versions of this kit. More importantly, he had a spare and offered it to me.

This frame, of course, was designed to fit the parts of the older car body. When Ulrich replaced the former wood frame with this cast frame, they continued to use all the previous body parts, which were assembled around the new frame in about the same way as for the old wood frame. 

The only task for me at this point was to remove all the old wood and glue, and to finish cleaning up the cast frame (Dave had done part of the frame cleanup). Here is the cleaned-up car body underneath, prior to repainting the brass slope sheets black. Hopper doors have been temporarily removed.

Next I needed to re-attach the AB brake gear to the new cast frame, for which I used canopy glue. Then came making new cover plates for the coupler boxes. I used 0.020-inch styrene sheet, and fitted it to the inset edges of the boxes, along with a center pin hole. With Kadee no. 158 whisker couplers installed, the underframe looked like this.

The next step was to finish painting the completed frame black, and to install it into the car body. I used canopy glue for attachment, and clamped the frame into the body to ensure a good fit and bond. Then the hopper doors were installed with canopy glue, as well as were Ajax hand brake gear, from my parts stash. To complete the car assembly, the original trucks were installed. 

The most noteworthy aspect of the photo above is that the car is far too clean! Clearly it remains to be weathered, as do a couple of other open-top cars recently completed, and that work will likely form a future post. I will certainly use my usual technique with acrylic washes, as described and illustrated in the “Reference pages” at the top right corner of this post.

I expect that the completed car will operate mostly in through trains (what I call a “mainline car”), but if you’re perhaps wondering what any kind of coal traffic is doing on a California layout, you might like to read my post on the topic (it’s at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2018/02/coal-in-california.html ). 

Tony Thompson