The future Iantha Branch

Discussion in 'General' started by Iantha_Branch, Jun 29, 2022.

  1. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    It's finally time to update this thread again.

    The good: Once I settled on the above plan as a basic premise, I spent the next month and a half going through it with a fine tooth comb. I've made a few noticeable adjustments to the setup, and several more not so noticeable adjustments. I even started on the basic settings for the scenery. It's consumed I don't know how many hours at this point, but I finally have this track plan settled out to the point where I'm really happy with it.

    The bad: Our house builder finally was able to give us an initial estimate for the main house and the price was more than we had originally planned for. Combine that with mortgage rates almost doubling since I started to pencil stuff out and we found ourselves in a bit of a budget crunch. We made some revisions to the house to get the cost back down closer to where we originally had it. I haven't received any estimates yet on the detached man cave, but based off some of the things in the house quote, it's probably double of what I expected. So I told my wife I would find a way to cut down the size of the building. It took all week to do so, but I found a way to revise my plans back to a 40' x 40' layout space and still check most of the boxes I wanted to.

    I like the bigger plan that I came up with so much that I wanted to share the final version of it before moving on. It's hard to find plans in this size range, so maybe some day it'll be of inspiration to someone.
     

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  2. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    Moving on, my new version of the building is 40x50. I took 10' off the common area and 20' off of the layout. The crew lounge may be a bit on the small side now, but it should still get the job done.

    As for the layout its self, it took a few attempts to get the correct combination of bench work, but I have something that I'm happy with. All of the bench work is still 2' deep and all of the aisles are 5-6' wide. It looks like I forgot to mention it in an earlier post, but all of the main line uses a minimum of 40" radius curves. I think the only spot that is less than that is going into the Texas staging area, I had to cut it down to 30" to make it work. All of the inclines are 2% grades.

    Once I settled on this bench work configuration, I mostly just copy and pasted sections from the bigger design into this one. I had to compress a few spots. Others, like Rosedale and Ft. Scott, had to be redesigned completely. A few areas had to be eliminated entirely. I gave up most of the industrial area in KC, all of Glenn Park yard, about half of the industrial area in Ft. Scott, a good chunk of Springfield, almost all of the Parsons Sub, and St. Louis is back to just a staging yard.

    This is just a starting point. I'll have to restart the process of going through with a fine tooth comb and make adjustments, but it's a good start.

    All for now. As always, feedback is greatly appreciated.
     

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  3. skyraider

    skyraider Member

    Man, that's pretty ambitious, Ethan!!! You could run some serious trains on that. You'll have to have a few hundred pieces of rolling stock for those yards. Do you plan on running any passenger trains? That would be a great layout for passenger trains. Having Amarillo on the layout is starting to get you close to my neck of the woods... even closer to where Tom Holley grew up.
     
  4. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    I would say ambition can be a positive and negative trait. Time will tell which it ends up being.

    One of my goals with the layout is long run time for long trains. Everything is sized for 24' total length of train. 20-30 cars depending on length, 4 locos and a caboose. I've already made good progress on accumulating equipment for this big of a layout. With an era of 1980, passenger operations aren't in the timetable. However, there's extra tracks in the staging yards to hold "for fun" trains, which could include passenger equipment.

    Amarillo is mostly a name on paper to give a destination for Santa Fe run-through traffic. I can do some Western OK/ Texas Panhandle type scenery in the Enid area though.
     
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  5. skyraider

    skyraider Member

    Sounds like fun!
     
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  6. skyraider

    skyraider Member

    Ethan,

    You already know all of this, but you asked for feedback.

    It just depends on what you want to do. I like building things, making scenery, etc. You are obviously into operations, so that is what you should focus on. That's the beauty of the hobby. There's room for all of us and we should all appreciate what each individual is doing.

    Regarding ambition...sometimes a person has to stretch the limits to see what they can actually do. There's absolutely nothing wrong with setting high goals. The smart thing is to have a plan B, just in case. "Hope for the best / plan for the worst".

    Let's say that time or budgetary constraints put the squeeze on at some point in time. If you start you layout and build the mainline section at a time, with the switches installed to enter / exit any particular yard, you can always go back and complete the yard at a later date when time and / or money allow. You could put in one through yard track (with the next switches installed) so you at least have a passing siding where the future yard will be. Maybe pick one yard that will be your primary and complete it, but do the others at some later date. That way you can still enjoy running trains.

    In my humble opinion-just coming from an old fart who has learned lots of lessons the hard way--it's better to dream big and have to scale things down than to get to a place down the road where you say, "dang, I wish I had really gone for it on this". Just have a backup plan.

    My personal downfall is being too perfectionistic and getting caught in the "paralysis of the analysis". If something doesn't look or work like you anticipated, redo it. It is, after all, a model.

    Have fun!!!!! At least that's what my dogs have always told me...:cool:
     
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  7. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    Those are all excellent points.

    Not sure if I've covered it yet, but part of my process in deciding on a base design was balancing the 3 main types of operating I'm looking for: road trains, local switching and industrial switching. Some of you might have noticed I have higher and higher numbers tacked on to the file names. The bigger layout I had been on got to the 9th iteration of design based off of a Northern Division concept. All the previous versions were different mixes of those 3 types of operations. That 9th version is where I finally felt I had the 3 balanced pretty well.

    Now, tie that all in with the ambition being a blessing and a curse. I feel that building something big enough to catch all of these elements gives me options for operating based off what I have the energy for. I had considered more simple, scenery centered concepts, but was afraid I would get bored with it too quickly and feel the need to rebuild to something different. I had also explored more switching intense designs, but the fear was it would be too much and not offer enough simple running when work gets tough.

    Being able to build in stages has been on my mind this whole time. I definitely plan to start with what you suggested in laying all of the mainline first with just the necessary switches, and then filling in yards and industries later. That's how I built a couple switching layouts in the past. The good news is, I have been taking advantage of sales from a certain big online retailer and buying up bunches of flex track while it's available. The first order last year I got for $4.5 a stick, the 2nd and 3rd orders went up to $5.50 a stick. Not bad when MSRP is like $8 a stick now. I've also accumulated about half of the turnouts that I need for the first level. Those Atlas turnouts are hard to find these days, but I lucked out and found one shop that can get them for me. Completing the first level shouldn't be an issue. The great thing is, I designed the layout so that if I don't want to build the upper level, I don't have to and don't have to redesign the first level in that event.
     
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  8. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    A lot has changed since I last updated this thread. We broke ground on the house April 12th. In the span of 2 weeks we went from starting the foundation to having the sub-floor on and the first 2 exterior walls going up. The good news is they're making progress faster than what I can keep up with. The bad news is, they're working faster than they can get material. There's a chance we may end up pouring the footing and the slab for the man cave in a couple weeks if we run out of things to work on with the main house while we wait for trusses to come in. What that really means is I now have to finish planning the building 4 months early so it can be blue printed for the foundation. I think I'm pretty well set on the dimensions at this point, but I'm going back and forth on some layout design elements that are effecting the windows.

    I'll attach a few pictures of the house progress here. I'll discuss the layout issues in the next post.
     

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  9. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    A new issue I started working on a couple days ago is the staging yard for Kansas City. For a while now I've been drawing it up as hidden staging underneath 19th St Yard. There's a lot of pros and cons to this idea, and the more I think about it, the less I like the idea. So, I tried a new approach to bringing it up to the same level as everything else on the base level. I downsized it from a full 24" depth to 16" depth and stuck it behind 19th St Yard. I left enough room to put up a backdrop to hide the staging yard. I'll build the back drop in a way that it can be removed if I need to reach in to fix a derailment or do work of some sort. The biggest drawback is it cut into the wide isle that I had originally put there. I measured it out, and it's 36" at the narrowest point, so it's not unpassable, but it creates a bottle neck for crew trying to navigate the layout. Further more, the yard ladder for 19th St will keep someone in a chair at the narrowest spot 90% of the time. My one solution is to simply add another 2' on to the layout space since we haven't started the foundation yet, but I hate to add cost back in to the budget after having to cut so much out. I'm just really unsure what to do at this point and may only have through the weekend to decide.
    In addition to changing up the staging area, you'll notice some dark blue boxes added to the walkway areas. Those are to help me settle out the window placement. The placement around the layout corresponds with placement in the floor plan. The right side of the plan is facing south toward the Ash Grove Sub main line.
     

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  10. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    While the forums were down, I continued working on the issue at hand. I came up with an idea that doesn't involve adding the extra 2' on the building. I simply cut 6" off the "east" end of the Springfield Yard and moved that whole peninsula down 6". That brings us back to a full 5' of isle width coming in at 19th St, and 42" of clearance where the curve bubbles out.

    I think I've successfully talked my builder into waiting on pouring the foundation for the building like we had originally intended, so I should be back to having a few more months to work this out.

    In the mean time, I made some changes to Enid last week and am in the process of revising Springfield now. I should have a more general update of the layout plans here soon.
     

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  11. klrwhizkid

    klrwhizkid Administrator Staff Member Administrator Frisco.org Supporter

    As far as windows, have you considered shallow windows up high on the room walls? No intrusion into layout backdrop, plenty of controllable natural light.
     
  12. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    Good question. I'm still thinking about that.

    I need to recheck some measurements on all of this, but I'll go through it in layers.
    32" up from the floor is the base level of the layout
    36" up is the bottom of the window
    56" up is the second level of the layout
    90" up is the top of the window assuming I go with a 54" tall window. The current plan is for 9' ceilings, so there's plenty of space for the header with that size of window.

    What this gives us is about 2' of viewing height above each level. The whole point of the property I chose was to give us a view of the real trains going past during op sessions. In between sessions, there's enough room to drop in some sort of blackout curtain to protect everything from the bit of UV light that comes through the windows. I'm thinking some sort of drop in piece for temp back drop I can add in for taking pictures/video.

    Attached is a side elevation I sketched up.
     

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  13. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    So it's been 2 full months now since I last updated this thread. A LOT has happened.

    Our builders have worked much faster than anticipated. So fast in fact, I got word from them this week it should be move in ready by August 1st. It may not be 100% done at that point, but close enough we could move in. That would beat the original projection by a full month. To give a sense of how fast this came together, they finished shingling the roof and putting up the house wrap a month ago. The past month they did all of the electrical, plumbing, insulation, sheet rock, most of the siding (we're still waiting on the front door), and are already working on mud and tape. I've had other sub contractors coming through at a quick pace as well. By the end of next week, we should have all of the HVAC done, the last of the concrete poured, and the septic system installed.

    What all this really means is my wife and I got surprised by the finish date, so now we're scrambling to get the rest of the house items ordered, and the rest of our work done before move in day. I've essentially been working 16 hours a day every day for 3 months now trying to make all of this happen, which is why I've been fairly inactive as of late. What time I do have at home has been spent working on my computer on the house project.

    The good (I guess?) news is the builders have a roofing project they have to go get done in August, so that will buy me some extra time to finish up plans on the layout building before it gets started.

    Attached are a couple recent pictures of the house. I'll have more about the layout its self below.
     

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  14. gstout

    gstout Member Frisco.org Supporter

    That's a good-looking house. An very elegant design.

    GS
     
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  15. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    Now, for the layout plan itself. I've had a little bit of time a night here and there to work on revisions for the layout.

    Base level:
    I started wondering if the 2 industries I dropped in between Rosedale and 19th St made things too crowded, so I ended up removing those. One of the bigger hangups I had about shrinking the layout was losing Glenn Park Yard for the MKT. When I was looking at eliminating the 2 industries previously mentioned, I came up with an idea. I reversed the direction of the yard ladders for Rosedale yard, which allowed me to bring the main lines further out from the wall and create a small space for something for Glenn Park Yard. There's just enough room to have 2 full length trains in the yard at a time, and classify a few cars.
    La Cygne and Ft. Scott are unchanged at this point. I shortened Iantha a little bit to make way for another turnout to create a passing siding through Lamar. From that new turnout to the crossover by O'Sullivan's is just long enough to hold a standard length train (24'). Other than that, I made a slight change to the industry trackage. I never have found evidence of where the Lamar TOFC ramp was (Frisco documents indicate Lamar had a ramp in the late 70's). After pouring through what few pictures I have again, I have adjusted my guess on the ramp location. My new theory is it was on the east side of Gulf St instead of between the depot and Thorco.
    Springfield has some changes to the west end of Kansas Ave Yard, it should be closer to prototype now. I brought the entire yard 4" off the back wall to allow room for the ascending trackage to be behind the yard instead of over it. There's also a couple minor changes to the area by North Yard.

    Upper Level:
    It looks like I didn't post an update of the upper level back in April. I didn't like the arrangement I came up with for the Parsons Sub, there just wasn't enough room any more. I swapped that out for the Port of Catoosa area. I think it fits the space much better. This also eliminated Cherokee, KS. I moved the hidden spur for Peabody Coal to that spot. I tried a configuration with some Tulsa industry spots, but it was too cramped. I opted for a mock up of the Arkansas River bridge before entering Cherokee Yard.
    Enid went through a few changes as well. I started at this part of the layout for days trying to figure out what it was missing. Finally realized I had left out the biggest elevators in Enid (in the world when they were built). I ended up removing the Champlain Refinery to make room for Elevators Y/Z. I eliminated one of the yard tracks for the Rock to leave room for the ascending track coming up the back wall.
    I changed up the Memphis/St. Louis staging quite a bit. I realized that I would have room to tack on a small classification yard next to staging, and add an extra staging yard to hold yard transfers. Essentially, it's another portal to get traffic on and off the railroad. St. Louis and Memphis got 3 roads a piece to interchange with. I made my choices based off who changed the most cars, and who I wanted on the layout the most. I can always change things up for different op sessions, but for now I chose CR, B&O and N&W for St. Louis and SOU, ICG and L&N for Memphis.

    I made some changes to the windows, which is reflected in the upper level plan. I haven't redrawn them in the lower level plan. Essentially, I put in 6' picture windows on the south and west walls for better viewing during op sessions.

    I still have plenty of time to continue revising the layout. I will need to finish up designing the building it's self in a month or so. I've got a little more work to do, but hope to have a revised building plan to share this weekend.

    Sorry for the long read, but a lot happened in 2 months
     

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  16. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    Thank You! We found the basic concept online, but made quite a few changes from it to get the finished project. I gotta give credit to the builders for getting the roof lines sorted out to look proper.
     
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  17. klrwhizkid

    klrwhizkid Administrator Staff Member Administrator Frisco.org Supporter

    I echo Doug's statement.
    I see it looks like there is a plan to build a deck later. May I recommend considering Zuri Premium Decking. We just had our composite decking (which was harboring mildew) and all of the supporting lumber replaced. Zuri is made from PVC and covered with a weather, stain and scratch resistant topcoat. I am impressed with its appearance and construction.
     
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  18. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    We strongly considered composite decking for a while. I hadnt heard of this PVC product, but I'll keep it in mind.

    The back patio is actually going to be stamped concrete. It's supposed to be poured this coming week, so I should have pictures soon. Concrete doesn't rot, and will go seamlessly with the pool foundation when we add that later.
     
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  19. klrwhizkid

    klrwhizkid Administrator Staff Member Administrator Frisco.org Supporter

    The issue with composite material is that it is made with sawdust and plastic. The sawdust particles can hold moisture which will grow mildew or mold, and that was what we were dealing with; the necessity to power wash it every season and treat with anti-mildew agents. The new superstructure of the deck is all Yellawood, and there is adhesive butyl flashing on top of all the joists and post tops.
     
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  20. Iantha_Branch

    Iantha_Branch Member

    I'm glad you told me about that. We were discussing making shutters this morning, and had been thinking about composit boards for the wood look, but I wasn't aware of the maintenance issues. I'll have to get some of this Zuri product to work with.
     
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