Coal is always part of the picture on the CSX in the Appalachians, and empties are moving on one of the McCoy Fork mine runs (op- posite, below). Many of the on-line industries are quite small in this area, as the Unimin loader at Green Mountain, N.C. (above) shows.
my part I was able to talk Tristan out of the bridge. (Reminder to self: if you want bridges, it’s easiest to account for them before you lay track and build mountains on a flat piece of plywood.) Without exception, all of our struc- tures were built or kitbashed from plas- tic kits. I learned quickly that even if you know the footprint of a structure kit before building it, your eye can fool you when trying to conceptualize in your mind how many buildings you can get in a particular space. Based on “eye- balling” (and, imagine this, even doing some actual measuring), I thought we could fit more houses into the coal camp community of Dixieco. I also thought we could have more stores in the little town of McCoy. Thankfully, I was only buying and building one kit at a time. Other- wise we would have ended up with way too many structures and not enough room in which to place them. Another lesson learned from build- ing our structures was that kitbashing is fun. In my earlier foray into the hob- by, I was literally scared to try kitbash- ing. Now I know that the hobby knife, Evergreen sheet styrene, and leftover kit parts are my friends.
Prototype structures were inspira- tions for many of the buildings on the layout. While no prototype is modeled exactly, we did make an effort to cap- ture the general “feel” of several struc- tures we found in the real world.
Operations
A loop of track on a 4′×6′ sheet of ply- wood might not seem to present many options for operation beyond a train go- ing around and around in an endless cir- cle. To the contrary, we have had lots of fun running trains on the McCoy Fork as prototypically as possible. We use a very
RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN 75
It consists of a pair of truck dumps, bins, elevator and a conveyor for loading covered hoppers. Set in a narrow valley, its small foot- print lends itself to modeling. Similarly, Spruce Pine, N.C. (above right), Dixieco’s pattern, is between a mountainside and a stream.
simple switch list with a listing of what cars need to be picked up or set out and at what industries. At the beginning of an operating session, a train is placed on the layout near the depot, simulating an inbound train as if it were entering the branch from some unseen and unmod- eled mainline junction. This train has the set outs appropriate for that session. Industries are then worked according to the switch list, and eventually a train is assembled from the cars picked up. To mix things up and add variety, we occa- sionally will have only set outs, with the locomotives and caboose returning to the depot. We also run a “pick up train” which starts at the depot and pulls cars from industries as needed. In these in- stances, we often let the train run sever- al loops around the layout to simulate running over some distance.
Conclusions I didn’t realize how much I would truly learn from the McCoy Fork Branch and how much I would enjoy such a small railroad. Many things were learned from articles or books, while many more were learned from trial and error. The layout has given me many ideas about techniques I plan on using when I finally get down to building a layout for my sizable N scale equipment roster.
Many folks might think that 4′×6′ feet isn’t much for a model railroad, but we have had a blast building and operating
our little layout. Besides
having fun and doing a lot of learning about our hobby, building and operat- ing this layout with my son has provid- ed us with countless hours of priceless “together” time.
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