I am building my benchwork now (attached layout).
I've decided the island "future construction" should be done now not in the future. I'm planning on making the island a kind of 'stub terminal. That is a yard of sorts (industry unknown). I will have access from both east and west bound trains. I want to be able to deposit cars from either direction and pick them up from either direction. Its not that big, but its the room I have (about 7 feet x 3 feet). If you notice the proposed entrance to the island is a curve (24") from each side but I havent planned out the interior details yet. I do know there wont be room for a 'runaround' on this as its only 3" wide so I'll have to drive cars in and detach the loco, or back them im. I'm thinking to use one direction as Arival and the other as Departure. To do this I think both east & west need access to the same yard tree ... so they have to connect up somehow.
I'm debauting several ideas, and open to more.
1) A Wye. Connect the east & west curves to a Wye which then branches off tree fashion to the yard
2) A Slipswitch E&W connect to the top of the slip and then the bottom branches off to 2 trees
3) A Double XOver ... similar to #2 but twice as complicated.
I'm doing this 100% hand laid (fastrax) and dont have any of these switch assemblies yet so price is an issue. I want to buy one of them and ideally be able to reuse it in other places. I like the double-xover but it seems very complex and of minimal other use in my layout. It requires 4 switches and hence is going to be complicated to wire up (read == "fun")
I just discovered the SlipSwith which seems like a very conservative use of space for the problem and requires only 2 switches.
Then there is the traditional Wye with 1 switch.
I could also use just plain old switches, I have a normall #5 and just bought a 24"/28" curved swich whith some asymetry could be used to this purpose.
Any suggestions ??? I only want to invest on at most 1 more of the above assemblies, and ideally one I could reuse other places as the assembly cost is the significant factor (although # switches is important, the double-x requires 4 switch machines or some very fancy footwork).
I've decided the island "future construction" should be done now not in the future. I'm planning on making the island a kind of 'stub terminal. That is a yard of sorts (industry unknown). I will have access from both east and west bound trains. I want to be able to deposit cars from either direction and pick them up from either direction. Its not that big, but its the room I have (about 7 feet x 3 feet). If you notice the proposed entrance to the island is a curve (24") from each side but I havent planned out the interior details yet. I do know there wont be room for a 'runaround' on this as its only 3" wide so I'll have to drive cars in and detach the loco, or back them im. I'm thinking to use one direction as Arival and the other as Departure. To do this I think both east & west need access to the same yard tree ... so they have to connect up somehow.
I'm debauting several ideas, and open to more.
1) A Wye. Connect the east & west curves to a Wye which then branches off tree fashion to the yard
2) A Slipswitch E&W connect to the top of the slip and then the bottom branches off to 2 trees
3) A Double XOver ... similar to #2 but twice as complicated.
I'm doing this 100% hand laid (fastrax) and dont have any of these switch assemblies yet so price is an issue. I want to buy one of them and ideally be able to reuse it in other places. I like the double-xover but it seems very complex and of minimal other use in my layout. It requires 4 switches and hence is going to be complicated to wire up (read == "fun")
I just discovered the SlipSwith which seems like a very conservative use of space for the problem and requires only 2 switches.
Then there is the traditional Wye with 1 switch.
I could also use just plain old switches, I have a normall #5 and just bought a 24"/28" curved swich whith some asymetry could be used to this purpose.
Any suggestions ??? I only want to invest on at most 1 more of the above assemblies, and ideally one I could reuse other places as the assembly cost is the significant factor (although # switches is important, the double-x requires 4 switch machines or some very fancy footwork).