Work on the upper and lower level

Greetings followers of the Atlantic Pacific Railroad!

With less than 5 months away to the NMRA/NER September 15th & 16th open house layout tours, I've been working on a number of projects to have the layout as ready as possible. 

Structures and backdrop flats are on the top of the list to help fill wall space, divider space on the main peninsula, and other places on the railroad. 

I've posted a couple pics in the past of flat structures in Rock Ridge Yard. Here's what it looks like as of today:

There is the American Hardware, which can be drilled by the yardmaster during a full operating session. Adjacent to it is an abandoned warehouse with 'For Sale' and 'For Lease' signs on them. Next to it another building that has the name 'Rock Ridge Freight Yard' on the top. This too, is a building with no freight action. I would like one of two more added, if possible. 

Next up are two Interlocking Towers. First one is positioned at Little Jamaica:

Next one is at West Harold and is closer to the edge of the layout:

Both towers are in their correct position and the 'windows' face the tracks.

Next structure I've been working on is a car shop / engine house for the lower level. For some reason, Walthers made a mistake in their Cornerstone Backdrop Kit many years ago. I bought two as it was originally planned for the previous layout in the room. When I opened it up, it had parts from not only the backdrop kit, but the ends for a 3 stall shop. How that happened I don't know, but I I decided that I will make the 3 stall version. 

The bases that came with the kit will not fit the new building, so it will sit right on the cork. There will be a track on each side of the structure and a good 24" of approach track to the actual facility. Also, I don't think Walthers made these kits to be intended to have code 100 rail go thru it. I tried one of my ES44 units on code 100 and the clearance, while it fit was way to close for comfort. Since the tracks to it come off the turntable, I will be using Code 83 track. 

I did have some construction issues as I was building it and some of the seams are not as together as I would have liked. Also, some of the pieces were warped from siting for years, even though it was sealed and in a controlled environment. The structure is not in its final place. I brought it up from the workbench just to see how it would fit. I'll add more details to it once I'm ready to tackle the area and secure tracks. One thing I am not going to do until after the open house is to add the roof. While there's not a lot of clearance underneath, I will leave engines inside the facility for the effect. 

Onward to the next project for the railroad!

P.C.C.M. 46L: Deliveries to Cargill & Tropicana

Greetings followers of the Penn Central Car Movements.

With the rest of freight train VW-1 still in Rock Ridge Yard, AP #100 is going to resume freight deliveries and head over to Cargill. The train will be designated as RC-2, the Cargill Turn.

 There's 4 covered hoppers that need to be dropped off at Cargill. The Hostess Bread covered hopper was shipped from the Hostess factory in Empire City, as well as the 3 Penn Central covered hoppers from Empire City Cargill going to the main Cargill Plant outside Rock Ridge. Also, the A&P Warehouse in beautiful Garden City, LI sent a 50' RBL insulated box car to get a car load of fresh Tropicana Juice!

 As AP #100 pulls out of Rock Ridge Yard, it crosses over at CP South to the other track so the train can shove the cars into both facilities.

AP #100 makes the quick entrance into Tropicana and drops off the car on track 3, the inbound track.

Backing out on to the Rock Ridge secondary, AP #100 will head around the bend over to Cargill and drop off the remaining 4 cars.

AP #100, its job finished, will head back over to Rock Ridge Yard. In the background are a string of coal cars that came from Hudson Coal. A quick peek shows that some of the hopper cars are empty. They'll need to go back to Hudson Coal in the not so distant future. Good news for Hudson Coal!!

As AP#100 heads back into the East Ladder of the yard, he stops and looks over to his right. A quick shout out to the crew working the yard left off a couple cars for Freihofers and Mike's Lumber Yard.

 1/87th Senior Engineer Ed, already near the end of his work day, gets back into the cab to get these two cars delivered. A call to the tower and he's now designated as train RX-3, the Rock Ridge Turn Extra!

A quick gesture to the tower operator, and he's off to Freihoefer, but not before he's told that a Mikes Lumber is ready to receive his shipment. Earlier, they dropped the car on the Little Jamaica secondary, waiting for the call from Mike to bring the car in.

Train RX-3 heads over to Freihoefer with a car load of flour from Blue Ribbon Flour, located in upstate NY.

 With the car spotted at the plant, its on to deliver Empire Belt car #358160 to the lumber yard. This car came from Neal's Lumber in Empire City. Some great wood products are made over in that Empire City factory Neal's Lumber manufactures.

With the car safely off the secondary and delivered into Mike's Lumber Yard siding, train RX-3 will head back to Rock Ridge yard and call it a day.

We turn our attention to APRR GP38 #305 & 306. This consist arrived from Weehawken designated at train WR-3. On his train, they had 4 Penn Central PS-2 covered hoppers, filled with locomotive sand from T&R Gravel. With the Richmond Hill Engine Terminal in its final stages of completion, a call was made from the management of the A.P.R.R. to the management of the N.Y.C.T.L. They arranged to get T&R Gravel to handle all sand deliveries to the A.P.R.R. and their engine facility.

A call to the tower, and this train, will be designated as Extra 306. At the controls is 1/87th Engineer PC Ralph, and he will head over to the engine facility to deliver these hopper cars and have both engines serviced while on the property.

As Extra 306 is ready to depart, he awaits the 'green' signal and will be on his way!

This wraps up the A.P.R.R.'s role in Penn Central Car Movement #46. We point you west to Elkhart where Brian and his great Ralston Creek Railroad where freight from the East will be delivered.
Thanks for reading and hope you enjoyed it!

P.C.C.M. 46K: Work resumes in and around Rock Ridge Yard

Greetings followers of the Penn Central Car Movements!

The action continues on the A.P.R.R. and focuses around Rock Ridge Yard. Trains WR-1 and WR-3, both from Weehawken have arrived in the yard.

APRR SW1500 #100 starts to head out of the yard, being designated as train RO-1, the Rock Ridge Turn.

This train has a couple of 86' auto box cars for Ideal Auto Parts. They've been sent from the Ford Plant in Empire City on The N.Y.C.T.L. Railroad. 

As the crew gets ready to drop the 2 86' auto box cars, he needs to cut the train on the main, and shove the 2 cars into the siding.

Next, RO-1 heads over to C&P Restaurant Supply. Ralph's Grocery sent over some produced and packaged goods. These will go out as fast as they come in! AP #100 will pull out the empties, shove in the loads, and take the cars back to Rock Ridge Yard for return to the originating destination.

This is no easy move as the there's a train heading west on the mainline, so the moves have to be made on the West Harold secondary. 

  

A quick run around with some creative switching by the crew, and these cars will be delivered very quickly!

Now positioned behind the 3 freight cars, AP #100 can now gently shove the cars onto track 2 in C&P Restaurant Supply. 

So why are there 2 KP&W freight cars behind the engine? Those two are headed over to Three Amigo Warehouse. There's a large order of appliances that will be off-loaded then trucked over to some stores outside of the Rock Ridge area. 

A quick run around, and RO-1 is over near Three Amigos. These cars were positioned well, and will make the drop off easy to complete.

On the siding, the cars are shoved into position. They're dropped on the north side of the building, which is a secure area. These appliances are top of the line, and Peerless Appliance is known for quality! 

With the KP&W cars dropped off, AP #100 returns to Rock Ridge Yard. A reverse move having both engine and caboose on the hind end makes this run somewhat challenging. However, we're being told that 1/87th senior Engineer Ed is in the cab, brakeman 187th ATJOE, with assistance from Tower operator 1/87th John B, supervised by 1/87th Sir Larry of Flemington. 

The empties are brought back into Rock Ridge Yard, dropped on the north classification tracks, and will be sent out at a later date to it's home railroad and destination.

Wait! There's a couple of other cars in the middle of the yard. Why are they just sitting there? Well, the architect of Rock Ridge Yard designed it with 2 sets of classification tracks in the yard, an East Side and a West Side. The benefit to that design is that engines can around around on the other track and use it as a through track to pick up or drop off cars. Genius!!

AP #100 picks up the Morton Salt covered hopper, which was sent from the fine people at Cavendish Foods. We have no idea what they're doing with all that salt and salt products, as long as they pay their bill, we'll fill them up and ship it out!

  

With the Morton Salt car shoved into the loading track at the main facility, train RO-1 has completed it's run. 

A quick break for lunch across the yard at the local diner, and AP #100 will set out for another job. There's a rumor that the diner will be changing hands in the not so distant future. Time and money will tell. 

Next up, deliveries to Cargill & Tropicana!