Real Stinkin' Progress

This sounds a bit self-helpy, but I recently read somewhere that the biggest challenge to adults trying to learn or achieve something is maintaining momentum.  When it comes to building a model railroad layout, I can see a lot of truth in that.

Thus far in the "journey" of building a layout, the biggest hurdle I've encountered was trying to find an idea which I was excited about enough so much so that when I began to loose momentum returning to that idea would be exciting.  Until last month I hadn't figured out yet what that was as I'm sure is evidenced on my blog with my jumping from theme to theme and scale to scale.

It's a difficulty of model railroading: figuring out where you "fit".  Are you a transition era guy? A mainline modeler?  A narrow gauge'er?  Do you prefer scratch building, building kits, or buying everything RTR so you can just operate the trains?  What exactly are you looking to achieve?

There's so many questions and to some degree I think I've been lost in them for the better pat of the past 2 years.  Late last month I reflected on the opening words to the book Model Railroading from Prototype to Layout:

Use extreme care when drawing a line in the sand that represents a goal, as it may instead become a barrier to even greater progress and knowledge.  Besides, such lines tend to be erased over time, leading one to wonder why such a restriction was created in the first place. -- Tony Koester

Barriers.  Barriers we create for ourself.  I took a look at the direction I was wanting to go.  Guess what I saw.  Barriers.  Why exactly had I developed such a distaste for Colorado narrow gauge?  Oh, right, because everyone does it and apparently I thought I couldn't because of that.

That's dumb.  Colorado narrow gauge makes sense for me...

• I live in Colorado
• Every time I drive into the Rockies I'm overwhelmed by how amazing it is
• It really is one of the most magical narrow gauge locales in the world
• It's available
• It's do-bale
• It's exciting

With that barrier cleared a lot started falling into place.  A lot.  Things started clicking.  I produced a logo that's really exciting..

I have momentum.

And momentum indeed, to hit the gas, pedal to the metal, and jump into something amazing.

My working name thus far is Rio✰Chama Central, however I've been tempted to swing it as Rio✰Chama Western.  In any case, it's Rio Chama, the other main river heading south from Colorado to Mexico.

My working track plan thsu far is I don't have one.  That's not entirely true.  I know where the mainline will be.  My plan is this -- Build the mainline with spline roadbed then fill in the sidings and scenic features as I go.  It's bit like "planning in place" where things are added around the mainline.  In a sense that's psuedo-prototypical anyways.  Sidings were added and removed over time and I'm planning on letting the railroad evolve for itself as I build.

Oh, and I've been building...

Welcome to the town of Tincup, population 0.  At the moment Tincup is a barren wasteland of flat, however railroad management has plans for this to be the southern terminus of the line.

The track crew layed out some rail in planning the town.  As things stand there will be the mainline terminus with a siding for industry.  An interchange (universal industry) with the San Juan Central is also planned on the siding closest to the edge of town.  The deviating track coming away from the town will also lead to a turntable, so the engine can be flipped around for the return trip.

That track leading to the turntable will require some fancy trackwork however.  The track crew is still debating on if such an arrangement is a good idea or not.

As you can see, the track leading to the turntable will need to cross over the main siding in town.  Being so close to the turnout this will require quite a bit of fanciness if this is going to be the final track plan.  The track crew is still debating on this track feature.

With a nice plan for the arrangement of track in hand, the contractors went to work installing a 1/2" plywood subroadbed for Tincup.  The crew also began to setup the profile for the mountain that will overshadow Tincup and even graded out an upper level where a street will lead to for additional structures.

Looking north out of Tincup, the mainline will likely then cut out of town and towards the back of the layout where it will then sweep with a large 30" radius curve to the east.

The charter that the Rio✰Chama Central management received from the state indicates that service to Tincup needs to begin in January 2012 1941, so they're anxious to get things rolling.  To that end work was started immediately on grading the mainline.  Certain considerations must be considered in these parts for grading and the crew chose spline roadbed as the method for the mainline outside of the towns.

The track crew made a visit this morning to Home Depot to pickup a number of hand clamps.

The track crew realized something important very quickly: YOU CAN NEVER HAVE TOO MANY CLAMPS when you're doing spline roadbed.  Even still, the spline method produces such beautifully flowing curves it will be worth it.

I'm sure there are many railroad contractors/track crews who think to themselves, "I would like to do spline roadbed but I don't have a table saw!"  Ah, but neither does the track crew that Rio✰Chama Central hired.  You see, table saws, while quite a useful tool, require a lot of space and additional support to work.  For example, with lengths of Masonite 8 feet long, one would certainly need an infeed and an outfeed table and at least 16' of working room.

The track crew for the Rio✰Chama Central instead uses a circular saw with a bolt-on fence.  Something like this:

This holds the saw at a consistent 1" away from the edge of the board.  The advantage here is that no in or out tables are required as the wood stays put and it's the saw that is moved over the edge of the board.  Those who are perceptive however will notice a little problem with this plan:  The masonite is only 1/8" thick and the fence is clearly higher than that off the shoe of the saw.

That's where a little tool I like to call "scrap wood" comes in.  A small piece of 1x4 can raise the saw up enough for the fence to make contact with the edge of the wood.

I forgot to mention something.  Rio✰Chama Central has chosen the gauge of 3 feet.  Rio✰Chama Central is a HOn3 layout.

H.
Oh.
En.
Three.

Rock it like it's narrow gauge.