Reliability, Reliability, Reliability

 This is going to come back to bite me, I KNOW it will.

When we build a model railroad, what we are really doing is building a large, scratch built, electro-mechanical-computer, with no actual plan, that we then ask ten people,  who have never seen this machine before, operate it. Is there any wonder there are as few problems as there are?

When you go to a layout and you’re plagued with problems, the engines don’t work reliably, the cars constantly derail, the command system breaks down constantly all you want to do is leave. “There but for the grace of God go I”.

If I accomplish NOTHING else, I sincerely hope my layout operates reliably. 

Commercial track does go together well. There is no REAL reason for the rails at a joint to have miss matched heights. 

Commercial track and the vast majority of our equipment is remarkably forgiving. I’ve seen equipment negotiate some pretty rough roadbed. 

Turnouts actually work very well. I would guess that straight out of the package a commercial turnout is about 90% to 95% reliable. What does that translate into, five to ten cars derailing out of every hundred that pass over that switch. Or if I run five-20 car trains over that track each train will suffer a derailment.

That’ll be a fun session.

I am terrified of electronics. I compensate for this by having the bare minimum of electronics incorporated in my layout. I have a main track buss with drops to the track, and nothing else. Turnouts are hand throw. Territory is dark, no signals. No lighting in structures. No track detection. It’s over-kill, but it works for me. 

I am not inclined to tinker with locomotives. I’d rather buy a replacement than fix something. I’m dying to find someone that can repair locomotives! No one around here does. 

Once I get this thing up and running it’s going to be a long hard slog getting the car fleet back in shape. I’m not sure it can be done.

This is one of the worst things about model railroading to me, looking at the “punch list” it’s a mile long, everything needs to get done. It never gets shorter. Model railroading is fun.

Only thing I know for sure is it has to run reliably.

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