ABRAMS RAILROAD EMPIRE
More Information

General Information     Technical Information    Freight Forwarding    Neat Ideas      More things to look at 

General Information

     This is the second ARE. The first lasted for 22 years. It was a 5? × 13? rectangle, closely packed with lots of track.  It featured a rapid transit district that was partially elevated, partially on grade, and had an underground stub-end terminal. Views are available.

     The current ARE is a free-lance layout; that is, it doesn't model any specific prototype. Nor does it represent a specific time. I say it models the anachronistic era. I designed it using CadRail. It is built almost exactly as designed. The physical drawing is from CadRail. The place names are locations important to my family. Many industry names are puns or personal references. You may want to view the track plan and schematic to follow the place names.

     The  ARE  is operated to simulate the movement of cars carrying loads among industries on and off the layout.  There are several schemes for determining the movement of cars.  We used to operate the ARE using car cards to simulate the movement of freight among industries. Now we're using computer-generated train orders.  Both systems are described below under freight forwarding.

     Local trains run from Babel Yard to industries and towns and back to Babel. Local switchers serve Vienna and Carnegie, interchanging cars with the locals from Babel. Through freights run between Babel and Marshal Yards. Marshal, in turn, interchanges freight cars with the world beyond the walls via the Westmoreland Railroad and the Providence & Worcester Railroad. The Westmoreland interchange track is connecting to Marshal Yard and serviced by a local locomotive provided by the Westmoreland.  The Providence & Worcester is a staging track. Both Westmoreland and Providence & Worcester are hidden tracks visible from Marshal by a mirror hung from the ceiling.  

     Train control is by Digitrax Digital Command Control (DCC). (Click here for information about DCC.) Operations are walk around with the engineer following the train. Jacks to plug in the throttles are located around the layout. Any throttle can control any train. In general, the address the Digital throttle uses to address the locomotive is the first two digits of the engine number.

     DCC automates polarity change for reversing loops/tracks. The ARE uses one booster (component that powers the tracks) for the main line and a second booster for Babel Yard (which is a reversing track) and two other reversing tracks: (1) the track from Carol Gardens to Hoboken and (2) the track from the Silver Spring Tunnel to Schenley. Look at the ARE schematic to see where these tracks logically connect.

     Two kinds of switch machines are used. Tortoise slow motion machines are used in Marshal, Carnegie, Carol Gardens, Bergen, and New Rochelle. They are activated on the control panels with a toggle switch. The handle of the switch indicates the direction the turnout is thrown. LEDs confirm the setting, powered through the stall motor. Twin coil switch machines, Kemtron and NJ International, are used elsewhere. They are activated by push buttons on the panels with LEDs showing the setting. More information in neat ideas.

     The ARE operates as part of a round-robin group, that we call the Anachronistic Region, located primarily in Montgomery County, Maryland. Some of the operating rules apply to all layouts in the Anachronistic Region, while other rules are specific to an individual layout such as the ARE. We meet every Tuesday night at a different layout. If you're interested, send email to abrams_railroad@comcast.net.

    The ARE uses several neat ideas that may be of interest to other modelers including independent loconet power, mounting switch machines under the layout, control panels, vinyl house siding to hold car cards or train orders, cut-away (longitudinal cross section) tunnel, trackage in the street, backdrops made using pictures from the Internet, track warrants, building flats, and LED headlights.

Freight Forwarding

     Freight forwarding direct the movement of specific cars to specific destinations, performing the basic function of a railroad. Train orders provides the information the operator needs to run the train, such as train name/number, where it originates, what it does, and when it does it, and where it is supposed to end up at the end of the run. A freight train order identifies the cars on the train, and which industries they are coming from and going to. Movement of trains on the ARE used to be directed by car cards. Click here to see an explanation and example cards.  The ARE now uses computer-generated train orders; click here.  

More things to look at

Photos of 1st ARE

Plan drawn with CadRail (opens in new window)

Schematic (opens in new window)

Benchwork & track

Viewpoints  (pictures of places and things)