Latest track plan

The new track plan for the SFRSD

     With work well and truly in progress on the extension to the shed ( Railroad Room) obviously at the same time I had been working on what I needed to do to the railroad to maximize this new found space. I regularly have 11 of us attend operating sessions and as a result the room was just too small.
     My main focus was to increase space for my crew and give more space around Hackney and Flynn. With this in mind Flynn need to be moved out to the new outside wall and the new peninsular would not be too long allowing me space around the entry.

     The did a lot of measuring and a few hand drawn track plans and then had my good friend John draw the new version in M S. Excel.

     So this is what I came up with in my newly created space. This gives me a 20'x 20' room, much better.

    
     As you can see, Flynn is to be moved to the new wall, the old wall has been shortened to allow more space in which to move. The town of Guthrie became Perry and a new Guthrie was to be built. This also allowed me to extend Augusta however I decided to leave a small portion of that old wall and create a new town of Augusta East. (more industries to switch).
     One of the most critical factors that I needed to reenforce to the builders was that the entry door must be in the same relative position on the new wall as it was in the old to allow Flynn to be fitted in a similar position.
     To take out the entire yard of Flynn it took only the cutting of one track and whilst I was doing that john C was terminating all of the wires into two terminal blocks on wire at a time. This would enable a quick join between these two and we could be up and running quite quickly once Flynn was back up on the wall.

    The next few images show construction of the ceiling which I do first then start on the stud walls and lining the extension which started as soon as I was given the ok to walk on the new concrete floor.

Demolition begins

Need lots of insulation, outside temp gets to 42C in summer

Starting on the walls for Augusta East

If you look carefully you can see Flynn on the floor to the left in one piece with thanks to my crew.

More next time, thanks for stopping by.
Rod.

The new floor

And now for the new dust free concrete floor

     The new floor was laid by just two guys, the one who pushed the barrow all the way to the back yard from the agitator looked quite old but did a great job. I get these fellows as they do a dust free surface for me. This is done after the pre- finishing to obtain a good surface. Then after about 3 hours they come back and spread a fine layer of very fine stone dust all over and float it off with a steel trowel. Voila! no dust and it makes a huge difference to the cleanliness of my layout room.

     Before these guys came I had to drill countless number of holes in my pre existing floor to add tie bars to avoid the floors moving away or up and down from one another.

This is the view looking from the extension into the layout

Most of this old wall will go and what remains will be a part of a new backdrop for the new Guthrie.

     This was a very exciting time. It allowed me to not only expand the layout and extend the mainline, it allowed me to make some space for my crew to gather during operating sessions. All in all a great move.
More next time
Rod.

SFRSD Expands

Expansion of the SFRSD

     In November of 2007 my Fun and Finance minister and I were sitting enjoying a cup of tea after breakfast one morning talking about our hobbies. Helen my wife of almost 47 years is into scrap booking and card making and was thinking about new machines she would like to purchase. Well one thing led to another and the subject of expanding my RR room for the SFRSD came up. If I agreed to save her Dublin Bay Roses climbing up the outside of the shed and it did not take up too much room in the back yard that I could go ahead.
     Well that was a big green board for me so the next work day I as up to the shed company to obtain a quote, come back home and rip out those dam prickly, I mean lovely roses.
     A few days passed the quote was accepted (well what do you reckon) and within a week or two the extension was in progress.
     While construction was taking place the pad and pencil was drawing the revised track plan to see what would work the best.

The cleared space in front of the shed is the size of the extension

The construction crew working in 37C temperatures

The cladding is on minus the window which was excluded from this wall to save the heat build up inside

I gained about 6ft 6inches in width to finish with a 20' x 20' space

     All of this took place over about a two week period and just before Christmas of 2007 so I was a very happy man. Please do not ask about the roses.
     Until next time have fun running a train.
Rod.

Past Guthrie and into Flynn

Now we are heading past Guthrie and into Flynn

     Guthrie is a very small area only serving one industry Harmony Sand and Gravel

 

Grade crossing just past Guthrie

     And now we have arrived at Flynn the last stop on the SFRSD.

The Dash 8 is no longer on the roster. The large building in the background is the Ford plant all scratch built.

     All of the above images where taken back in 2005/6. These couple are not such good shots so hopefully those that I took later in the progress of the build should show a little more of the yard.

     In the next series of posts I will show the upgrade to the room (shed) and RR expansion in 2007/8 so until then thanks for stopping by.
Rod.

Ponca City and Red Rock

Now we''ll head to Ponca City and Red Rock

     Parts of Ponca City are still not completed, there are two elevators McMurray Co-op to the left of town and Farmers Union to the right. Several industries are served by rail however the buildings for these are still to be made.

      All of the following images are from 2005.

The timber elevator and conveyer were scratch built

     For some reason I have no images for the McMurray Co-op Elevator probably as the rest of the area is not completed.
     Ponca can be a very busy spot during my monthly operating sessions so over the past two sessions I have modified my timetable to ease the congestion. Now I think my operators can breath a little easier knowing that it is not so stressful.
    Now around the bend to Red Rock.

The gas station was built from a kit supplied by Joe Warren thanks Joe it fits the scene just as I wanted

These two buildings, the general store and repair shop are also scratch built. There is an elevator at Red Rock but alas no images from 2005

The Southern Pacific SD45 is waiting for the Fln / Aug grain to clear the cantilever. The stick is showing the wrong colour that is because I only have the signals wired to show turnout position at this time. Not enough cash!

 That's about it for today so have fun and thanks for stopping by.
Rod.

Moving around the layout

Lets move around a bit further.
   
     Today I will concentrate on Hackney.

Hackney is looking a little more complete as the Kodachrome slowly rolls by the road gang

All of the elevator complex at Hackney was scratch built except for the bins

Hackney can be a busy spot during operating sessions

All of these images were taken in 2005.
That will do for today so thanks again for stopping by.
Rod.