OK, so here's a series of photos, showing the recent Tortoise installs, and a (very messy) overview of the layout as it exists at the moment. I'll be very glad to start working on scenery, but I'm forcing myself to finish wiring, track, and turnouts first.

First up is a tour of the layout - here's Vance Junction, with Lizard Head curving above it. On the right you can see the wye from Vance heading toward Telluride's penisula.



And here's a couple shots of Telluride:





And here's Ridgway's yard:





This is Rico, with just the main line and sidings laid so far.



Here's Hesperus, with the area for Durango unfinished above it. Lots of scenery will hopefully hide most of the yard lead directly above Hesperus behind a ridge.



And here's Dolores. Again, scenery is intended to nearly hide the line climbing above it on the way to Lizard Head.



Here's the staging tracks cutting thru the bathroom. There's a main line between Dolores and Mancos hidden under those staging tracks, too.



And this is the crossover into the Ridgway yard lead, which is hidden in a closet in the bathroom, before the Tortoises were added.



And finally, one of the two Tortoises above ground in the closet; the one that's installed is part of the crossover, and there's linkages prepared for another, handling the first switch in the yard lead for Ridgway. My method here was to carefully drill a #70 hold in the Peco linkage (after snipping off the nub), then running that thru some aluminum tubing drilled into a bit of scrap masonite. The tubing keeps the throw wire from popping up or moving around too much.



And here's the turnouts at Vance, handling a 3-way Peco, with one motor above (hidden in a tunnel eventually, I hope), and the other below.



And a closeup of the upper machine at Vance - using a slightly different method to grab hold of the Peco. I like the method used at Ridgway better, but this seems to be working fine.

Wow... has it really been a month and a half since that last post?

Anyway, I've managed to get another 4 Tortoise installs done, along w/ the related control-panel wiring. The turnouts for both ends of the Ophir siding are done now, as is the hidden crossover in the bathroom closet, just outside of Ridgway's yard. That was difficult; I will (promise!) post photos soon of that one.

Next up is trying to find a way to install Tortoises on the 3-way at the start of Ridgway's yard, which is a difficult reach from the aisle. Another Tortoise is about finished on the first turnout of the Ridgway yard ladder - that one also being in the closet.

This Thanksgiving break was really nice - very relaxed at home. I had good time w/ the family, and also some time for layout work. And on that front, I was able to complete all of the electrical work at the Vance Jct wye - turnout motors are all in, panel and LEDs are wired and functioning, the reverser relay for the wye (actually, for all of Telluride) is in and operational - it's all good!

I've FINALLY finished wiring all the detector and force-red circuits, and panel LEDs for them, all that stuff. My dwarf signals are complete and ready to install, but aren't in yet.

But - one of the panels also needs to control some of the turnouts for a wye remotely, and since I wired all the LEDs and switches for that, I thought it was finally time to tackle a Tortoise install - for a code 75 small-radius Peco wye turnout.

I used a method from Rich's methods, using some metal tubing and spring wire. I like this because I got to lay track w/o worrying about drilling large holes under each turnout as I went.

So - I've got the first one done now, but not wired; it seemed to go pretty well. I underestimated how difficult it'd be to actually get it screwed into place upside down - and this was the probably the easiest of the places I need these!

Oh well - challenges are good, right? I'll try and get a photo posted eventually.

I've been slowly working my way through wiring detectors and LED indicators in my panels, for the various hidden-track sections of the layout.

Tonight, I started working in earnest on wiring a number of 2-light dwarf signals (Oregon Rail Supply), which will be installed at the entrance to all the hidden track sections. These are a bit more work to wire than I expected - as you have to figure out where to physically locate the resistors for the LEDs (I opted for below the layout - meaning I had to wire the LEDs with a short length of wire, then the resistor(s), then more wire which would attach to the 'real' wiring below the layout somewhere).

Anyway - it's going smoothly now. I debated for a long time between normal block signals, and the much smaller dwarfs, because the RGS never had any signals (of course). I settled on the dwarfs because I don't want to 'model' block signalling, but just want to give my operators some indicator of whether they can proceed into the hidden blocks or not. So I kinda have block signals, and kinda don't, if that makes any sense.

Hopefully I'll post some photos once they're built & installed.

According to this posting, apparently the restoration of Goose 4, currently underway at the Ridgway Museum, will be a restoration to operating condition. And, Telluride has apparently made an agreement with the museum to let them run the Goose once a year. This is different that the original posting on the museum site, which was only for a cosmetic restoration. Hopefully the posting referenced above is true!

This is big news - Goose 4 was the last of the remaining Geese to be restored, and was thought to never operate again. When this restoration is complete in 2011, all 6 remaining geese will be operating, and the original Goose 1 recreated and also operating. And then there's RGS #20, undergoing a very extensive rebuild in Pennsylvania, and when done will operate again, and in better condition than she probably ever was on the RGS.

Here's a couple shots of the inside of the Ridgway panel, showing the wiring for the block-detection LEDs and force-red circuits for the remote signals protecting those blocks.

A friendly alien is keeping careful watch.

I'm still slowly working thru the wiring of various panels, LEDs, and all the inter-connections to the detectors. Having a detector board in one town, but wiring LEDs and sometimes force-red circuits in other towns, requires a bunch of wiring between the towns, and that just takes time.

I did take a break over Labor Day weekend (which was really beautiful here in the midwest) to gather up a pile of unbuilt kits and get them sprayed w/ base coats and a little weathering - just so I can work on lettering and finishing them over the winter, if I want. With no spray booth, it occurred to me that if I wanted to finish up these rolling stock kits in the winter, I'd better get the spraying part of the work done now! Which I did.

So - back to wiring during my layout work times.

So, I continued working on wiring between trips to local pool this weekend. The RGS was not signaled, of course, but my layout has a number of hidden track segments and I've added detection for those sections.

There's a couple of long hidden segments that exit directly into towns (Dolores, Ridgway, and Vance Jct). In those areas, if you are switching and blocking the main, I think it'd be helpful - and probably required for sanity's sake - to be able to block trains from unexpectedly jumping out of those hidden tracks. So - I'm adding signals (on the panels at least) for those blocks, and allowing the operator in - say - Dolores to force the signal red to prevent trains from entering blocks leading to Dolores.

So - I've got blue LEDs on the track segments, to show if a train is actually in those hidden blocks, and red/green signal LEDs (on the panels) to indicate the signal status at each end of the block - repeated on panels at both ends of the blocks. When the track is empty, the signals are green, when occupied they are red.

What I've added is a 'force red' switch in Dolores, so that if you are switching in Dolores and want to stop trains from entering, you can set the block signal at the far end to red, even though the block occupancy LED (blue) will still show the track as empty.

The wiring for this proved a little trickier than I expected, and it's not done so I'm not completely sure it'll work. In terms of physical wiring, I'm bringing all the panel LEDs from both locations to one panel (Dolores in this first case), then bringing the detectors ouputs there as well, and making all the logic connections in one place. I'll spare you further details, but it's been a fun exercise so far!

And, at long last, here's some photos of the painted fascia. The layout still in major construction stage, so it's messy! The paint was done using Behr paints, primed with a tinted good-quality primer, and then 2-3 coats of semi-gloss interior latex, in Windsor Moor, which is a dark green. I picked it because it's dark enough to not call attention to itself, but isn't black, and seems to blend well w/ planned scenery colors. Behr is available from Home Depot.

I was pretty pleased w/ the results. I picked the semi-gloss because I wanted something tough, that wouldn't easily scratch, scuff, or get marked up.

I plan to add car-card holders, in the same color, but that's on hold until wiring is further along.













Here's a kinda poor picture of the current wiring for Durango. You can see the BD8 from The Signaling Solution installed here. This is one of a number of wiring panels, one per town. This is hinged at the top, and swings up and out of the way when I'm not working on it.

Each panel has bus feeds for track and other power (upper left corner), then feeds those circuits out to blocks and other circuits for that area of the layout.

Well - time for a few photos. Here's some shots of the signs and control panel graphics I've added. I finally got one of my BD8 detector boards wired as well, and you can see a couple of the blue LEDs I'm using in the panels, for detection of trains on hidden track.

With signage complete now, I'm back to wiring. I've added some LED lights about the track-power kill switches scattered around the layout, for operators to more easily know where they're located (hidden below the fascia edge). With my control system, having kill switches has always been helpful to me.

I'm also beginning to wiring by BD8 detector cards, now that I've got panel graphics and can start installing the occupancy LEDs and perhaps signals (both of which are needed if guest operators are going to start running trains).

Scenery is still a ways off... oh well. But, I'm also building freight cars when I need a break from wiring, and I've added two more Accurail hoppers this week - custom-lettered for my version of the RGS.

I worked on-and-off the last several weeks drafting signage and control panel graphics, and today finished installing them.

After searching around and trying a number of freeware graphics programs, I finally settled on using PowerPoint. Eventually, I'll dig out the camera and post some photos.

To finish them, I went ti Kinko's and had them create color printouts on cardstock (black background with mostly white graphics, and color highlights), then laminated onto this stuff that's laminate on one side, but adhesive on the other; Kinko's used it themselves for some of their keyboard and phone notes. Works great, so far anyway.

Wiring wiring wiring... sometimes it seems it'll never end! But, I completed all the control jacks, so trains can be locally controlled from any of the towns now. I suppose wiring in block detectors will be the next task, since it would be hard for multiple operators to use the layout w/o knowing if the hidden tracks are occupied or now.

Actually creating the bloc indicators, though, means I will really have to get to work on drafting the control panels. I have done lots of CAD work in the past, but for some reason I haven't yet come up with a good graphic design or layout for controls panels. It should be easy, right? I suppose part of the issue is that I'm not sure how much information to include, whether to create a full track diagram at each town (which I figure would be helpful for other operators), or what.

Stay tuned, I guess!

I've been slowly continuing wiring efforts on the layout, as I've found time for it (only a few hours per week, in this current season of life). I've got a Keller Onboard control system, and current work is wiring the remote jacks for the controls - running a bus around the layout, and wiring the jacks.

Keller's system comes with 3-circuit 1/4" stereo jacks on their keypads, but I don't like these for a number of reasons - they're hard to pull out, cause a momentary short when plugged in, and the stress from pulling seems like a bad idea for long-term durability. So, I replaced them with - borrowing from my theatre experiences - 3-pin metal XLR jacks, commonly use for microphones. The receptacles are male, while the plugs on the keypads are all female. If you're not familar w/ this type of connector, it's got a spring-loaded locking tab on it - so when you insert the plug it locks into place, and to remove you depress the tab and them pull out - not much stress at all because of this, but very durable.

Because I might someday upgrade to DCC, I researched the control bus requirements for a number of vendors, and decided to use a shielded network cable for my Keller control bus - the idea being that if I upgrade to DCC, I won't want to have to replace the bus wiring. I found - are you ready for this - 1100 feet of just the right cable on eBay a couple years ago, for maybe $60. It's #20 wire, with 2 sets of individually shielded pairs, plus a mesh metal shield around the whole thing.

Probably the only downside is that this wire is solid, and because my control panels drop down, I'm running this wire to terminal blocks near the panels, then switching to stranded wire into the panels themselves. I don't want the wire breaking because of the panel movement.

My usual comment... yes, I should get around to posting pictures, and I will try.