Amherst Railway Society Show 2015

So much to talk about - an amazing weekend spent with a lot of amazing people.

My module was functionally completed on Thursday night (1/22/15), the night before the setup for the show. Track feeders soldered to the track and then tied into the track bus, legs built and tested, sides and top painted. Even put down a little grass in the space between the tracks for the future passing siding.

When I got to the show, they did some tests on every module to make sure that the electricals were up to snuff. My module needed a little work (a couple of wires had to be swapped) but otherwise, everything was fine. Trackwork? Check. DCC? Approved. Woot woot! My module was placed on the branch between a couple of curves and two excellent, larger module sets; Mike McNamara's Woodstown Junction and Dan Picciotto's Aliceanna Yard/Baltimore.

Setup was amazing, one module set (Bill Gibson's remarkably prototypical Cedar Hill) was used as the 'keystone'. Once it was in place, we starting building out in two directions -- to the Eugene loop and to the wye. From the wye, one team built the main line to the St. Cloud loop while another built the branch.

Here's how the track plan for my module ended up:

We ran opps both Saturday and Sunday; the modules on the branch (including mine) got a lot of switching.

Here's are a couple of photos of my module covered with structures:

And here are a few photos from the setup:

Looking from First Avenue to the wye during setup

The electronics underneath the approach to the St. Cloud loop

Looking down the branch during setup; Surburban Propane to the right,
Woodstown Junction to the left.

My New Haven passenger train outside of Boston, Mass. on Sunday

The 'caboose train', a traditional last train of the show, led by my 'dinky' New Haven S1. Thirty-three cabooses in this train representing railroads from all over the country. And yes, the S1 pulled the train without any problems.

The layout was huge - 62 module pieces; a mainline run of about 150 feet and a branchline of approximately 50 feet. We had participants from Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, New York, Toronto, New Jersey, Maryland and Ohio.

Here's the layout plan (.pdf)
http://www.nefree-mo.org/Springfield_2015_Final.pdf

It was truly an amazing weekend. I learned a lot, made some great friends and didn't buy a lot. Can't wait to get back to work and complete this module (scenery) and build the second part. Thanks to everybody for all of their help and support!