At long last the yard design is finalized. I am not overly happy about some of my compromises but I think it is workable. Some of the stuff that I wanted to put in the yard just would not go -- the coaling tower and ash pit. Since this is a transition era layout I decided to put those items in a different area and leave some foundation marks in the yard when I finally landscape it.

A remark I was reading elsewhere about too much track and not enough railroad made me look again at some of the clutter that was being built in -- now gone. There is a much larger rip track by the back shop and a few other odd bits got pulled.

Now the fun is to test the turnout motors currently installed and get the remaining bunch on order. And a couple more DS64s. My thoughts now are on the wiring connections I will need to make to hook up everything -- even with the simplifications that DCC brings there is a lot of plumbing under the deck. I want to bring the integral switch contacts out for a later track signal and possibly panel indicator installation. But not now...

Looks like using a short stretch of Cat5 with an RJ45 plug on the end might work. Then I can bring it all into a patch panel and bix in the motor leads, leave the rest open. Then bundle the motor leads back to the DS64. Having a decent crimp tool for RJ plugs was a necessity for Loconet cabling, doing ethernet connectors was a bonus.

And the track diagram actually fits on the panel space available -- although the angles are a touch odd. Don't know if I can accommodate LEDs or not to show status in the panel. Some of the fancy tower interfaces could do that at a cost -- right now a run of ribbon cable works for the buttons.

Pictures soon.