Loudermilk
Grand Teton Railroad
Owners Ron & Annette Loudermilk

Started in June 2000 as result of a visit to White River Gardens of Indianapolis. They had a small train in the garden. As my wife says the rest is history.

Length =250Ft of track & sidings. Track is floating on about ½ of layout and the rest is supported by scratch built supports Bents composite decking material and system from www.largescale.com )

A waterfall was constructed approximately 7 years ago. That was the start of my garden. It consists of two ponds with a stream between them. The water is pumped from main pond to waterfalls and then into pond one and that overflows to stream and then to main pond.

Mountain stream has running water supplied by a sump pump concealed under the deck and a sump pump returns the water to the mountain & discharged into the stream.

Mountains are scaled versions of the Grand Teton Mountains near Jenny Lake Wyoming. They were constructed using Styrofoam cut out at each 500’ elevation and then stacked together to form the core of the mountain. Then concrete was applied to outside using rubber molds (copies of real rocks) or using plastic wrinkled up to form cracks and crevices.

System is DCC (Lenz Digital Command Control). The system is controlled by a command station or by remote utilizing a hand held cordless phone .The track is divided into 5 blocks and they are control by DCC-BitSwitches of Denver Colorado. This allows the trains (up to 4) to be controlled automatically using a principal of Latching relays.  

Bridges include a Thru Trust Bridge, Howe Truss Bridge Deck Truss Bridge & Trestle Bents they are scratched built form plans by:

Brewer Plans
PO Box 48
Gabriola Island , BC
Canada , VOR IXO  

Storage shed (10x 9) Patterned after train station on layout) for the Trains & was constructed in fall of 2003 and finished in 2004

1:25 scaled automobiles are contained in the layout running on an automobile road constructed of plywood with 3/16-inch bar stock buried into the road. The automobiles have been altered using magnets to steer the car. Also installed is battery operated electric motors. The car will also be automatically controlled at the crossing to stop the car for the Trains. Concept is being investigated for a patent.

Signal system is scratched built using brass tubes and square stock. The lights are controlled by custom-built electronics.

Phase two will be an addition of approximately 200-ft of track. Plans include a scratched built village of Oak Town In. (Wife’s Home town)

Many of my ideas came form the Garden Rail Road magazine, the web site www.largescale.com and from other layout visit. Note the Internet has been an invaluable resource.