The last several days have quite productive. Benchwork is up on the wall, I've started setting up OperationsPro, and I was able to get to Dallas a day of prototype research.

Benchwork

The hollow core doors have a 3/4" layer of foam on top, and a few tweaks to the front shelf. I picked up some shelf brackets for the office wall and got them mounted.

As the first part of the lower deck I have decided to build "bottom up" and install the staging first. This is double ended and the yard sits under the town of Glanton (itself under the town of Atherton). Staging feeds Cornhill (under Mortimer) at either end therefore forming a loop all round the room and also the link between the C&A and all points East and West on the Antioch and Southern railroad.

Today I was able to get into the shop to work on the benchwork.  Since the hollow core doors are 80 inches tall and I only have 10 feet of space available, I needed to trim them down to size.  Now I could have just left one door alone and trimmed the second one to fit, but I would also like to be able to take the layout to shows.  By cutting both doors down to 5 feet, they will also fit in the back of my truck.

The older I get the more difficult it gets to rummage around under the layout, on the floor, trying to complete wiring, switch machine installation, etc.  There are ways of easing this somewhat (e.g. using suitcase connectors for wiring) but I'm wondering how far some of you may have gone to address this.  Since I tend to do all the work myself I'd be interested in any tricks/tips/hints you may have on ways to work from the top down instead of bottom up.  Suggestions for switch machines, accessing wiring for maintenance, etc.