Dual turntables

T

Thai1On

Slave to my route
I wanted to post this question in hopes someone other than myself has seen any form of 2 turntables together?

I first saw this many years ago when my grandfather was a member of the Cincinnati Railroad Club and he would take me to the club inside Union Terminal. When CUT was closed the management threw away all the plans and paperwork stored in the offices. The members of the club went dumpster diving and carried away a treasure trove of railroad artifacts. Going through the proposed yard plans I spotted the idea that CUT would have dual turntables to help service the traffic in and out of CUT.

So, has this idea ever been put into practice? I'm experimenting with the idea tonight to see how it looks in the virtual Trainz world :cool:.

Dave
 
A full circle (or close to it) roundhouse on one side of a heavily trafficked main line has the problem of locos often blocking the main line when accessing the side without the roundhouse. So railroads would often build two smaller (half circle) roundhouses - one on each side of the main line. Main line blockage problem solved.

The amount of loco traffic to and from a single full circle round house is also a problem. With 48, 60, or 72 stalls that would be one very busy (spell that overworked) turntable. A definite bottleneck.

What if the single turntable breaks down? Total stoppage but with two only a slowdown.

Finally - two turntables and round houses on the same side of the main line wouldn't as efficient as one on each side of the main line.

I remember seeing photo from the air of a setup with half circle roundhouses on each side of the main so its prototypical. I don't remember if there were complete coal and water facilities on both sides but from a practical point of view that would make sense. Having them only one side negates the point of keeping locos from having to cross the main line all the time.

Make an interesting and busy part of a route I'd think.

Ben
 
bendorsey said:
A full circle (or close to it) roundhouse on one side of a heavily trafficked main line has the problem of locos often blocking the main line when accessing the side without the roundhouse. So railroads would often build two smaller (half circle) roundhouses - one on each side of the main line. Main line blockage problem solved.

The amount of loco traffic to and from a single full circle round house is also a problem. With 48, 60, or 72 stalls that would be one very busy (spell that overworked) turntable. A definite bottleneck.

What if the single turntable breaks down? Total stoppage but with two only a slowdown.

Finally - two turntables and round houses on the same side of the main line wouldn't as efficient as one on each side of the main line.

I remember seeing photo from the air of a setup with half circle roundhouses on each side of the main so its prototypical. I don't remember if there were complete coal and water facilities on both sides but from a practical point of view that would make sense. Having them only one side negates the point of keeping locos from having to cross the main line all the time.

Make an interesting and busy part of a route I'd think.

Ben
Click to expand...

These dual engine servicing facilities also occurred where two separate companies shared the same yard and station. In North Adams, Mass the Boston and Albany and the Boston and Maine shared the yard. The B&M, or at the time when it was built, the Fitchburg Railroad, built a facility on the south side of the yard where the B&A built one on the north. In part this was due to the B&A coming under the B&M main line and then merging together at the far west end. In the mid-1940s, maybe a bit before, the B&M facility was closed and the B&A was left open to serve both companies.

Given that turntables take up so much space in tight quarters, I can see why this dual process is not all that common.

John
 
Yes, I have.

Some german examples:
http://www.osnabahn.de/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/grafik_bw-hbf_slg-huelsmann.jpg (Osnabrück)
http://www.bahnstatistik.de/Gleisplan/Gs_1968.gif (Gießen)
http://i45.tinypic.com/2w7qscw.jpg (Hamburg-Altona)
http://www.bahnstatistik.de/Gleisplan/HbgAlt.gif (also Hamburg-Altona)
http://www.s1gf.de/index.php?page=A...c47fb8801f0b813eebec0b86de0c0d680223&a2df8500 (as well)
http://www.doku-des-alltags.de/BDMuenchen/Muenchen Bw Hbf/Muenchen Bw Hbf Data/Glpl_Bw_1911.jpg (extreme turntabling in Munich)

American examples:
http://www.columbusrailroads.com/images/20th-St.jpg Colombus, OH
http://i525.photobucket.com/albums/cc339/cascaderailroad/AltoonaYardsEast.jpg Altoona Yardlands, PA
http://carstens-publications.com/images/store/terminalstructures-02.jpg (generic idea of a layout)
http://ngmdb.usgs.gov/img2/ht_icons/Browse/IL/IL_Englewood_307533_1929_24000.jpg (turntable paradise)

Canada:
http://www.railroad-line.com/forum/data/biglars/20091013224825_CN002868.jpg (Toronto had two right next to each other)

Wherever you have some big railroads close together, no worries about turntable-moresomes.
:)
 
Hi John:

I hadn't thought of them being owned by different lines but that's certainly a good point.

As I understand it dual RH & TT's were rare. After all - how many locations have the traffic to justify two large (and expensive) facilities that close together? Not many but a few did exist.

I made three full circle roundhouses a while back with 48, 60, and 72 tracks. The last doesn't actually have 72 tracks as there is a limit in the config file of 256 characters per line. The angles line (which sets the turntable positions) ran over the 256 character limit so I had to delete 4 tracks and block off the doors to those stalls. Not a problem in the real world of course but the bottleneck at the turntable still applies.

Wonder what the maximum number of tracks is in the real world. The rails can (and sometimes do) overlap at the edge of the turntable pit (lot of frogs for nothing, lol).

Ben
 
Awesome examples guys! These track plans are very helpful and interesting to look at.

Andre', you link to the Hamburg-Altona has something very similar to what I saw on the proposed blueprint I saw.

I was thinking from a visual point of view how a dual turntable set-up would look and operate in a large engine service facility. Unfortunately there is no roundhouse made for this type of set-up so I'm placing a 2 stall engine house between the 2 roundhouses to serve as a locomotive readying shed to return a locomotive warm and ready for it's consist. Screen shots will follow soon.

Dave
 
As the old saying goes " this thread is worthless without pictures" this is what I came up with.

This is the L&A's dual turntables during a photo-op. This is part of the "Sow's Ear" area of the L&A locomotive servicing, rebuilding. and erecting shops. Not far away is the "Silk Purse" building where the company's suit and tie engineers work. The company wanted to show off some of the heavy hardware in it's inventory.

a56699a48fc767a55331a83334d810e6.jpg


6c7c0bc4da6dcf61b25b85b4e5e8fda2.jpg


Dave
 
Last edited:
Hi Dave, There is a two turntable depot at Broadmeadow in New South Wales, Australia. If you type "Broadmeadow NSW" in the search box of Google Earth it will go straight to the spot. The table at lower left also had a roundhouse in the past. I am not sure if the roundhouses were full circle at one stage, a check on Google would provide more information.
Hope this is of interest.
Mike
 
Dave,

instead of the 2 stall shed at the one end, you could connect it to some layover-tracks and connect it with a switchback to your mainline and/or yards, that way you´d have workflow headed in one direction, which will speed up things. Like those on the right side of the picture: https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7061/6970250567_2d55797c05_o.jpg
Also I recommend the roundhouse doors that frogpipe made, they look cool.
:)
 
Great tip Andre'

From the picture you can't it, but on either side of 2 stall engine house are tracks heading to the wye behind the roundhouses and engine shed. You're right about work flow as the engine terminal can ship and receive locomotives from both the mainline and the wye.

I'll take a look at frogpipe's roundhouse doors.

Dave
 
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