Night ops

The outdoor railroad that I was introduced to operations on operated every Friday night from 3-10pm. In the wintertime, it started getting dark around 5, so we had a good 3 to 4 hours of night ops. To operate on the railroad, you where required to have a locomotive that had working lights, and a caboose that had working red lights. At most of the switching areas, the owner had installed small walkway lights. Just enough ambient light to let you see what you needed, but not enough to blind you.

I can't wait to get my outdoor railroad built, so I can run night ops as well. Night ops are pretty easy for indoor layouts, just turn off the lights.

Craig 

@Craig

Craig,

As I remember, you live near Port Orchard, WA?  Is the railroad you operated at night on Dave Goodson's?  Years ago, probably like 20 or so, I participated in a couple of night ops at his house over in the Juanita area.  Really a lot of fun.  He uses switch lists, and flood lights illuminated the areas requiring switching.  His layout runs into an outbuilding, sort of a shed/workshop, and on those Friday nights, the cigars would come out, along with the whiskey, and the aroma in that shed would be quite overpowering.  He told me they even operated in the snow, with a snowplow clearing the way.  Don't know if he is still doing any of that, though....

Al Carter, Mount Vernon, WA

@Al

Yep, Dave Goodson is the guy. He is down to once a month operations. I haven't been over to his ops in probably 5 years. I never had a chance to operate in the snow, but I'm working on my own working snow plow for future winter ops. His layout was in Garden Railways years ago. I started operations there at 15. Not too many 15 year old boys choose to hang out with cigar smoking old men on Friday evenings, but I sure enjoyed it when I lived closer.

Not my photos.

Craig 

Hmmm

I have bene trying to make a flashlight that has only a glow at the end, in a 360 degree arc, which would be like a scale switchman's lantern, and then doing night op sessions once I can re-create this blue light that I'm working on for the whole room:

I think dusk / sunrise operations would be better.

If you have the right lighting. I would like to see enough for switching. Highballing could be almost total darkness but I still like to be sure the switches are lined correctly.