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DESIGN OF AN N-GAUGE LAYOUT |
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The design of my
layout began with a wish list, which was quite ambitious. I have an
area of about
2m²
to layout my plan. After a periode of puzzling, I came up with this
first
design. The majority of wishes are included, and so this design will be
the guideline while building my new and first model railway layout, but
it is very probable that changes to the design will be made while
building it.
the main station with accessing tracks
The hidden yard
The hidden yard consists out of 4 tracks. I was looking for a way to hold trains of upto a length of 150cm. I also wanted to keep the yard at the back, to permit the access from below to the rest of the layout. All together the design is a classic 4-track hidden yard with a turn back loop. I added one extra track, so reversable trains can leave the yard backwards. I made a plan of the design of the hidden yard:
the hidden yard
The helix and parade track
The double tracked mainline ascents via 3 large circular loops to the base level of the layout, where the parade track starts. The radius of the helix has been kept large, to reduce the steapness to about 2.5%. I think that a small N-gauge locomotive pulling a long train will have already enough trouble climbing that kind of hill. The parade track lays totally in front of the layout, and dives at the left, after a large bend, back into a tunnel...
the helix and parade track
The main station
The
main station is the most noticable part of the layout. I would like to
try to integrate platforms of sufficiant length to be able to receive
trains with a length of about 1m50. It is not certain I will succeed in
doing this. In each direction of the main line there will be
2
platform tracks. A 5th platform track will serve for the local single
line. The arriving locomotive can be uncoupled, and routed arround to
pick up the waiting carriages. The maintenance infrastructure will be
kept to a minimum (lack of space).
At both side of the station the tracks are immediatly diving into a tunnel. Both sides of the main line are in fact coming together at the parade track. So, it does not matter what side the train leaves the station, it will always end up in the same hidden yard. I would like to have it different, but the lack of space prohibided me from more.
At both side of the station the tracks are immediatly diving into a tunnel. Both sides of the main line are in fact coming together at the parade track. So, it does not matter what side the train leaves the station, it will always end up in the same hidden yard. I would like to have it different, but the lack of space prohibided me from more.
the main station with accessing tracks
The side line
A single side line
curves it way
up to a small head station. Starting at the the main station,
this
line enters a tunnel and climbs over one loop and a half, to appear
again
at the connecting industrial track. The line continues to climb and
after another large loop, it arrives at it's destiantion. In this small
head station, locomotives are changed and serviced in the small depot.
The waiting train receives a fresh locomotive to start the descent
again.
Both passangers and goods trains are expected to run on this line, and
should be the main playing theme on this layout.
the single line curves up the hill
The composed view
In
this composed view it becomes clear that there are 2 main regions on
the layout: in front the city Saraan (or better the border of it) and
at the back a rural region, with woods and hills. At the upper right
side lays the litthe village of Asselberg.
...what happens
underground...
the composed view 
In a
3-dimensional view the layout could look like this. I used Wintrack
7.0 during the design of this project. I made available
the saved Wintrack
file for all who is interrested into looking more in detail
at the design of the layout.
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the project Saraan - http://users.edpnet.be/saraan/eindex.html - email: saraan1@edpnet.be