The Home Machinist!

You'll likely beat me, work continues on my "train set" but it won't actually get laid on the ground for some time yet. The northern-to-mid portion has potential to go in quickly due to the terrain, it will mostly be a shallow "dig" to get the right elevation. Then, at least that end of the line can open for garbage service:)

Making some progress on finally clawing my way out of the “Grand Canyon” of the Woodnville Cascades. These are the last two approaches to the eastern abutment. Thought about cut n fill. But it would take to long - months - for the fill to settle. Around here the soils “fluf” up about 1/3 in volume when dug and deposited elsewhere. So takes a while for compaction to reach permanet grade, to be able to lay track. So laying cement block and cement seemed quicker and easier??

This afternoon I’ll lay the caps and stringers, then throw on the ties and rail, if I can get that far.
Glenn

Spent the day finishing up some miniature landscaping along the main line adjacent to my future loading platform. Park gauge railroads usually ave some sort of associated theme. So this landscape element turned into a small scale Japanese garden, bordering the edge of the ROW with rock work and juniper planting’s, including a small Buddha placidly comtemplating the world below from atop a rocky precipice, backed up to Mount Fuji. I hope the tiny miniature junipers don’t grow widely out of control for a few years yet. If so, then they will get transplanted out in the Forest Division to become real trees. And new miniatures, brought in to replace them.

Iam thinking of naming the passenger loading yard, “Burma Station”, and name my ballast hopper car operation after the famous South Asia subsidiary “Bonsai and Wasabi Range Mining Company Ltd”.

Glenn

Classy, Glenn!
As usual.
~RN

Looking good! Looks like you'll be running soon?
Have you done a turnout yet?

Ryan, well I have the turntable and a couple of short spurs in the yard, but no actual turnout on the mainline. I’ve got the fixings for two switch’s, including switch stands, and a diamond crossing, but no actual plan to install them.

Tomorrow the last section of trestle gets finished. Then it’s up to the excavating crew to knaw through the last of the mountianmpass and lay the final section of track.

Glenn

NP317 wrote: ↑Wed May 23, 2018 10:02 am Classy, Glenn!
As usual.
~RN

Thanks Russ, much appreciate the comment! Are you headed to Tm for the triannual? I might go down for a few days. Be great to catch up.

Glenn

Glenn:
I am not attending the Triennial this time around. Simply too many people for me this year. Silly, because it's only a 4 hour drive from my home!
But maybe I'll decide to stop in anyway for a day or two. We'll see.
I will be attending the Ops meet, and look forward to time with my Kitsap Live Steamer Colleagues.
I miss all of you Folks, after 20 years of messing about together with trains!

See ya sooner and later.
~Russ

Finished up the trestle and my boy and I started laying ballast and running rail off the Northern approach. Jon came over to help as a father’s day present. And was a big help. Plus, it doesn’t get any better when you work with your boy to do something fun!
A few days earlier, the first part of the ballast was: Shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel. Spreading ballast by hand is a rather large task. Finally decided to rent a nice little Kubota tractor with bucket and backhoe to spread the remaining ballast -20 tons of 5/8” washed and crushed rock. Very nice stuff. Locks in solid when compacted a bit, and drives underneath the ties nicely. I found it useful to survey and raise the ties and rail to final grade before laying ballast, then shimming the spiked rail to final grade with 2x4 and 1x2 pieces of wood. With the rail elevated off the low points in the grade, it’s fairly easy to dump gravel over the top, RR maintenance style, and tamp the new ballast firmly underneath.

This is more or less, what I’ve been doing in the photo below.
Here’s the final look after all the ballast was distributed properly. Tamping and compacting completely under each tie pretty much shrunk 6” of loose rock into a 4” road bed, more or less, depending on irregularities in the dirt road bed.

that next-to-last picture looks just like a big ol' American Flyer track setup! Glad you are making progress.

Beautiful setup Glenn!

That trestle looks great! Good work. Your back will thank you for renting the Kubota, that's way too much weight to shovel by hand.
I think the 5/8 clear is the best choice for our weather here, it will let the rain drain through it, but is large enough that it won't move in a downpour. I really like the way the 3/8 clear looks and packs, but it holds water and under heavy rain it will migrate.
Btw, If you isolate your track electrically into 3 sections, I've got a freebie for you. I don't have the space to have reversing loops at both ends of my RR so I have an extra searchlight signal you can have. If you will only have 2 isolated sections, you can just do red/green and not hook up the yellow.