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You can see more of my model railroading photos at:  http://home.comcast.net/~j.sing
Thank you for visiting!

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Santa Fe 'Peavine Line' in 4' x 4'

To get a perspective, here's what the N scale layout looks like looking into the office from the living room in January
of  2006.  The layout is 4 feet x 4 feet, consisting of two 2' x 4' modules back to back.  Kato Unitrack was used,
ballasted with Arizona Rock and Minerals 'mauve' color ballast:



The front of the layout, the Glendale Junction module on the left, is an attempt to use diagonal arrangement of
lines-of-sight to optically distract from the small size of the module.   Here's an angle shot:



As I tinkered with the track plan, the concept of Glendale Junction is to loosely represent Glendale, Arizona.
I use two fairly good size buildings at the ends of the module to act as:

- View blocks to track entering/exiting the Glendale Junction module
- Give some 'heft' to the scene, i.e. have the buildings appropriately overwhelm
the trains a little - i.e. a little bit of visual illusion trickery

A view that shows the the Glendale Junction module from overhead, with the 'Prieta Canyon' module in the back:



Another view of 'Glendale Produce' on the left side (decaling still to be done).  This is a standard Walthers George Roberts Printing
Company kit:



And a view of the right side of the layout and "Santa Fe Ice House Number 1" (also a Walthers kit) on the right side
of Glendale Junction:



Now we move to the back half of the layout, the 'Prieta Canyon' module.  The Prieta Grade was the old Santa Fe
Peavine Line through Prescott, Arizona, running on a 3% ruling grade.   The layout is flat, there is no grade, the scenery
goes up and down to visually distract the eye into thinking of elevation changes.  These shots were in 2005 and 2004,
before the Kato Unitrack was ballasted:


(by the way, Southern Pacific never ran on the Peavine Line, but I just like the SP Black Widow paint scheme)

Model photography can really fool the eye, the following shot, one of my favorites, is taken from the stream
bed in the previous photo, looking up at the locomotive headed towards the tunnel:



And here's another view that fools the eye in terms of the small size of the layout,
this one taken on the Glendale Junction module looking right at the overpass area:



As final proof that the camera really does 'lie', here's a shot of a set of Santa Fe Warbonnets departing the tunnel
on the Prieta Canyon module:



The layout is approaching some semblance of the original concept that was developed in August of 2002.

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Kato Unitrack:  Painted, then ballasted

As this was my first layout as an adult, and from research, clearly I wanted to make sure I did not have any
track reliability problems - hence my choice of Kato Unitrack.  From a tracking reliability standpoint,
the Unitrack has been bulletproof.   Click here to see how I did a simple modification to the Kato #4
turnouts to avoid some locomotives and rolling stock from picking the points .  

The layout's Unitrack was originally painted only, as you can see in  the view below from August 2005.   Click here to see
an overview of my methods for painting Kato Unitrack.   The painted track  was satisfactory until I started to weather, 
at that point, the ballasting became necessary to maintain the overall appearance of the layout.



You can see in the above photo where ballasting the Kato Unitrack was started where the bridge is.  

A view that the track crews had in September of 2005, after ballasting the Unitrack in the Prieta Canyon module:



The Kato turnouts have been carefully have ballasted.   My basic method on the turnouts is to make a small thumbnail-sized
'glob' of ballast and 50/50 water-glue mixture, and then with a small screwdriver tip, carefully spoon that mixture into the
appropriate places on the Kato turnout.  This assures that I would not glue shut the internal Kato switch machine:



And you can see below, where I used PollyScale acrylic 'Earth' paint for the areas that I wouldn't / couldn't ballast:



As you can tell by comparing the two photos, the eye can be easily fooled.  (smile)

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Track Plan and Kato Unitrack Uni-joiner Electrical Experience

Here is a track plan, with the curve radius of the Kato Unitrack noted.  I arrived at this plan by clicking different
combinations of Kato Unitrack together until I got an optimum combination for appearance.  Clearly, the
appearance and tracking created by using vary curvature radius to create easements was worth it.   Any of
the "straight track then abrupt transition to curve" plans I tried, looked *awful* compared to this final plan:


By the way, the purpose of the run-around track is to facilitate a simple switching puzzle for the three sidings.

The layout's Unitrack continues to use the standard Kato Unitrack Unijoiners.   From an electrical conductivity
standpoint, after 3 years, these have held up to adequate level.  The fact that they continue to work as well as
they do is a testimony to Kato's engineering - no other non-soldered rail connection would have lasted this long. 
Regardless,  I have to have four feeders at equidistant points around the loop in order to maintain the voltage
to be adequately stable.   I do have concern that as the layout ages, these joints will probably someday force me
to solder them.

More to come over time.   For right now, I am in the process of weathering my entire fleet of locomotives and rolling
stock.  (smile)


I hope you my photos makes your day more enjoyable, and if you'd like to see more, please feel free to
click here to return to my ATSF_Arizona Home Page.

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Please feel free to sign the guestbook:



Thanks for visiting!

John Sing
San Mateo, California, USA

Modeling the Santa Fe's Peavine Line (Ash Fork -> Phoenix, Arizona)
in the 1950s and 60s - in N scale

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