This past week has seen some significant progress on the Mill Brook Railroad. First of all, my oldest son and I picked up another load of rail from Connecticut. Saturday, I tamped and leveled the curve on Washburn Hill to the point of making the track very stable in most places. After some rain today, I had to do a little tamping due to some settling, but not near as much as I’ve had to do in the past in that same section. Sunday, I bought a few rolls of landscaping fabric and spread one of them out on the roadbed. I hauled two wheelbarrow loads of ballast this evening to cover that up and get it ready to lay some more track. There’s still a lot more to go, but when I can get a few minutes in here and there it gets me a little closer to the goal.

Slow order board entering an area where the ballast has settled.

Slow orders. Everyone hates them, but every railroad has them. What’s a slow order, you ask? A slow order is a temporary speed restriction for a section of track where a derailment is more likely to happen at normal track speed. Slow orders are used by the maintenance department in areas where there may be a defective joint, bad rail, settling ballast or a number of other safety reasons. The Mill Brook Railroad’s normal rail speed is 8 MPH. Restricted speed is 2 MPH. When a train approaches a slow order board, the engineer must slow down to restricted speed. With the ballast shifting like it has been doing in the past month, I need to impose temporary speed restrictions in trouble areas. To help the engineer locate those trouble areas, I put slow order boards around them. The slow order board itself is a sign that is painted yellow on one side and green on the other. The yellow indicates the beginning of the slow order and the green indicates the end.

The clear board indicates that it's safe for the engineer to resume normal rail speed.

We have a lot of old light duty steel fence posts around the place that are bent or broken in one way or another. These metal posts have a plate on one end that is intended to keep the post from twisting while it is in the ground. This plate is what we use for the sign board. I cut the posts to a convenient length, clean off the rust with a wire brush and spray the plate with yellow on one side and green on the other. After everything dries, I push the post in the ground a couple inches and that serves as my slow/clear order board. It was very easy to make and the concept can be expanded on to include whistle posts, mileposts and more. Why not give it a try on your railroad?

Track cost estimate table

The title of this post is a difficult question to answer, but I hear it a lot. The truth is: the answer varies depending on where you put your railroad. Things that will affect the cost include the purchase price of the property (if you don’t already own some), any necessary permits, surveying your route, how much excavation, fill and grading you have to do and whether you build your railroad by hand or use heavy equipment. I have put together this handy tool to help you figure at least the most predictable part of it out. This table only deals with track material costs, not roadbed preparation or labor. Figures included are for the Culp rail system. You can replace the figures with any price you get for materials. Ballast was figured for a 10 yard dump truck load of 3/4″ crushed rock ledge which is covering an estimated 600 feet of track for a cost of $412.00. Your cost may vary, so call your local crushed rock dealer or quarry for a quote.
Now, if you go hog wild and estimate the price for a very large amount of track, like a mile or more, you may fall out of your chair at the price. Don’t fret, it’s a normal reaction when you overestimate your project. Start small and build in stages. I have never known a private railroad to be built all at once unless the builder was a millionaire . If you were to apply a similar table to an indoor layout I think that you’ll find the cost per foot of building a backyard railroad is surprisingly low.

So, figure out how much track you need to build and then take this handy Excel file and figure out how much it would cost to build your backyard railroad.

Download the Track cost estimate table.xls

I ordered 22 tons of 3/4 inch crushed ledge rock this past week and I’ve been ballasting the railroad with it. I was going to order 1/2 inch, but the 3/4 inch was a hundred dollars cheaper.

The gondola loaded with ballast for the first time.

Since I came in under budget, I bought a pair of couplers for the flat car I got from the trolley museum. I got the wheels turning the same day the ballast came. The friction bearings aren’t the best, but with the addition of some way and spindle oil, they do roll better than they did, which was not at all.

Today, my oldest son and I ballasted 80 feet of track and tamped and leveled another 20 feet on top of that.

This weekend was rather productive around the railroad. On Saturday, my wife and I got the whole family involved in cleaning up around the place and burning old fence posts. At the end of the day, my oldest son, AJ, and I built another 30 feet or so of new roadbed by  using the dirt from a ditch we were digging to provide storm drainage along the track. We stopped at a point where there was a small tree that seemed like a good place to put a culvert. The field drains in the direction of the ditch and it seemed to be a low spot in the terrain, which is where I would expect storm runoff to collect.

The finished culvert undergoing a hydro test. We poured water in the upper end to see how well it would flow through.

Today, AJ and I got together with our friend Tyler to tackle more work on the roadbed. After we walked around and assessed the work that needed to be done during the few hours we had to do it, we decided it would be best to put the culvert in. Since he has professional experience installing culverts, (a fact I only found out about as we were digging the trench to put the pipe in) I put Tyler in charge of the project.

First, we selected an old drainage pipe from a pile that I had laying around next to the barn. Then we took it to the point where we were going to install it so we could see just how it would fit.

Tyler digs the trench for the new culvert pipe.

Our next step was to dig a trench for the pipe. We made sure that the inlet was higher than the outlet so the culvert would drain water away from the ditch and not let it pool up. After the trench was dug, Tyler tamped the bottom of the trench, then placed a large flat stone at the top (inlet) end while I got some more stones. After the pipe was where we wanted it, I checked it with a level to make sure it was going to drain in the right direction. Meanwhile, Tyler started building a Headwall out of the field stone I had just brought down on the train. After he was done with the inlet end, we filled all but the outlet end of the trench and Tyler tamped the dirt down. Then we dug out the outlet end to give enough room for the erosion control rocks and he built the Headwall for the outlet end. We finished filling the area with dirt, tamped it and ran water from the garden hose into the ditch to simulate rain water. The result was a fine working culvert that looks great.

The finished culvert being tested with the garden hose.

Spring has sprung! Yes, I know. It’s a month early, but spring has definitely arrived in southern Vermont. While maple sugaring season has just started in the northern parts of the state, it ended on Tuesday for us. On Thursday the 15th, I mowed the field for the first time this year and I’ve seen robins picking the clippings up ever since.

AJ shovels debris off an old pile of fence posts.

On the railroad, spring means that we can once again move dirt around. Yesterday, the kids and I worked on removing piles of old fence posts and other old wood debris to the burn pile. We also finished the router table extension for the table saw that I started to build on Friday. After that was done, I showed the kids how to use the new router table with the table saw rip fence to cut an even groove in the sides and ends of the gondolas I am building.

AJ and Joe loading fence posts on to the flat car.

I also took the opportunity to show them some basic shop safety tips.

The new ditch and freshly tamped roadbed with two new track panels on it. Progress!

Today after church, I took all of the kids to the track with me. Number two son and I started digging the ditches along the track and putting the dirt at the end of the roadbed. I got tired of my oldest son derailing the train on a couple of trouble spots and went to the hardware store to buy four bags of tube sand. While I was there, I picked up an 8×8″ hand tamper. After we got back from the hardware store, the kids and I fixed the bad spots in the track and tamped the roadbed at the end of the track. Then we put two track panels down and had enough time to connect one of them to the rest of the track before it was time to go.

The work train gets ready to head back to the other end of the line.

All in all, it was a weekend of hard work and fun for all. We got the track closer to the place where we dump rotten wood and we had fun doing it. That’s what it’s all about, working together toward a common goal and having fun while doing it.

Jon at the throttle for the last few feet.

I love my wife. Friday when I was thinking of spending the weekend cleaning the barn, she told me she wanted to see the shovel handle stuck in the bridge abutment at the Pioneer Valley Live Steamers track that someone had told us about in the past week. I thought it was a good idea, so i checked the forecast. Saturday was too cold for it so we worked in the barn and loaded the shifter in the back of the van and the gondola on the roof rack for today’s trip.

The morning was spent waiting for everyone, especially our oldest daughter who slept until 9:30. We finally got underway a little after 10 and after some stops, finally arrived at 1 O’clock in the afternoon. The weather was a sunny 56°F when we got there and we found that there were other club members taking advantage of the warm weather as well. Everyone got a chance to run a train. Both of our daughters ran the shifter at least one time around the track, our youngest got a chance to run a Mountain Car Company Dash-9 40C and for the first time in a year and a half, my wife got a chance to drive the loco. Her first trip around the track, she had to push the stalled MCC Dash-9 up the hill. After delivering the disabled diesel to a convenient jump start spot, she asked what more she could pull. About an hour later or so later, I got a chance to drive it myself (after driving the Dash-9 around the track once). I think she had fun.

After four hours of running and chatting, we loaded up the train and headed for the nearest Friendly’s Family Restaurant for the perfect finish of a great family outing. For the unfamiliar, Friendly’s is a family restaurant chain headquartered in Springfield, MA that is famous for their ice cream, clean restaurants, good food, nice waitstaff and a pleasant family atmosphere. It also made the ride long home more pleasant. Two thumbs up for my wife.

So far this month, most of my energy has been spent on cleaning up the workshop and sealing up the cracks in the floor. The result is a workshop that is easier to heat and easier to work in. I expect that I will be buying some more insulation come May. At that point I will pull up the floor, pull the walls apart and insulate the whole thing from floor to ceiling. Then I’ll need to take down the wall I put up last fall so I’ll have room for more tools.
On the railroad side of things: It was sunny on Monday, so I took the #70 out of the barn, rode it down the track and took some pictures of it in the sunshine. The green and yellow paint scheme looks extra colorful against the snow. It was a good photo session.

It has been busy on the Mill Brook Railroad. Last week, My friend Tyler and I cut down some brush that was in the way of the track, then we burned some piles of brush on Friday.

The tender frame on the track at the Mill Brook Railroad.

Today, Kyle Stockman and I went to Massachusetts to pick up some cars. What we ended up with is a tender frame, a caboose frame and a flat car for a very favorable price. The frames are riding on friction bearing trucks and they don’t have any couplers yet. My plan is to finish the cars to running condition.

Three cars in the back of my wife's van.

The Shifter in green. Lots of masking to do before it's ready for the yellow stripes and lettering.

So far, February has been quite a busy month with household duties and other projects and I haven’t gotten nearly as much done on the railroad as I had hoped by now. It took 20 days to get the yellow stripes and lettering on the Shifter. Cold weather inside the workshop made painting a difficult task from time to time, but today was warm enough outside that I could get the workshop up to 60°F without much effort.

All masked up, the vinyl masks have been removed and it's almost ready for the clearcoat.

I have been putting in a little time here and there to get the loco back together and today I finally got the hood and cab so they look finished. I still have some minor touch-up work to do here and there before I clear coat the whole thing and I have some sanding and painting to do on the footboards before I can call it finished.

It's almost hard to believe that this is the same loco.

Outside, I had some help today cutting brush out of the way for the trackbed. In a couple hours we cleared about forty feet of roadbed and piled it up so we can burn it later. It was a lot more constructive than sitting inside watching paint dry.