John's Alaska Railroad HO Scale Layout

April 4, 2020

Even though the governor's "stay at home" coronavirus order has shut down our weekly train night sessions work still continues with a skeleton crew. John cuts four pieces of foam board leading into the dreaded "S" curve.	Dragging out a new 4'x8' sheet of foam board the CFO marks off a 26"x36" square to cover the remaining portion of the S curve as well as the north Usibelli Coal Mine switch.	This foam board is put in place and the measurements are checked again. Both Max and Indy spent their time getting in the way of the crew.

Using a pencil the CFO traces the fascia board and road bed lines. The L-girder braces make this a very challenging effort.	The weather is drop dead awesome so working outside is a joy. Terry and John move the foam board square to the balcony and use the jigsaw to make the necessary cuts.	After a few fine tuning cuts the foam board fits like a glove! The only remaining foam board installation is the Flint Hills Refinery switch and the mountain. Yeah!

Several of the locomotives are acting finicky. Using gloves (coronavirus contamination prevention) John picks out three locomotives, some snap track and a power pack. He drops them off on Rick's front porch so he can do some trouble shooting. It is important to first test to see if the locomotives work correctly under DC power operations. Rick says of his photo, "This is a harness I built to test the locomotives. It allows access to four lines: orange (motor +), gray (motor -), red (power +), black (power -)."	"No. 2503 connected to power cable. Power is connected where power comes from the trucks, thus using wiring of the loco. The test harness is installed with orange to red, gray to black. This is a DC mode test. Test passed. Two loops around the track."	"Video of DC mode test. Number 2503 passed. "Also connected to 2503 was power from the Tech II Railmaster power supply. In both videos you can see the white wires running from the Tech II to 2503. The track was not powered. The DC test required the orange wire to be connected to the red wire and the gray wire connected to the black wire. Test ran successfully. The decoder test required the decoder to be connected to the test harness with the orange to red and gray to black connections removed. In the first video you can see the clip leads used for orange to red and gray to black connections. "

"Number 2503 decoder test. Test passed. "This video shows the decoder running the loco. The handheld simulator on my laptop was used for this test. All loco functions worked (horn, bell, lights). 2503 made two loops around the track with no issues. "No. 1500 did well. No. 2004 did not do very well. I want to do the tests over with a RailPro power supply to eliminate any power issues. The Tech II voltage is lower than the RailPro power supply voltage. Doing the testing at the layout is probably the best way to go. When ever the self-distancing edict is removed we will resume layout tests."	One of the tasks I've been putting off for a long time is an inventory of the contents of my 25 boxes of HO scale items. Terry was kind enough to pull the boxes out from under the layout and bring them to a staging area. I numbered each box, removed, photographed and reloaded the contents. Finally, Terry put the boxes back under the layout tables making sure to keep numbers on the isle side.	Laying out the items from each box took some time. However, the effort will pay off in the long run. I plan on using each photograph to create a text list of the contents of each box which will enable me to do a word search and thus locate any desired item.

The CDC recommended wearing cloth face coverings in public settings where social distancing measures are difficult to maintain. The CFO took it upon herself to sew masks for family and friends and currently has made almost 50. She tries to use fabric that each person would enjoy wearing. Of course mine had to be Alaska Railroad material!

April 8, 2020

Governor DeWine would be pleased as John is practicing social distancing at train night. Actually, he is the only one there! He starts the session off by cutting and installing two foam board pieces, the first is the curve leading into Flint Hills Refinery and the second is a straight piece in front of the refinery siding.	Now all that remains is the foam board at Tunnel and Mountain. This will be quite the extensive undertaking and will take several months. First, John cuts and installs foam board from the beginning of the Flint Hills siding to the Alaska Railroad deck bridge and beyond. A second piece which holds the tunnel portal as well as part of the cut along the track is put into place.	View looking southwest: The next layer of foam board is installed on top of the second piece.

View looking east: The second layer receives an angled cut to match the piece below. Some gaps still exist in front of the layers. In the coming weeks ahead some minor fill will be added in these gaps so plaster filled rock molds can be placed overtop.

April 15, 2020

Why paint all this pink Styrofoam board brown when some day it will be covered with scenic materials? Because I can't stand looking at all that pinkness! Additionally, if I don't achieve total coverage then brown (i.e. not pink) will show through. Here I am painting the foam board pieces for Flint Hills Refinery.	The arrows shows the new foam board pieces in place. Once LJ returns he will need to install supports for all these new pieces.	A large foam board piece (upper left) was cut to fill in the remaining Usibelli Coal Mine yard. This piece ends at the tunnel. A McKinley Explorer railcar, the largest car in the inventory) is used to ensure proper clearance.

View looking south: The new Usibelli Coal Mine foam board. This board was cut in the garage while the refining cuts were made on the balcony. Little fairies must live at our residence as pink sawdust can be seen throughout our lawn.	Brown paint is applied to the foam board making up the cut approaching the tunnel.	View looking east: All Usibelli Coal Mine and Tunnel foam board painted and in place.

View looking south: All Usibelli Coal Mine and Tunnel foam board painted and in place.	Track level view looking south: I absolutely love this view! It shows how things are really coming together.	East of the double crossover: Another piece of foam board is cut and put into place. It only took three trips under the table to trace it to fit. Angled cuts are made along the track.

April 22, 2020

I have an inexpensive security camera in the train room which I can monitor from an app on my iPhone. Every now and then I will take a peek in hopes of catching some train elves building mountains on my layout. Nope. Never.	My work on the hill into Tunnel actually took place over five days. Muscle pain and fatigue due to MD makes for slow progress. Here is part of the first layer of the hill.	I use LJ's Dremel with multipurpose cutting guide as a router to carve a curved channel through the underside of the foam board. This provides the necessary headroom clearance for the train.

Two foam board pieces are added to the inside curve leading to the portal. The inclines are created using the hot wire foam cutter. Gaps between foam boards and wavy patterns across the board don't matter as they will eventually be covered by plaster rock molds.	The next layer is cut to fit and again needs a channel carved to allow for the headroom clearance.	Although the carving process creates quite a mess it does not become airborne and create a layer of pink dust on the layout.

Three layers are a good start to the hill. More layers will be added later to create a peak. It will be some time before plaster, paint, talus and grasses are added. Therefore, the pink foam will be painted brown so it won't look so dorky to visitors during the transitional stages.	Track level view leading into the portal. Nice!

Feel free to contact me at john@alaskarails.org
Page created 9/4/17 and last updated 5/8/20