The idea behind Steinrücken came well before design or construction started, when I was searching for small electrified terminus stations and was pointed to Ostseebad Binz by members of the Railways of Germany forum. Although there was no instant attraction, it corresponded with me starting to look more at the railway of the former DDR, and was further spurred by Roco's release of DR 112/114s (DBAG 202/204) for very attractive prices. A bargain Roco H0e start set also triggered ideas of a dual gauge layout, and with the Rügensche Kleinbahn having an HF110 (the loco in the set), ideas began to crystallise. I also decided to give Tillig track a try.
After the move to New Zealand was out of the way, I had a blank canvas as far as layouts were concerned. Once I'd chosen the room which was to house the layout, I designed and built a set of baseboards- before even designing the layout! At the end of the day, the layout had to fit the space available. One aspect of the design was having the storage sidings below the the scenic boards, accessed by a helix at each end of a J shape, so I had to test trains on the first helix to ensure that they would get up with a train behind them- I wasn't going to build the second unless the first worked! Even the diminutive 202 hauled seven scale length coaches up happily- only my solitary Piko Hobby locomotive struggled. Owing to size constraints, dual gauge ideas were abandoned. The boards were constructed gradually, the double deck nature consuming many metres of batten! Boards are bolted together, with alignment dowels added on the upper level.
I did consider scales other than H0 for Steinrücken. N, although best on cost grounds, was quickly ruled out owing to non-availability of key items, inlcuding the ex-DR double deck stock which dominated Regional Express services until recently. TT was a viable and attractive, but for the fact that stock I already owned made H0 a more economic proposition. I guess I could have sold some to fund TT, but there's nothing like having something to run with immediately.
I had just about finished the initial boards when we moved house, and I gained a larger
playroom
layout room. Although the layout gained an additional four feet and became a U rather than J shape, I didn't initially make any changes to the design, just lengthened all the tracks. However, problems getting long wheelbase stock through the Tillig points meant that I reverted to tried and trusted Peco, so I took the opportunity to make some changes. The station had been on the inside, and it has now moved to the outside, and rather than a bay for the branch there is a full through platform, so there are now three platform faces. I have open possibilities at either end, with the Gingst branch allowing me to link Bad Horn to the layout for better entertainment with multiple operators (solo, it'll just be a long headshunt), while at the other end I am considering some sort of industry over the helix. Or possibly a depot, which could be a self-contained layout too.
About a third of the storage tracks have been laid, with the full fan of points at the bottom end, but only two tracks going the full length. There will be six roads altogether, with section breaks for protection where multiple trains occupy one road, and also for train detection later. The redesign means that I've lifted all the track on the scenic section, although most of the bottom end's points are ready to go in. I am using Atlas and Peco code 100 track for the helices and storage roads, Peco code 75 points and Tillig code 83 (2mm) flexi track on the scenic area The difference between code 75 and 83 is so small that trains ride the joints with barely any perceptible bump. The storage roads use Atlas surface mount point motors (actually sold bundled with the points, see 'Temporary wiring'), and the scenic ones use Tortoise motors.
I plan to make use of computer control for the signalling and route setting, with train detection. Whether I use MERG RPC or a DCC solution is yet to be decided.
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