Guy Cantwell's Willoughby Line

The Willoughby Line

"HEARKENING BACK TO A TIME THAT NEVER EXISTED"

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WELCOME TO THE LAYOUT PAGE
Here you will find info on the design concepts and construction of the Willoughby Line

QUICK LINKS

LAYOUT TOUR
A quick look around

PROTOTYPE
A look at some of the prototypes modeled

YARD DESIGN PDF
The Willoughby Yard design process

SWING GATE BUILD
A solution to crossing the door

TURNTABLE BUILD
Construction of the Willoughby Turntable

BASIC OVERVIEW

Scale: HO

Style: Double Deck Around the room with duck under at door, Peninsula and a helix in far corner. Operations based trackplan – Point to Point design

Era: Early 1950’s. West Coast steam.

Locale: Central Valley on bottom deck and the Sierras on top deck.

Modeling Philosophy: Proto - lance

Height: 40”-63”

Deck Separation: 20”

Room Size: 22’ X 13’

Mainline run (in operation mode): 180 ft (60’ in helix)

Control system: CVP Easy DCC wireless

Ruling grade: 2%

Minimum radius: 30” in visible sections - one 28” curve in staging.

Turnout minimum: No. 6

Track: Mainline code 83, branch code 70.

Roadbed: Homasote on ¾” plywood.

Scenery: Plaster on screen

Average Train length: about 10 –12 cars.

LAYOUT DETAILS

Basic Physical Structure: Railroad is double decked around the walls with a peninsula. There is hidden staging underneath the main yard and on a double tracked helix. Staging is accessible in either direction from the bottom deck. Both decks have loops for continuous running. Aisles are 30” mostly. Deck widths are 24” bottom around room and 18” top around room. Deck separation between railheads is 20” Railhead heights are 40” and 60”.

Benchwork: Bottom decks: L girder open grid –cookie cutter roadbed. ¾” plywood cabinet grade plywood/Homasote sandwich. Top deck: plywood brackets supporting ½” cabinet grade plywood/Homasote sandwich

Track: Staging: Atlas code 100/Peco turnouts. Visible track: Micro engineering codes 83, 70, 55 flex. Mostly Micro Engineering turnouts with live frogs. Other turnouts include B. K. Enterprises, Darr, Railway Engineering, Walthers, Peco, scratch built. Peco switch motors in staging, Switchmaster stall motors everywhere else…

Lighting: Compact Fluorescents in porcelain sockets.

Helix construction: ½” plywood cut in ¼ circle sections stacked on wood risers. Track is laid directly on plywood.

Electrical: 12 gauge DCC buss, feeders to most track sections. Switch motor power supply: wall warts in series to provide a bipolar to ground supply. Connections are soldered.

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