The East Broad Top Garden Railroad and Coal Company

The Layout

Thus far the layout consists of just one large loop 139' in length with no sidings. The track is all Aristo-Craft and uses 10' diamater curves and 1', 2', and 5' straight sections. I have recently purchaced switches to crate at least one staging siding, but need more track and time to get it done.

There are two bridges of 4' and 5' in length and one trestle about 12' in length. None of the three are more than 6" off the ground. The trestle started out as planks between loose blocks of 2x4. I'd prefered to have made it a fill, but the landlord insisted that I could not tear up the grass for it. The trestle carries Coles Curve (which is a fill on the real railroad) out into the lawn and around a 160 degree arc and back into the flower bed. To make it removable I sunk sections of 2x4 vertically into the lawn as flush, yet firm footings for the trestle. From that base, square crosshatched piling of timber (like those seen on western logging railroads) build up to the deck level. The deck sections consist of two 1/2x3" beams joined into a solid unit with lateral beams, bottom beams on each end and diaganal stringers on the bottom. The sections are about 16" each on the curves and 24" under the straight sections. There are 12 sections resting on 11 timber piers of height varying from 4" to 6".

The two bridges are just 2x dimentional lumber until more realistic replacements are ready. The replacement for the 5' bridge is under construction and will be a through plate gider design similar to the EBT's "Kylers Bridge". The replacment for the 4' bridge has not been determined yet, but will likely be either another plate girder or a multi concrete arch.

There is one road overpass at Fairview (site of an overpass on the EBT). The bridge is an LGB 1' through girder design, not prototypical of any EBT bridge.

Power

Layout controls are housed in a weatherproof 12x24" control box mounted on a 3' PVC post set in concrete. 120VAC comes in from the house in a steel underground conduit and all 12VDC lines to the layout in plastic conduit.

Right now the layout is powered by an MRC Trainpower 6200 which has provided ample power so far. The unit has failed once and had to be returned to MRC for warranty repair. Other than that it has performed extremely well.

The Aristo-Craft Train Engineer remote control throtle system is definitely on the wish-list.

Equipment

I've more recently invested in some mainline standard gauge equipment with the eventual intention of running them on a separate loop connected to the EBT through a 'simulated' dual gauge yard. Obvously they both run on the same gauge of track for the purpose of modelling and for the run of the current layout the standard gauge prototypes will be forced to run on the 'narrow gauge' loop.

Definite upgrades will involve swapping out all those pesky plastic wheels, more than 20 cars worth $$$!

Motive Power

• Aristo PRR Alco FA1/FB1 set
• 1 Aristo PRR Alco FA1 units
• 2 Aristo PRR Alco FB1 units
• Aristo PRR 0-4-0 Switcher
• Bachmann EBT Ten Wheeler
• Bachmann CNJ Ten Wheeler *
• Aristo PRR Lil Critter
• 2 Aristo P&B Lil Citters ?

Passenger Equipment

• 6 Aristo PRR Heavyweight Coaches
• 1 Aristo PRR Heavyweight Combine
• 1 Aristo PRR Heavyweight Diner
• 1 Aristo PRR Heavyweight Observation
• 2 Bachmann EBT coaches
• 1 Bachmann White Pass combine ?
• 1 Bachmann White Pass baggage ?
• 1 Bachmann CNJ coach *
• 1 Bachmann CNJ combine *

Freight Equipment

• 8 Bachmann EBT steel hoppers
• 2 Bachmann PRR steel hoppers
• 2 Bachmann steel hopper kits (unpainted) *
• 2 Aristo Southern wood hoppers *
• 1 Bachmann Texaco wood frame tanker *
• 1 Bachmann ET&WNC wood boxcar ?
• 1 Aristo EBT wood boxcar
• 1 Aristo EBT wood gondola

• Layout Photos
• Layout Plan
• The East Broad Top Railroad Homepage

This page was last updated April 28, 2002 by Chris Coleman,