road. Ultimately, I chose to build a new 24′×26′ building specifically designed to house the layout. The construction of a dedicated building allowed me to in- corporate R-60 insulation, full HVAC and proper lighting for the railroad. All turned out to be very important in cre- ating a good, stable environment for the model railroad since middle Geor- gia sees temperature swings from the low 20’s in winter to over 100 degrees in July and August with the South’s typical high humidity.
Layout design The actual layout design was devel- oped to showcase prototypically-correct 12- to 18-car Southern Pacific passen- ger trains (the Shasta Daylight, the Lark and the Number 21-22 night mail trains) and good-sized freights headed by the road’s larger steam and diesel power, including the unique AC-12 cab forward 4-8-8-2’s, operating over the Hill. The challenge was to allow for the showcasing of these special trains and still provide some degree of local train operation to maintain ongoing opera- tor interest.
The resulting 19′×21′-foot layout design features an “L” shaped double track mainline with sweeping curves of 48″ to 60″ radius. Both mainlines are continuous running loops 60-plus feet long with the inside main designed for switching and operation and the out- side main primarily serving to show- case those long passenger and freight trains
I so love to see. A pair of
crossovers allows trains to move from one mainline to the other. A large stub- end yard is situated in the middle of the loops, together with a full round- house, turntable and diesel servicing facilities. All mainline turnouts are No. 8, and the yard trackage uses No. 6 turnouts exclusively. Both the inside main and the yard provide access to the industries switched by local train operating crews.
Lumber is king at Truckee Truckee, California, is the principal town site and is the main feature on the Sierra Northern layout. The Sierra Nevada Lumber Company is head- quartered there and operates a large lumber mill complex with its various support structures. A series of both BTS kits and scratchbuilt structures make up this complex that includes a fully interior-detailed saw mill, log dump, drying yards, planing shed, dry- ing kiln, powerhouse, sawdust shed, pump house, warehouse, “teepee” slash burner and general office.
The Sierra Nevada Lumber Company also operates a narrow gauge logging railroad out of Truckee that brings
RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN
Blue Canyon is an important water stop (above). On this day SP No. 4369 leads a string of PFE empties down the Hill on their return trip to the Salinas Valley. Still operating in its “as de- livered” long-hood forward Black Widow paint, RS-11 No. 5722 is about to depart the Truckee yard with a local freight (below). S-2 1308 has the switching assignment for the day.
loaded log trains down the mountain from a truck reload at Camp 8 to the mill and log dump at Truckee. The nar- row gauge railroad includes 45 feet of mainline track plus the locomotive and car shops and a yard at Truckee. The SNLCo. logging railroad uses for- mer D&RGW K-27 2-8-2’s, a former White Pass & Yukon 2-8-2 and a 2-6-6-2 mallet as the principal motive power. All are highly modified and converted to burn oil. Also operating on the narrow gauge are several West Side Lumber Company Shay and Heisler locomo- tives, all on lease to the Sierra Nevada due to heavy timber traffic on the line this logging season.
The Camp 8 reload includes a full yard with enginehouse, water tank, speeder sheds and multiple logging buildings, including a cookhouse and many bunkhouses. The actual reload is operated by a large Willamette steam loader that transfers logs from woods trucks to skeleton log cars for ship- ment to the mill. The lumber compa-
ny’s skidder and crawler repair is per- formed at Camp 8. Logs are brought to the Truckee mill on the narrow gauge, and finished lum- ber leaves on the standard gauge Sier- ra Northern Railroad for points west and east.
Expediting construction
In order to meet the objective of ac- tually completing this layout in a rea- sonable time period, I chose to take a very different construction approach from my previous layouts in Sn3. For the Sierra Northern I opted to take ad- vantage of and use many of the new commercial products available in S scale, as well some of the newer scenery techniques currently in use on many HO and N scale layouts. All of the railroad benchwork was constructed using the Mianne open-grid system
that features exceptionally
strong, fabricated hardwood and hard- board I-beams that are joined using quick-lock furniture fasteners.
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