New Beginnings

Thanks for taking a moment to swing by.

I have a couple of housekeeping things I need to take care of.

To all of my SRO friends. Thank you for a great 6 years. For a site that was supposed to be temporary it sure lasted a long time.

To everyone else, thanks for your interest. The purpose of this blog is to track the progress of my next generation of the Summitville RR. The SVRR has been started and abandoned in 4 different scales, and multiple types. G Scale, HO, N and I had a loop of Lego once. It’s been on the ground, on modules, tables and affixed to the wall of the garage. None have survived various family and time constraints.

Now with one kid off to college and the other about to embark on an independent life on his own, I’m finding more and more time that’s getting filled by various software projects and video games. (I’m kind of addicted to MMOLRPG games.)

But as a full time programmer, I need to get away from the keyboard and nothing suites that better thank finally getting my track going.

I have been modeling off and on in N Scale for about 7 years. As a serious geek, of course I'm in DCC.

Now on to planning the layout.

I have some rules I will make for myself and try to follow.

Requirements:
Must fit well into our all but unused sun room. Over all room size is ~10x20. There is no wall to attach to so it must be a table. Approximate available area is 8X10. But when not actively working on the layout it shall be pushed up against one wall.

I shall stay within a $50 month budget. (This ought to be pretty easy as I’ve got multiple $1,000s in RS, Engines, Structures and scenery materials on hand already.)

It must be viewable while sitting around sipping a cold brew with friends.

It must be portable. Ie light weight and small enough for two people to carry.

I should be able to be converted easily to a mobile layout for shows.

I must be able to run DCC or DC on independent tracks.

It must have multiple layers of track and must be able to run 3 trains.

It must have tunnels, bridges, water features, rock.

It must look great at night.

It must be unique, but simple to build.

I WILL TAKE THE TIME TO DO IT RIGHT.

The era will be early to mid-steam. With a touch of modern passenger.

Locale is a fictional run from the desert south west into the pine forests.

Industries include: Logging, Mining (gold), Cattle and Horse ranching.

That’s all for now. Thanks for looking.