Chicago St.Paul Minneapolis & Omaha Dennis Blunt
Chicago & Northwestern
Concept: A large Division Point yard with a branch line connecting two
small towns in west central Wisconsin.
Era: Labor Day weekend 1956 requiring added passenger equipment.
Area Modeled: West central Wisconsin with real names used for fictitious locales.
Benchwork: L girder with ½” plywood and ½” Homasote roadbed. Later additions
use spline roadbed and cork.
Track: 750’ of code 100 Atlas N/S flextrack for hidden trackage and 600’
of code 70 Shinohara flextrack with 90 turnouts for visible areas.
Control: A Silent Engineer automatic device advances all the staged trains up to the visible layout. Magnetic reed switches control the entry and exit of trains to the staging loops. Trains on visible track are controlled by Digitrax DCC system with radio throttles. Transition between DC and DCC control is seamless. All switchers and branch line trains are strictly DCC.
Scenery: Hard-shell with a topcoat of molding plaster is used throughout. Many rock castings are blended in. The backdrop is hand painted.
Fascia: 1/8” Masonite painted semi gloss black. The valence is flat black.
Lighting: Daylight florescent with a mix of incandescent and floods for warmth.
Ruling Grade: 2% – less in most places.
Clock: Four fast clocks at 4 to 1 ratio, controlled by a wireless device.
Communications: Two way radios to the hidden Dispatcher. He’s under the layout!
Motive Power: A mix of steam and diesel power appropriate to the early 1950’s. A ‘power’ car usually assists steam locomotives. These are passenger or freight cars with a diesel drive in them.