Model Railroading > Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session

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Date: 04/08/18 08:02
Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

Last night I participated in one of Ken McCorry's operating sessions. I try and run when I can but with business travel and long hours, I rarely have the time to run at Ken's. Many of you know Ken's layout from Model Railroader and he has been published. Ken has bounced around with his timeframes with Penn Central, late PRR and I believe even early Conrail at one point. He recently switched back to Penn Central from late PRR. Many good friends at the session and it's always good to catch up with those folks. Ken has a very dedicated crew who know the railroad quite well. I was assigned to road crews which is good for me as I like to run. It can take easily an hour to run one train and there have been sessions where I was on a train for close to 2 hours. It takes 2 full-time dispatchers to run the railroad and it is fully signaled. I had back to back grain trains this session and left about an hour before it ended as I had just run out of gas from a long week at work. Anyways, it was a great session. Fun to watch Ken in action. I have a rather large layout and have operating sessions and even though I like to run, most of the time is spend helping out and Ken's no exception. The leader can be seen answering questions, giving orders and troubleshooting a huge layout that is quite complex. He knows it all. Thanks Ken. Ken is on this board so I am sure he will chime in. I have a lot of pictures to post and several videos and I will go back and add commentary over the day.

Thanks, Bruce Friedman

Picture of Model Railroader cover of Ken's layout

Train board for last night's session

The man himself giving instructions prior to the session starting

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Date: 04/08/18 08:04
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

Some presession shots prior to starting.

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Date: 04/08/18 08:06
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

More presession shots.

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Date: 04/08/18 08:07
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

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Date: 04/08/18 08:08
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

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Date: 04/08/18 08:10
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

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Date: 04/08/18 08:11
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

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Date: 04/08/18 08:13
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

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Date: 04/08/18 08:15
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

Here are some shots from the first grain train I ran.

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Date: 04/08/18 08:18
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

Some shots and a short video as I ran from my journey of grain train #1

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Date: 04/08/18 08:24
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

More action along my route.

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Date: 04/08/18 08:25
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: tomstp

Very impressive. Thanks for posting all the photos.

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Date: 04/08/18 08:26
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

More action.

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Date: 04/08/18 08:28
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

Time for helpers so we can head towards the summit.

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Date: 04/08/18 08:30
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

Nice

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Date: 04/08/18 08:33
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

The session is alive. Ken follows the same principles as I do. Model the real deal and run a transportation system. The real trains working the real yards working the real tracks. Nothing like it in my opinion in this hobby.

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Date: 04/08/18 08:36
Re: Ken McCorry's HO Penn Central layout ops session
Author: brfriedm

3rd photo shows dispatch center which requires 2 full-time dispatchers. They are on a different floor then the railroad so the separation is very real.