Benchwork for the Schattenbahnhof

Time to start on the benchwork for the Schattenbahnhof.  This translates literally to shadow train station, an interesting way to describe a hidden staging yard.

The first pic shows the hellx that was salvaged in place from the previous Cahaba Southern layout.

Here is the feed to the Schattenbahnhof from the helix.  The cork roadbed will be removed, as it does not match the new track configuration.  You can also see the curved painted backdrop, already in place from the previous layout.  One less thing to do.....

Here you see the underlying 1x3 framework that supports the 3/4" plywood subroadbed.  You can also see in the picture and previous picture some of the storage I have available under the layout.

Here is the remainder of the benchwork.

The next two pictures show the plywood subroadbed installed.  You can also see the 1:1 scale printout of the track plan getting pieced together.  It will be used to mark the plan onto the plywood.

Here you can see a closeup of me using a Sharpie to put a mark at each tick mark on the plan.  The Sharpie will bleed thru the paper, leaving the marks on the plywood.

The whole track plan is pieced together....yes, that was a lot of marks to make!

Once all the marks have been made, the paper can then be removed leaving the track plan on the plywood.

Time for some cork for the roadbed.  Until next time!

Design of the Jacobsburg & Beccaheim DB

The Jacobsburg & Beccaheim DB is named after my two children.  Located in southwestern Germany, it will feature a castle on a hill (a must for a German layout IMO), small German town with framework houses galore that is served by a branch line, a double-track main line (a parade route in German model railroading lingo), pinion tourist line climbing to a hillside resort, and a hidden staging yard feeding the layout thru a helix.

The JaBeDB will be built in a small room in the downstairs area of our split-foyer house.  The room is 116" by 101" with no windows and only one door.  The room is fully finished, along with heat & AC, and is located off of the downstairs den.  While it isn't a large room. it still plenty big for a nice size N scale railroad.  During the planning phase there were plenty of "I wish the room were a little bigger" moments, however I was able to work past those.  Here are some of the design parameters incorporated into the design:

1. Southwestern Germany, sometime in the 1970s.
2. DB Diesel and Steam rolling stock, no electric locos.  Yes, Germany ran steam engines into the 1970s.  Concentration on Passenger service with some limited freight trains.
3. Parade route mainline, 1 branch line, 1 pinion tourist line
4. Hidden staging on a second level
5. Primarily a railfan layout, with some operating capabilities
6. Small German town surrounded by forests and hills
7. Digitrax DCC operation with future full electronic control and detection
8. Peco Code 55 track, medium turnouts on mainline, small turnouts on yards/sidings
9. 15" minimum visible radius, 12" minimum hidden radius, 2.25% maximum grade
10. L-Shaped design, allowing one corner of the room to be used as a workbench.

The upper level track plan is heavily based upon a track plan I discovered on a German model railroading website.  Inspired by one of my favorite German layouts Manni's N Bahn (follow LINK here), it was drawn a Swiss model railroader Patrick Z.   Patrick's design was the correct width, just a little short on the lower part of the L-shaped design, and needed to be mirrored.  It also needed to be modified to take advantage of my existing helix and staging yard.  After a few weeks worth of work in CADRail I was able to come up with the final design.  Here is a pic of Patrick's original design.

The final design features 2 levels connected by a single track 18" radius helix.  The helix is already completed, as it remains from my previous Cahaba Southern layout.  The lower level holds a staging yard that feeds the helix, with no scenery planned, at approximately 36" high.  The upper level will be fully sceniced at approximately 52" high.  I've attached jpeg exports from CADRail which I've used exclusively during the planning stage.

Upper Level:

Parade Route Mainline Hidden tracks including Helix feed:

Lower level Staging Yard:

Benchwork will be built from 1"x3" lumber.  I'm reusing as much as possible from my previous layout to help keep costs down.  I have ripped the 1x3s from 3/4" cabinet grade birch plywood.  If you have the means (i.e. a table saw) I highly recommend using the 3/4" plywood as it is very stable and strong, resists warping, and cheaper than buying 1x3s made of pine.  A single sheet of 3/4"x4'x8' plywood is $40, out of which you can rip 18 8 foot 1x3s.  Decent 1x3s run over $3 per piece, for a total of over $54, and none of those will be as straight and stable as the plywood 1x3s.

Next on the agenda is beginning the benchwork.  I promise more frequent updates and pictures as the work goes on from here...

Willkommen!!!

Model Railroading has always been a love of mine, starting with the first layout I got for Christmas in 1970 when I was 6 years old growing up as an Army brat in Germany.  It was a Fleischmann HO set mounted to a 4x6 board.  I still have the rolling stock from that set to this day.  Like any kid, a lot of different things got my interest, however I always seem to gravitate back to the trains.

Going to college marked my first hiatus from the hobby, but it was a short one.  After getting married and going to grad school I started back into model railroading again.  I dabbled in German N scale for a few years, building a few hollow core door layouts that never went very far. I then started getting into southeastern US HO trains, and with the purchase of our first house I built a 22'x16' L shaped HO layout.  It was my first serious layout, and had all the typical first layout mistakes, but I was learning.  I even joined a local club, Smokey City Rails, which had a modular HO layout.  I made a lot of great friends thru the club, however I was never really satisfied with HO.  It took up too much space to do anything that looked realistic without having a warehouse to build a layout.   It was the late 1990's, and N scale started catching my eye again...

I started noticing that the quality and realism of N scale, and in particular US prototype models, was really improving.  Atlas, Kato, and MicroTrain rolling stock was starting to rival the quality of German prototype N scale maker Fleischmann, and with one big difference:  it was less than one third of the cost!  The HO layout was torn down, I sold off all my HO equipment to fund my switch to N scale, this time in US prototype, in particular southeastern railroading around Birmingham, Alabama. I built 2 different N scale Cahaba Southern layouts, one in 1997 and one in 2009.  More information on those two layouts can be found at Cahaba Southern.

Work on the second Cahaba Southern layout was going strong for almost 3 years when I hit a wall.  All the track was laid and running well, and the basic scenery shell was in place.  Something happened, and I just lost interest.  I dabbled with it every now and then, trying to get restarted, to no avail.   So a few years went by, and the layout room collected dust.

Early in 2014 I was getting restless and bored.  I needed a stress reliever, something to occupy my free time instead of justing watching TV.   I started to miss working on a layout again, but I couldn't bring myself to work on the Cahaba Southern.  I had done some thinking, and realized that while I enjoyed model railroading, I really didn't enjoy US prototype model railroading.  A big part of my identity was being that Army brat in Germany and being half German.  One day I was reminiscing about Germany, I was reminded of my enjoying German model railroads growing up.   Suddenly the realization hit that I what I really wanted to build is what fueled my dreams as a kid, eine Deutsche Bundesbahn Modellbahnanlage (a German Federal Railways model train layout)!

I thought about it a few more weeks, but the more I thought about it the more that realization I had was right:  I was building the wrong prototype, I needed to go back to my German roots.  It was time to tear down the Cahaba Southern, sell off the rolling stock, and start planning a new German prototype layout.  I told my wife my plans and ideas, and after some eye-rolling on her part the teardown of the Cahaba Southern started and the planning of the JaBe DB began.....