My set -up for the ICG Sparta District sidings average 15-18 feet long with that in mind my trains are going to average 25-35 cars are in the same area as CSX Dixie line 's set-up I have been doing some testing and as of right now I have decided to do a What-If with using up to date locomtives. I have had trouble with Atlas 4 axle units not being able to pull that many cars (20)on level track they have no weight and they just sit there and spin their wheels even a consist of 3-4 units.I have gone to Kato units which have no problem 2 units pull 40-50 car trains up my 2.5 percent grade helixs' so that is what I have for now. BlaneKessler
My layout will handle 100+ car trains.. My yard tracks are long enough for 110 cars.. The layout is 35 x 38 feet so it doesn't look bad at all.. In fact you can pick a location and railfan it.. I can run 30 trains by you most of them with a 100 cars and you won't see the same train twice.. 4 Kato or 5 Atlas is what most take..
Wow, that is impressive Todd. I have a small layout 1'x12', so I run 1 engine with up to 7 modern hoppers or boxcars
do you have more pics to show us, that layout is looking great!! Are you modelling any particular Conrail Line?
on my old 4X8. I ran trains of 14 cars. My maximum limit is 50 cars as that is the point where slack and weight make the train difficult to run without helpers. Max with helpers is 80 but i've never done more then 70. i normally run 25-30 car trains.
I run Ntrak so naturally I run long trains. However, that has changed due to a variety of reasons. First, we have not been able to set up the really big layouts as in the past. We do some one day shows where space is at a premium. Even the two day shows we are limited on space. What I have since done is to change from running long trains to trains long enough to fit on one siding in the yard. I might have three trains running on the main and/or on sidings and run them in turn so people will see maybe a unit coal train, a mixed freight, an intermodal or a passenger. So I'm down to about 35-40 cars until we can build a bigger yard.
My still under construction layout is designed to run about 30 car trains, locos included. That said, I sometimes take the Unitrak I have and make a huge oval on the floor and run 60 car trains. In that regard I'm still 5 years old. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJdvhjKh8XQ"]YouTube - UP Stack Train[/ame]
The beauty of Unitrack... as seen in Traindorks video! Wife leaves for a day-long excursion. You pull out your box of Unitrack and go wild! Run it through the whole house and set-up 100 car consists. Late in the afternoon you pick-up the track and trains and the wife never knows how much fun you had while she was gone! Got to love it!
On my N-scale layout with a maximum grade of 1.67%, I generally run 20-30 car freight trains, powered by brass locos (2-6-6-6, 2-10-4, 2-8-4)or three 4-axle diesel units. As can be seen from the videoclips, 25 hoppers plus caboose, mostly 33' ones, or 21 40' cars + caboose will look good on tangents shorter than the train length. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SInKbTay7CY"]YouTube - Extra 1645 East, Thurmond to Hinton WVa[/ame] [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72ELrOl8UNg"]YouTube - C&O train 91 westbound[/ame]
Years ago I developed a method to designing my layouts, which seemed to work well. No more than six cars per diesel. Maximum train length was a siding that allowed clearance for 18 cars, caboose and three SD length, three GP length, or four F units. Boxcab E50
Long Military trains When I get a finnal place to build a layout. I'd most likely set the sidings to be able to park a 40 car 89' intermodal train.
In my dreams I would be able to run 80+ cars with 3-4 engines. As I drool over the baby's room and count down the days we move him into his big boy room, I am thinking I will be only able to run 4 axle trains with 30ish cars. Yeah, I am thinking thats alot of engine, but I am going to have a 2.5"ish grades.
Interesting topic! We typically run 30 car through freights and 10 to 12 car locals and turns. The limiting factors are the staging yards lenght and the sorting capacity of the yard. Cheers Dirk
