Information Plaque and Train Bulletin

Over the past few days I finished engraving the information plaque and train bulletin for the layout.

The information plaque describes the purpose of the layout and sets the historical background. The map shows where our we located our fictional landing.

The train bulletin shows the actual schedule we will follow. The schedule is written with a chalk marker so it is easy to change if we need to. We can also use it as a sign-up board as we will record the operators names in the remarks box.






Here is a copy of the text on the information plaque.

The great question of the campaign was one of supplies.

General W. T. Sherman

This is a fictional, but historically based, model railroad layout set in the summer of 1864 in northern Alabama on the Tennessee River. The layout demonstrates in scale model form how the Union's overwhelming logistic capacity contributed to victory. It shows how the Union Army Quartermaster Corps built or repaired railways, ship yards, saw mills and depots in occupied territory to support the Union advance into the southern states.

At the time that we model Union General Sherman’s Army was fighting outside of Atlanta, while Union General A.J. Smith was operating near Tupelo, MS. The main Confederate Army, now under the command of General Hood, opposed Sherman in Georgia, while General S.D. Lee had a smaller army in Mississippi. 

The landing was near the small town of Brendelton (fictional) on a peninsula off a tributary of the Tennessee River, surrounded by marshy land with dense forests on north and west. a narrow strip of land along the creek to the north-east provides ground access. The town had one main industry, a combined sawmill and shipyard that specialized in "puddle" jumper steamboats to navigate the shallow rivers of the upper Tennessee. The town began to build a railroad toward Athens, Alabama to connect with the Nashville and Decatur RR.  During the railroad-building boom in the 1850s, the stockholders had the line graded and built some abutments for bridges but did not finish the project before the war started.

Because of its remote and hard to reach location, the town was relatively unscathed by the war. However, some of the local riverfront farms were burned by Union water-based troops in revenge for guerrilla fire from area in 1863. Due to its geography, it is an easy location to defend and an ideal location for a supply depot.

In late spring 1864, the Union Army moved into the area. The United States Military Railroad quickly laid a branch line to Brendelton on the planned right-of-way. They built a standard Howe truss bridge over Biscuit Run and trestles over some of the swamp ground. They also rebuilt a sawmill to use in constructing boats and barges for use on the upper Tennessee River. This was one of several shipyards the Union Army built along the upper Tennessee River. The shallow water between Muscle Shoals and Florence made steamboat navigation from the lower river impossible most of the year, thus necessitating the shipyards so far forward.

They named the facility McCook's Landing after Brigadier General Robert Latimer McCook (December 28, 1827 - August 6, 1862), who was killed in this area a few years earlier while battling guerrillas. The facility is strongly fortified and garrisoned with about 1,500 soldiers, about half from newly raised regiments of African-American volunteers. 

Bernard Kempinski

About this layout

Scale                O scale (1:48^th)

Bench work     One-by framing with quarter inch plywood and 2 inch foam composite surface layer.

Track               Standard Gauge (5 ft) hand laid on laser cut wood ties, 4 spikes per tie

Roadbed          One-eighth inch aspen plywood

Rail                  Code 100

Lighting           LED Ribbon, blue tint

Sky board        One-eighth inch hardboard hand painted with some art work cutouts

Locomotives    SMR Trains with Stanton Cab Battery DCC power

Rolling Stock   Scratch built with NWSL wheel sets

Figures             Various sources and scales from 28mm to 1/43^rd scale

Acknowledgments: 

Sponsors:  Alkem Scale Models, Scenic Express, & Train Troll

Layout helpers:  Brian Brendel, Joel Salmons, Jeff Peck, Christian Peck, J.B. Weilepp, J.D. Drye, Andy Small, Paul Dolkos, Michael Spoor, Marty McGuirk, Mark Franke, Dave Emery, Jake Brendel, Brian Kammerer, Eric Cox. 

Violet Kempinski gets special recognition for the drapes and bunting.

Deepest appreciation to Alicia Worthington and Gabriella Petrick

Special thanks to Co-Builder and Co-owner Gerry Fitzgerald

Photos disappearing

I don't know why but photos on past posts are disappearing from this blog. If anyone knows what might be happening, please let me know.

Sign-Up Sheet for Op Sessions at the NMRA Meet

We plan to hold a limited number of operating sessions on McCook's Landing at the NMRA meeting.  We plan to offer three sessions a day starting on Tuesday and going through Friday morning. However, we will not have any sessions planned for Wednesday as we will be attending layout tours.

If you wish to participate in a session, please sign up by either sending me an email or commenting to this message below. I will manually update the sign up sheet on this blog post as folks reply. This will serve as the advance sign up sheet. We may have some additional impromptu sessions during the interstitial times if there is interest and time.

Each session can take up to three operators: Conductor, engineer and brakeman. A session will take about 45 -60 minutes including some training on the paperwork, throttle and couplers. The conductor will deal with some authentic paper work from the 1860s. The engineer will operate a radio throttle connnected to a battery powered loco. The brakeman will operate link and pin couplers and scale sized switch stands controlling stub turnouts.

Tuesday  10 AM Conductor  Rob Hinkle     Engineer John Bopp    Brakeman  John Brazaitis

Tuesday 2 PM     Conductor___________   Engineer___________ Brakeman_________

Tuesday 8 PM     Conductor___________   Engineer___________ Brakeman_________

Thursday 10 AM Conductor  S. Neumann   Engineer  Bill Welch      Brakeman_________

Thursday 2 PM    Conductor___________   Engineer Thom Radice  Brakeman_________

Thursday 8 PM    Conductor___________   Engineer___________ Brakeman_________

Friday 10 AM      Conductor___________   Engineer___________ Brakeman_________

The Sound of Fury

"I wish Bernie would install that wood pile. This BPS is no fun to sit on."

T minus seven and counting....

The do list is shrinking, though not as fast as I hoped due to the cassette staging and battery-decoder installs taking much longer than expected.

I made a new cassette from half-inch poplar. While the wood looks nicer than the previous cassette, it was a bear to spike into, even considering I was using flex track and track nails.  After building a 4 foot long cassette and testing it a few times, I decided to modify it. As I removed the long and ungainly cassette, I kept having visions of the whole thing dropping from my hands and hitting the floor.

The smaller cassette is for turning the engine.

The long cassette need not turn each run.
Note the thumb screw
for end of cassette security,.

So I put the cassette on my chop saw and cut it in two, but not after I did a test to make sure my chop saw would cut the flex track cleanly. It did cut cleanly and crisply.

Speaking of using big tools, I was also using a 20 ounce hammer and nail set to drive the track nails through the flex track and into pre-drilled holes in the poplar. You  got to love a scale where a 20 ounce hammer and a 12 inch chop saw can be used to lay track.

The new cassette works well - the cassettes can be repositioned without taking them from the staging table. We just need access from the back to work it. In my basement, I removed the front panel and accessed the cassettes from the front.

I added a rider and couplers to Dave Emery's box car. It is ready for service.

I did a bunch of little detailing projects before tackling the battery and decoder install in the next loco. This was the former W&ARR Texas. It is now the USMRR Fury. I originally was going to name it Leach, but after all the trouble I had with the install, Fury seemed like a much more appropriate name.


I believe the problems arose when I created a short circuit in the two track power feeders under the boiler tube. For some crazy reason the builders of these locos change the color code of the wires from the rails between the tender and the engine. I knew this, but I forgot that there was a wiring harness in the engine that feeds the headlight, AND ALSO takes power off one wheel on the pilot truck that has a wiper (presumably to help the loco pick up track power).  Temporarily forgetting the color code swap,  I assumed it all supplied one side of the rail but in truth that harness supplied both.

So by hooking pilot truck wire to the black wire that is connected to the frame in the engine I  created a short. Since I was just using a regular power supply with no short circuit detection, the loco just sat there when I put it on powered recharge track  and gave no indication of a short, even  the decoder was playing sound. But the rails were heating up at the alligator clip where I connected track power. I even got a second degree burn on  my thumb when I removed the alligator clips, I guess that was the highest resistance spot.

Anyway I sorted that out. I fixed the black wire from the pilot (actually removed it as it is no longer needed)  and redid the harness. No more short.

Then I did some tests that Derrell Poole at NWSL suggested (great customer service -  He answered my emails over the 4th of July weekend!). The BPS was not putting out 12V. The most I saw was 1.04V after 2 hours of charging.

I connected 10V DC to the decoder voltage inputs and was able to get it to play sound, but no output to the motor.

Using my existing plugs and  harnesses I put 12V to the motor with the decoder unhooked. The motor worked. So I knew my harness to the motor was OK.

The battery read 3.9V.

So I reasoned that I fried both decoder and the BPS. Oh well. I guess I'll be ordering some new BPS and decoders soon.

I removed both inoperative parts and redid the installation with a second BPS and decoder that I had on hand.  Fortunately, it works fine.   It picks up track power and turns on and off like it should. The decoder functions normally.  I used a Tsunami 23mm super mega bass speaker and it sounds good. I had to scratch build a square styrene speaker enclosure for it the would fit in the fire box/boiler. There was no room in the boiler for the decoder, so it is riding below the firebox. I painted the yellow heat-shrink black to make it less obvious. It actually doesn't look bad as it resembles the firebox in that location.

Once Fury was running I adjusted several CVs so it starts and stops smoothly and has good sound.  I replaced the burned out headlight with a yellow LED. I removed the lettering on the tender and repainted the letters using laser cut stencils. I replaced the name plate with a new laser cut one. I still need to add the wood pile and a coupler on the back. This engine never came with a rear coupler. Then I will weather it a bit to show a engine in heavy service.

Finally, we will have a back-up loco for use in Atlanta now that Fury is raging.

Finished the backdrop - 500th Post

I finished the backdrop for McCook's Landing just in time for the 500th post to the blog.  McCook's is almost done. There are just a few detailing and infrastructure tasks left.

I was very pleased with how the photo extension of D.S. Barmore worked out. AW says that it is now her favorite building as she really likes how I used photos to extend the left wing and add depth to the interior.

Overview of the left side of McCook's Landing. All the backdrops are done including the alleys between the buildings.

I used a photo of the model ship yard and saw mill to add a wing on the left side. I was amazed at how
convincing the computer printed image was at depicting the rest of the building.

I am now thinking the engine shed should have a roof.
I actually built two water tanks as the first one was a little too big for the spot. I saved it for use on Aquia Landing.

The photo flat is visible behind the engine shed. The photo had to be slit to accommodate the gap in the sky board
 between the layout sections. Two couplers awaiting installation can be seen on the flat car.

I painted the backdrop behind the engine terminal to represent an open area. Then I  added a few of cutouts from
Brian Kammerer's camp scenes to embellish the area behind the engine shed.
The Silfor flowering grass blend perfectly with the backdrop.