Allegheny Western Lines
HO Modular Group
Member Rob Raggi Page 2
Back to Raggi Page 1
Louisville
Louisville is a northeastern city in the middle of autumn in the 1990’s. Along with Lou’s Diner and Jessica’s Shoe Emporium, the major online customers are MGR Shops, Fran’s Oil CO. and Lou’s Snowplows (name to change.) MGR Shops is a car repair shop with the building being loosely based off of the former Tank Car Corp. in Oreland, PA and with the visual feel of the PRR’s Hollidaysburg Shops trackwork. The front few inches of the building will be modeled on this portion of the layout with the bulk on my home layout. Fran’s Oil is a small oil distributing company modeled on a small jutout of the main module. Oil comes in and is distributed to homes and businesses in the area. Lou’s Snowplows is a manufacturer of snowplows for municipal and commercial use. I have modified the original building to have rail use on 2 floors. A ramp leads to the second floor docks. It is one building now but I plan some expansion in the future. Louisville is also home to a Civil War reenactment. Every year, thousands of people come to see the epic battles of the North and South portrayed here.
Left six-foot module.
Right six-foot module.
Looking at the right end of the modules, the retaining wall and some scenery has been added.  The building has been reworked from its original layout, The wall under the overhang still needs to be finished. Dec. 2008
May 2007
LV tower, (notice the renaming from BX), and the freight house and station.  The new hill is visible to the left along with the bridge.  Also note the working signals.  At this point there are 3 dwarf signals protecting the exits from the 3 sidings.
May 2007
This shot from the left end highlights the bridge and the hillside.  Close examination will reveal the signal from the yard tracks to the left.
The panel which houses the components, Digitrax SE8C, BDL168, DB150 and associated power supplies.
Yes, we are adding signals.
Sept. 2007
This view shows the new signal bridge at the left side of the modules.  The signal heads are controlled by the SE8C. I am using JMRI, (Java Model Railroad Interface) to control the SE8C. 
  
The JMRI software is a free download from the following link: http://jmri.sourceforge.net/
The next five photos are from Nov. 2009
Here I am with my son Robbie working on his module Robert's Run.  This is a two to three track arrangement and if you look closely, you can see the start of the cutout of Robert's Run at the bottom left of the picture.  This mates up to the left side of my Louisville modules.
An overview of Robert's Run.  The curves are the only place on any modules that I will solder the rail joints.  This allows me to have a smooth transition without worry of loosing the alignment.  You can faintly see the solder joints in the center of the picture.  The rear corner is a two track module.  Two of my corners are flat and two have raised sides.  I relocated the rear corner module to the other side of my basement in favor of a different module.  This is a flat module and I swapped it for a raised sided one, similar to the one in the following picture.  Incidentally, the rear module in this picture is the rear one in that is painted in the following picture.
This is one of my at present three unnamed corners.  This is also a two to three track arrangement, but in the opposite direction of Robert's Run.  This mates up to the right side of my Louisville modules.  The wood sticking up from the module is the profile of the ground.  The final effect will be a cut through a hill.
Here is Robert's Run.  This was my first attempt at pouring a water effect and I am very pleased with how it came out.  I have purposely only done this much scenery for a reason.  I like to give my modules a test run for at least one show so I can make sure that the tracks do not need to be altered.  (Don't ask how I know this.)  It is much easier to relocate or move tracks before the scenery (ballast) is put down.  I glue the tracks down to the roadbed, so removal or repositioning is a matter of a squirt bottle of water and a putty knife.  The masking tape is for super elevation of the curves. 
Here is Robert's Run and if you will take note, my other high sided corner in the rear.  This new rear corner has a crossover in it.  I used it at the December 2009 Oaks show as a demonstration on track laying.  I also let Doug Baer use it for a class that he ran on painting which is why it has the dark spot on it.  What a difference paint makes.  Thank you Doug.  Thanks to Paul and Dave Lebiedzinski for all those trees.
All Photos above by Rob Raggi

All photos below by Val Pistilli
Left and right halves of both modules at the Greenberg show August 9, 10, 2008
Dec. 2008
This view is from the inside of the layout setup August 9/10, 2008 at Edison NJ .  The paying public will rarely see the modules from this side.  In this shot looking over the oil module on the rear of my main modules, you can see the front side of the LAR building.  This was the first time that my modules had the  JMRI file that I made operate the signal system for a show. It was neat to watch the signals drop from green to red as a train entered the block on my modules.  
Robert's Run Dec. 2009 Greenberg Show
Raggi Modules looking left. Dec. 2009 Greenberg Show
Raggi Modules looking right. Dec. 2009 Greenberg Show
Home made signals!

January 2011
Page updated 1-20-2011
Designed and Maintained by
V. E. Pistilli
Allegheny Western Lines

Mailto: vpistilli@verizon.net
Allegheny Western Lines
P.O. Box 73
Ft. Washington, PA 19034
Copyright ©2006-2010 Allegheny Western Lines