Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report

I'd like to let the route design community know that I've made considerable progress on The Switch Back Route, originally known as the Mauch Chunk and Summit Hill Railway (1827). I'll be updating my web site with progress reports as progress develops. Check in at http://home.stny.rr.com/wniehoff/sbsim.htm .Walt

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RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, werner001, Mar-20-04, 07:51 AM, (1) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, jlef, Mar-20-04, 09:19 AM, (2) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, WaltN, Mar-20-04, 06:41 PM, (3) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, jlef, Mar-20-04, 07:59 PM, (4) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, WaltN, Mar-21-04, 06:38 AM, (5) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, jlef, Mar-21-04, 02:31 PM, (6) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, WaltN, Mar-21-04, 06:12 PM, (7) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, WaltN, Mar-21-04, 06:22 PM, (8) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, jlef, Mar-22-04, 04:09 PM, (9) RE: Switch Back Gravity Railroad - Progress Report, WaltN, May-08-04, 05:24 PM, (10)

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great shots Walt, i'm really looking foreward to getting the mother of all rollercoasters as a route for MSTS!Werner

--> Visit the Virtual Lehigh Valley <--
www.geocities.com/wmueller28/msts.html

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WOW! The idea of having that as a route never occured to me! But how are you going to make a complete loop? And how does the car reach the top? Perfect adheasion and super horsepower?

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The loop thing is a problem compromised. The historic route was actually two reverse loops (one at each end) with the junction point at a switchback kind of in the center at a point called "Five Mile Tree." Having read that reverse loops "sometimes" work, I kept my fingers crossed that my two would. But, no such luck.What I did was what I would do on my HO layout: Put in gaps! I interrupt the loops on each end with gaps. That means I can't run "continuously." I have to have an activity change, in essence, at each end. But since cars historically always stopped at those depots, it works out quite naturally.In fact, since the depots at each end both sit on double-track, I stagger the gaps and have an arrival track and a departure track.I started with the "physics" for the KIHA-31 and diddled. Yes, ridiculously high adheasion. I spent more days than I want to count playing with the gear ratios and transmission (none of which made satisfying physical sense) to get a prototypical 6 mph on the plane. I do want to get back to the .eng file for some refinements, but I've got lots more structures to do.Thanks for your interest.Walt

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Cool. I really had thought it was a complete loop with double track and single track sections (I've seen a little N scale model of it, which may have been wrong) but I don't really know that much about it. Anyway, I won't really care if it doesn't work completely or even may be inaccurate, it seems to me that if you made it so that it's more or less correct, I can't complain- I know from experience that route building is plenty hard already! Just a suggestion- It might be neat to have an activity where the little pusher thing comes up from behind and "pushes" you up the slope. And that picture looks very realistic.

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My wife and I built the N-scale operating model at the Mauch Chunk Museum (in Jim Thorpe) over a period of something like five years. (See http://home.stny.rr.com/wniehoff/sbgrr.htm .) That has the same track topology -- two reverse loops with the "throats" at the switchback at Five Mile Tree. (However, in that case, the electrical gaps are at their conventional positions.) Electrically, it really is a continuous loop (with two "twists") until you think about the switchback in the middle.Your suggestion about having a "pusher car" push the load-carrying car up the plane is prototypical and is right-on. (The pusher car was called a "barney car," we believe, named after its inventor.) I've got on my to-do list to model a barney car and create engine physics for it. Then, it becomes an "engine" and the current car a "wagon." Lots to do ... .Walt

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LAST EDITED ON Mar-21-04 AT 02:37 PM (EST)

That's the one I saw. Excellent modelling, by the way. I thought the switchbacks were removed when traffic got heavy enough that they wanted to make a complete loop so cars had a separate back route- but I'm not sure. Of course, you could also be modeling it before they added that.EDIT: After pulling out my one and only resource on the route, I see that it was apparently a figure 8 type track which crossed twice, but only for a while- I'm still confused. Maybe a screenshot from the activity editor? Could we see one? Thanks

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Thanks for the compliment, and I'd be glad to oblige with a screen shot.Darned if I didn't forget how to upload and reference images on this forum. (Someone clue me in please.) This one I'll reference from my web site.

What you see is an annotated screen shot of the activity editor zoomed in the area around Five Mile Tree. I'll try to make this as crisp as possible.The Back Track enters the scene from the upper right carrying west-bound traffic from the top of the Mt. Pisgah inclined plane. At the Five Mile Tree overpass (marked with a circle), the Back Track crosses over the Down Track and continues westward, bound for the base of the Mt. Jefferson plane. This overpass is the first "twist" in the overall oval topology.The Down Track enters on the left-hand side, crosses under the Back Track, and continues eastward, bound for Mauch Chunk. Now, notice the switchback just to the left of the Five Mile Tree overpass. I think it will be easier to grasp this if I tell you its reason-for-being. It happens that a mile or so to the east of here and up in elevation pretty near the Back Track route there was a tunnel mine. (This was a secondary anthracite source that wasn't very successful.) Near the mine, there was a spur off the Back Track. They loaded cars on the spur and hauled them upgrade (mules) a bit to where the spur met the Back Track. From there, the now gravity-powered coal train went westward down the Back Track toward Five Mile Tree.But, just before the crossover, they switched a turnout (at the 3-mile marker, referenced to Summit Hill). They brake to a stop at the stub, reverse direction, and, with turnouts properly aligned, they head down the Down Track toward Mauch Chunk.I need to emphasize that this was entirely a peripheral activity. The main productive mine was a surface mine at Summit Hill to the west. I should also mention that this switchback is not the one from which the railroad got its nickname. That one is on another path (not now modeled) that led down into Panther Valley operations to the north of Summit Hill. Nevertheless, the nickname stuck.Finally, the second "twist" in the loop topology is a couple of miles to the west of here. The Down Track, bound out of Summit Hill, actually crosses under the Mt. Jefferson plane.I apologize for the length of the reply.Walt

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As much as anything, I want to see if this attachment thing works like I think it might. The first attachment is the overpass (Twist No. 1) at Five Mile Tree. The second attachment is the so-called "Over/Under" at the Mt. Jefferson plane (Twist No. 2). Hope this helps.Walt

Attachments

http://www.train-sim.com/dcforum/User_files/405e231c1fa04753.jpg

http://www.train-sim.com/dcforum/User_files/405e2347202039bc.jpg

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Yes, that makes much more sense. I didn't realize there was a spur! Thank you, I didn't know what you were talking about. Good luck with the route!

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Two weeks ago, I demonstrated the current state of the Switch Back Route to the Switchback Gravity Railroad Foundation's annual meeting in Jim Thorpe, Pa. Here is the story: http://www.tnonline.com/online/localnews/06saturday/feature1.htmlProgress continues to be posted at http://home.stny.rr.com/wniehoff/sbsim.htmWalt

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