The Quebec & New England is a proto-freelanced regional railroad that runs between Montreal and southern New England circa late 1980's. The focus of the HO scale 19' x 29' layout is the interchange with Conrail and the many industries served by the Q&NE. Basic buildings and scenery are complete and detailing has begun. Wireless DCC operations began in 2012 using a home-made XL program that assigns and tracks customer siding occupancies, car routings, train consists and staging. There are 16 customers on the layout, with a combined capacity of 75 cars across 25 tracks. Each operating session sees a N/B and S/B Q&NE train and E/B and W/B Conrail trains. Separate east and west staging loops automatically turn train departures to become arrivals in a later operating session. The Q&NE fleet includes 12 GP38's, 4 B40-8's, 9 SW1500/MP15's, 2 GP9's and a rebuilt GP10. The Conrail fleet includes 24 high HP locomotives (SD40/45-2, SD50/60, C40-8, B40-8) plus 6 U23B/B23-7's and 4 GP38/40's.
Hi Mike. The building is a kitbash of the Pikestuff Car shop and Diesel Shop kits. If you are interested in how it was built, please check out my video #143.
Trying to get the final benchwork and surface level subroadbed to line up properly to connect with the existing layout. This was always going to be the trickiest part, as multiple elevations have to be supported above the staging yard where there is limited room for risers.
Very tempting, but I am trying to stick with the 1980's New England regional railroad theme. Like the New England Central and the Central Vermont before it, the Q&NE roster was dominated by GP38's.
Nice work and update! My helix construction went very similar to yours, but a few years back. I chose single track, but am coming up 5 turns. My inspiration came from a Jeff Johnston article in MR and his video here on YT.
Wow sorry that the circuitry malfunctioned I didn't see that coming. 😳 Glad engine 81 was running in service. Good job rebuilding , painting & detailed parts looks great.
Get a four-foot rule and tack it down flush to your track. You may have to lay down loose cork to get the height right. You can the press tight to the rule edge. Any straight edge will work. You lay pretty clean looking track. Nice work. The helix staging is inspired. You get a really long track with very low space use. There was a idea in and old Model RR magazine. Put a tortoise under places in staging to go up and down. Hold the cars until release acts as a break.
Is your Entire Layout Schematic pictured in any of your Video(s)? I just found your channel today 9/25/2024. Thank You! I’ve been enjoying what I have seen so far.
Yes, you can find it most recently on Video #155, and you watch a complete tour of the layout on Video #159. There are also links to the pdf's that you can download on my RU-vid home page and in the "About/More ..." section.
I admire and appreciate the thought going into your design. I especially like the idea of having retired out of service service track to represent change and upgrades to the industry. Adds an element of time and realism, especially considering often decommissioned tracks are just left in place to decay. Will you be bringing in any wood chips, log loads etc. On flats or high capacity open hoppers? I see opportunity for a siding and an off loading landing in the top corner perhaps (if my brain is thinking about the process correctly?)
I got a few comments about this. Not unexpected. Unfortunately, the wood chip piles are located across the mainline, so I would have to squeeze in a curved turnout off the main, on a grade, unless I used the spot I had planned to used for the mill switcher service area for unloading (which would require re-thinking the location of the chip piles). From the photos I've seen it would need to be more substantial in size, and I wanted to preserve the scenery to track ratio. Furthermore, based on my latest track plan, the small yard will quickly run out of space, even without wood chip or log cars. Plus, I figured that in New England there are plenty of raw materials close by such that log/chip shipments by rail are not necessary or cost effective for the mill. Still time to think about it though ...
Sto seguendo il lavoro che stai facendo per l' ampliamento del tuo plastico con una zona industriale sicuramente molto bello il lup con il fascio dei. cinque binari buon lavoro a presto
nice track plans and i agree if you wanted to you could add a wood chip/unloading track and you would need wood chip hoppers.You could either buil some from existing open top hoppers or would need to buy some just a thought
I got a few comments about this. Not unexpected. Unfortunately, the wood chip piles are located across the mainline, so I would have to squeeze in a curved turnout off the main, on a grade, unless I used the spot I had planned to used for the mill switcher service area for unloading (which would require re-thinking the location of the chip piles). From the photos I've seen it would need to be more substantial in size, and I wanted to preserve the scenery to track ratio. Furthermore, based on my latest track plan, the small yard will quickly run out of space, even without wood chip or log cars. Plus, I figured that in New England there are plenty of raw materials close by such that log/chip shipments by rail are not necessary or cost effective for the mill. Still time to think about it though ...
Great update! Can't wait to see where you end going with this plan. Paper mills are busy places.. at least they were back in the day. We had no less then 3 major mills here in the St.Catharines/Thorold area, Ontario Paper being the biggest with the most complex amount of trackage. Looking good!
Funny that you mentioned Thorold. The other (smaller) paper plant on my layout is a somewhat to scale replica of the old Fraser Brothers paper mill at the end of the Pine Street Spur. I was lucky enough to have visited it while it was still in business, so I have photos. Also had access to CN engineering drawings when I scratchbuilt it.
You have given A LOT of thought to adding an industry. Thank you for sharing the helix progress I find it helpful for any building I may do. Many things are in the works personally for me to possibly acquire the room to build a layout.
Just discovered and subbed your channel, top notch. Video headings including a word at the end about contents would help accessibilty to the vast catalogue. For example, have you posted a track plan? My youtube postings only started this year, so I don't know if the existing names can be editted without causing trouble. Appreciate the time it takes to make the videos, and the superb modelling. Looking forward to going through them all, thank you.
Thanks for the sub. Yes, titles can be edited, but I am on the fence about it. I'll have a rethink. Html links to the track plans for both the visible and hidden levels are provided on my home page and in the "more ... " section. The Q&NE backstory and explanations of the track plans can be found in Video #155. Enjoy.
Very entertaining , my interest for all trains & scenery on this model railroad QNER get more better watching these Switching yard locomotives. I like this entire series. 👍❤💛
To save money on cork, buy the cork flooring that comes on a roll. You can source from Floor & Decor, and other retailers. WAY WAY cheaper than buying the midwest stuff. Measuring from the floor induces errors. Floors aren't a truly flat and level plane. Best way seems to be using a laser level to create a datum or reference line somewhere on the walls around the entire layout space. Do check the laser level for error first, BTW. Creating a video like is is humbling, but good content, as it is easy for the beginner to get scared off after dealing with challenges while trying to measure up to what they see in the hobby press.
I looked into the flooring underlay, which is marketed as cork, but it isn't a pure cork material and it has an inconvenient plastic adhesive layer tat I didn't want to deal with. What I am using is still about half the cost of the roadbed foam/cork that is marketed toward the model railroading user. I know my floor isn't purely level but I ma checking my construction with my old bubble level as I go. I didn't want/need to invest in a laser level, though it is cool!
Good video. Hopefully your helix learnings will help others! Glad you were able to resolve it early. Always enjoy seeing the paint scheme of your engines.
Some how your channel came up on my RU-vid feed, what a cool layout. I really need to get back into model railroading, but don't know where to start so much has changed from 20 years ago.
Thanks. Start by making a list of things that you'd like to model. Then identify your available space and a budget. There's help out there ... it's a caring/sharing community.
Lesson number “x”. Every piece of rail, including frogs, should have a dropper. End of story. For long term reliability do not rely on rail joiners to carry power, including putting droppers onto the rail joiners. And do not rely on the switch blades on a turnout to carry power to the frog. One bit of dirt or grime and the frog losses power. Those who get away with it is purely by luck.
The rail joiner droppers was a test and they are in an accessible part of the helix if I run into problems. The rest of the layout has droppers soldered between every pair of flex track sections, so I have no dead rail anywhere. Regarding the turnouts, I guess I have been very lucky over the last 30 years, because I have never had to power any frogs. I can, if it becomes a problem, but it hasn't. I agree with you about the points, but new turnout designs allow power to flow from both ends.
The errors one can make in the construction phase. our former club had a upper and lower section in two areas.one area had a good 3-4 % running grade meaning climbing or descending was fun not to mention limited in cars a engine could handle.
3-4% !!! That's nasty. I have enough to contend with when a train breaks apart and I have a runaway on my 2% helix. Can't imagine that your trains would stay on the rails if they let go!
Needs a steady hand and a lot of patience to not get any yellow on the stairs. By the way, I checked out some local (very large) rail-served fuel depots in town (Toronto), and they do NOT have yellow railings. Most tanks are white with white handrails and staircases. There's even one with a black staircase!
qnerr... what beautiful stuff !!! aren't gp 38's just fun to watch roll down the tracks with a string of cars ??? at the end of your video the placard said comments are welcome.... well, none really as i am going to watch your video again later tonight !!! any chance of painting the handrails on the qne black fuel tank safety yellow ? that would certainly help workers doing inspections/work on top. even though leading edge work requires a full body harness and secured lanyard tie-off point, here in the states, safety yellow hand and midrails with toe boards are mandatory... not sure about canada but i assume it is the same or very, very close !! blessings to you, qnerr, and please send along more videos !!!
I don't disagree with you. It would match the yellow sanding tower cage and staircase over the fuel tank berm/wall. It's just a pain to paint without getting any yellow the rest of the tank.
@@QNERailroad qnerr... i had the same problem... therefore i used tamiya paint retarder to "thin out" the yellow paint for the handrails and any "small" mistakes that got on the tank i let dry, then covered them up with a flat black color which, just like your tank, was a rather flat, dull black. imho, the yellow would add a lot to your scene on an already beautiful layout !!! the retarder makes the paint flow smoothly with no globs of paint at the handrail intersections... about a 1 to 10 ratio i believe. you could also use a thin piece of paper at just the bases of the vertical rails as a "buffer" preventing minor mistakes. tedious, yes, but it would add more beauty to an already fantastic scene, as i am sure you know !!! many blessings to you, qnerr !!!
