Progress was slow over the past few days with only a minor amount being accomplished since last Thursday. Today, saw more significant progress though.
My friend, and mentor Larry came up today. No work was completed on the railroad, but much discussion was made about the changes. Larry approved of all the benchwork completed so far. That is awesome to receive verification that all is well and will work. Larry did suggest cutting back the former box benchwork where the ovalix once resided. This would allow for better access to Ottawa.
After Larry left, I took his suggestion to heart and began the process of modifying the former ovalix box benchwork. I moved both support legs back and then attacked the benchwork with the saw all (saw of death). The project was quick and painless. The floor and aisle space it created is tremendous! Plus, operators now have easy access to Ottawa on the upper level.
Larry and I also discussed in detail the track arrangement in Ottawa. Most of the newly created places were straight forward as far as track arrangement. Ottawa was a large blank slate. I really am glad to have Larry to help work out a master plan. I think it will work really well. I'm happy to report that the Burlington Northern junction will be added to Ottawa as with the prototype. The BN will come in from the north and work the Ottawa Silica plant and head back.
This week, the girls are at VBS every night, so this gives me a great opportunity to really knock out some projects on the layout.
This evening, I continued cleaning the room. The room is looking *MUCH* better than it has been. For the last month, it appeared as if a bomb was set off in the room. I ran the bus wires for all the new benchwork and connected with the existing layout. I re-installed the fascia board at East Ottawa and trimmed down to match the layout profile (it was lowered from before). I moved all the downtown buildings and Bader Ag structure back to Ottawa. I also moved the buildings for the future Bureau into place. Re-installed the car card boxes to the benchwork. Re-installed all but one of the NCE DCC throttle jacks. I have removed all items that were stored on the layout and potentially shorting the track. Tomorrow, I plan on firing up the NCE system to ensure there are no shorts before beginning track work.
I need to continue cleaning as I really want to get that complete before laying track. The floor is pretty much clear, but I need to organize my desk/workbench.
I would like to go ahead and install the fascia board on the new section of layout. It makes the layout look so much better and finished. I will try to work on that off and on this week too.
The vision of the Rock Island v1.33 (since we removed a third of the layout) is coming in nice and clear now. I'm very excited and now focused to get the layout back online.
Thanks again to Larry for coming up today to help hash out some design issues on the new layout.
Project update (I keep adding to the list as I think of new tasks that need to be complete):
6) clean up the room
7) test NCE system to ensure no shorts before commencing trackwork
8) start laying cork roadbed and track.
9) drop solder feeders
10) install slide switches
12) run wire and install throttle jacks
13) install fascia board (newly added)
14) revise timetable schedules
15) introduce new and remove obsolete waybills
16) re-stage layout (majority is re-staged, but need to integrate the new industries and place cars in the new Ottawa yard, LaSalle and Bureau storage tracks).
17) schedule next op session!
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