"You can build a layout in the house, as long as it's N scale"

Thus spake the missus.

So, after some considerations and not a lot of scribbling, I've decided to gather more materials (I've already had cars, diesels & track) for the construction of an N scale Frisco layout. Yes, it'll be Frisco- a secondary line somewhere. No, not too sure where, but with the rolling stock I have, I'm leaning toward something representing the former Ardmore & Arkinda Sub between Hope, AR and Lakeside, OK, in a time period before the arrival of the GP15s (unless I can find a decent N scale model). This means forest products, paper, lumber, chemicals for papermaking, sheet tin, perishibles, feed for poultry, pulpwood, etc.........no coalies, doublestacks, SD-anything.

With three Frisco diesels ready to go, plus two more I can paint into SLSF colors (1 U25B, two GP7s), and another caboose or two, I'm reeady to go. And I can put that Walthers N scale paper mill to use now , plus the switcher I bought from Hemi 2 years ago.

I foresee trips to Denton & Silver Spike (or even Addison & Discount Model) in my future........must have more Code 55 (got lotsa code 80, which will be staging track).

 

Sounds like a great deal to me.

 

Just start with the code 80. Clean your track every day with a bright boy and soon enough it will be code 55.:teeth:

 

Sounds Interesting...keep us posted.

 

In the area I'm modeling, there IS a MP interchange at Hope (I'm back in the 70s, remember, so no Borg) and at Durant, OK on the old KOG main from Muskogee. So MP cars would show up. Then again, with an MKT interchange at Durant and KCS at Ashdown and Hope, the door is open.

 

As long as the locomotives and cabooses have Frisco on them you can run about anything between them, even Borg if you got em.

 

Jay- I've seen the JnJ GP15 shells, and they're incorrect for the CNW and SLSF body types- niether one had that blower bulge behind the cab. The shell would require some extensive reworking to be correct. Since Frisco had 25 of these diesels, and they were mostly concentrated on the Central Sub (where I'm modeling), hosting several would put my timeline from 1977 to November 1980 (merger month). Without them, I go 1975 to early 1977, around the time my wife graduated from high school in Hugo, OK

Ron- That's EXACTLY the trackage KRR runs, as well as the Arthur Sub to Paris and the remainder of the Winding Stairs line to Antlers (plus, now, 4 miles of the KCS from Hope to Anthony, AR, tthe rest of that line embargoed by KCS to Springhill, LA). I want to turn the clock back to the mid-70s, when it was all Frisco. Again, I may concentrat on the part east of Hugo but not including the Hugo yard (and thence the Ft. Smith-Paris line).

I have pics of the interchanges back when I lived in Hugo & Paris & railfanned the Kiamichi and its predecessor the Bad News.

Oh yeah, MAtthew, Frisco also interchanged with MP down in Paris, indirectly via the Santa Fe. And until the 1975 abandonment, also with Cotton Belt in Paris.

 

Jay- Actually, the surgery you describe would also involve the use of an Atlas GP9 shell for the louvers. I didn't say I would wait, but I'm pretty sure what I would need to do to get it right, and at least JnJ has the shell from which to start.

Matt- yes, the MP ran thru Paris- before then, it was the Texas & Pacific's Transcontinental Division between Ft. Worth and Texarkana via WHitesboro, Sherman, Bonham, Paris, Clarksville, De Kalb, New Boston and Hooks. Came into Paris in the mid- 1870s, section east of Paris to De Kalb torn up 1995 by UP. Trackage from Bonham east to Paris embargoed by TNER , but still intact. Station now used as a private club/restaurant.

 

As mentioned, I'll be going with code 55 track in the visible areas. I'll be using Atlas for the price (plus I have a bunch of it already ), but I also have Atlas code 55 turnouts, which will be operated by manual ground throws.

I'm open to advice on other builders' turnouts- any suggestions from the panel?

 

I had posted this plan once before, but I'll do it again :



I'll have to widen the benchwork a little bit, but it's 9 feet along one wall, 5 feet along another, and all areas are accessible. This is just a proposed plan, and may change up as necessary.

 

Merely coincidental, I assure you......but I can see the similarities.

As for curves, I'm modeling a secondary/branch line of the Frisco, so I shuld be able to getaway with 12-13" radii. I'm running no more than four-axle diesels and cars no bigger than, say, 55 ft.