Sugarwood Blog

I haven’t made much progress this month as I would have liked. I am waiting for a friend of mine to obtain the necessary lumber to complete the module for the left side of the drawing I showed last month.

Previously, I made three modules. One 48” with the 45-degree top (see blog entries from 2020), one full 48” square top and a second 44” square top. I need to build another 48” module and the 60” one for the left side. I have what I need to create the 48” module and most of what I need to complete the 60” one. I only have the lumber to build 48” modules, one Square and two 45-degree. I have decided to build the 60” module square, and the two modules on the right will be 45-degree. Also, what is not shown on Rob’s drawing is a window on the 10’ wall. (See the drawing below.) I use a French Cleat to support the layout and need two 8’ cleats to support the two modules on the 10’ wall.

So, what have I been doing all month?

I started by redrawing Rob’s design in AnyRail. (See drawing below.) I did this for two reasons. First, I wanted to get a feel for how and where to start laying track. Rob pointed out that the long track in the Bakery, which runs parallel to the layout’s edge, would be the place to start, and he was correct. Second, the AnyRail drawing can be printed 1-to-1 scale, which will make it easier to lay out the trackwork.

Next, I start working on the operations part of the project. Each year, the 7th Division of the Pacific Northwest Region of the National Model Railroad Association hosts the Railway Modellers Meet of British Columbia (RMMBC). As part of this meet, there are Layout Tours and Ops Sessions. I plan to give back to the community by opening my home for both.

For a while now, I have been comparing methods of freight car forwarding, Car Cards and Waybills (CC&W), Switchlists, Ops Buddy, JMRI Operations and Roll-Your-Own. I hear people talk about the difficulty setting up any one of these, there is setup time with all. It’s all a matter of what you are comfortable with. I prefer Switchlists.

I have used CC&W, but handling the cards and sorting them every time I need to switch is not something I enjoy. While I can take the time to write out a switchlist while using CC&W, most of the layouts around here don’t have a place to sit and write one out. (Also, my writing is atrocious, especially if I’m in a hurry.)

The Roll-Your-Own is very tempting, but I am having difficulty finding an approach I’m happy with. The Ops Buddy Google Sheets below has given me something to think about. It’s on the table for the future.

I heard about the Ops Buddy Google Sheets workbook on the “Around The Layout” podcast, and Matt explains it on the MFRailroad YouTube channel. This has good potential, but it involves a lot of manual cutting and pasting. I have thought about automating it in some form, and I may try it at some point. I like the randomness of the workbook.

I have decided to use JMRI Operations with a custom switchlist with a twist. The Twist: Each industry will have instructions for spotting cars. These instructions will give the spotting location but may also delay the process with an instruction such as “Car must not be moved for 20 minutes. Unloading continues.” Similar to the MACRail Situation Cards. While not necessarily needed, I will be running a “Fast Clock.” I am still working on the Situation Cards.

I hope to have the lumber this month and get started laying track. I hope to have a Plywood Pacific for next May’s RMMBC.

Until next time.
Victor

Wow, it has been almost five years since I posted on my blog (this blog). Time sure gets away from me.

Well, I hope to do better. A lot has happened over the past years, so let me catch you up.

Let me just say that keeping up with a weekly update schedule is difficult if you don’t write for a living. So, I will provide updates, but there is no schedule at the moment.

So here is what happened: The place we lived in back in 2020 was of 1950s origin, and therefore, had little insulation in the walls and attic. My office area was upstairs in a bedroom that was in the attic. So, that and the equipment I had in the office made it extremely hot in the summer. The winters were okay, but after working all day there, I usually did not want to be there after dinner. My haste in building tracking and some assumptions about wood (it’s all the same, right? An 1/8 inch is the same in plywood and basswood, isn’t it? Well, no.) made me dissatisfied with the layout. While I did continue to work on the layout, progress was slow to non-existent.

Then, in 2022, we decided to move. Well, there’s no point continuing if I don’t know what my new space will be, so all forward progress stopped. When we found a space, my plan could not be adapted, so I had to start the design process all over again.

We moved into our new space in January 2024, right in the middle of one of the coldest cold snaps Vancouver, British Columbia, has seen in years. The weekend we moved, it was down to -18 °c. For those of you familiar with Vancouver, BC, you’ll know that a cold winter is when it gets down to -5 or -6 °c, so -18, yeah, no one was ready for that.

Now, to tell more than I should, it’s a condo. We got this place because it’s going through a complete exterior renovation—yep, new siding, windows, doors, and plumbing. Why is that important? Well, one week after we moved in, as the weather warmed up above freezing, a sprinkler pipe on the 4th floor that had frozen thawed and flooded all the way down to the ground. Luckily, we hadn’t unpacked, and most of our stuff was still in the bins we moved with, so we only lost the two new rugs we bought. However, the ceiling had to come down in all but the two bedrooms and bathrooms. Yep, my space as well. To bring this trial to a close, they finally finished the repairs in January of 2025.

This is my new space.

I have spent the last couple of years trying to develop a new plan, so, in April 2025, I gave up and asked for help. I contacted Rob Chant at the Journal of Model Railroad Design on Facebook group Journal of Model Railroad Designand his website http://jomrd.com. I sent him my space, what I was working on, and my Givens and Druthers. After some discussion, I commissioned a design.

Here is what he came up with.

This is way better than my designs and worth the price. After at least 2 years, I had not gotten anywhere near what Rob came up with in a few days.

To review the benchwork I will be using, check out my June 2020 post, “Why does it take so much longer than you think?”. I completed three of the six planned modules in 2020, which will be reused here. I will clean them up over the next bit and start on the plan. I still plan on hand-laying the track and turnouts. The “Snap-Track” approach works well enough, but I am still deciding if that is the way to go.

I plan to keep updating, but not weekly, and definitely sooner than I have in the past.

Until next time.