HO scale Pennsylvania RR Middle Division from the April 2015 Model Railroader
Name: Pennsylvania RR Middle Division
Scale: HO (1:87.1)
Size: 36 x 36 feet
Prototype: Pennsylvania RR
Locale: Harrisburg, Pa.
Era: 1945 to 1950
Style: around the walls
Mainline run: 150 feet
Minimum radius: 36″ (main line), 24″ (branch line)
Minimum turnout: no. 5 (main line), no. 4 (branch line)
Maximum grade: 2 percent
Height: 50″ to 54″
Roadbed: Homasote
Track: code 83 (main) and code 70 (branch) flextrack
Scenery: Gatorboard, extruded-foam insulation board, and plaster cloth over cardboard strips
Backdrop: painted wallboard
Control: Lenz Digital Command Control
Scale: HO (1:87.1)
Size: 36 x 36 feet
Prototype: Pennsylvania RR
Locale: Harrisburg, Pa.
Era: 1945 to 1950
Style: around the walls
Mainline run: 150 feet
Minimum radius: 36″ (main line), 24″ (branch line)
Minimum turnout: no. 5 (main line), no. 4 (branch line)
Maximum grade: 2 percent
Height: 50″ to 54″
Roadbed: Homasote
Track: code 83 (main) and code 70 (branch) flextrack
Scenery: Gatorboard, extruded-foam insulation board, and plaster cloth over cardboard strips
Backdrop: painted wallboard
Control: Lenz Digital Command Control
The track plan originally appeared in the April 2015 issue of Model Railroader. Click on the link below to download a PDF copy of this track plan.
Why are all the trains so short on videos. This layout could easily run trains 50 cars long but the ones filmed are very short. Nothing spoils the realism for me more than seeing trains that would be normally between 50 and 100 cars long shortened to 12 to 20 cars in length. They don't look like the railroad could make up the cost of fuel. It might make sense to do this on a compact switching area where only small cuts are handled but when depicting a main line train the short trains just don't look realistic to me. The layout was nicely done scenically and captures the feel of a big vibrant city when things were proudly marked made in America. The scenes also looked very well done from a standpoint of not being spaghetti bowl types where too much track is crammed in to the layout. Excellent layout from appearance and the possibility of operations as trains can come in and go someplace else. I just wish that longer trains would be filmed on nice looking layouts like this one, gives a reason for the double header, if the video were nine minutes instead of under 5 this would be possible. I suspect most folks could get their attention span up to ten minutes.
Thanks I do like the videos and the film work is great as well would just like to see longer trains.