UP's Aerotrain in Victorville, and Creating a New Section 3A

The Victorville locomotive topic this time will be UP's Aerotrain, and my progress report will cover the creation of an extra new Section 3A.

General Motors in 1955 designed and built two futuristic-looking new trainsets they named the Aerotrain.  The locomotive model number was LWT12, and it pulled ten short bus-like coaches.  The second demonstrator trainset first came west through Victorville in March of 1956, when it went on display in Los Angeles and then was tried out as a San Diegan train in April.

Here's a good photo of one of the GM demonstrator Aerotrains:

 

After the trainset failed its trials on the San Diegan, it was sent back east until December of 1956, when the UP began using it as its new City of Las Vegas train between Los Angeles and Las Vegas.  Its first run as a UP train was on Dec. 18, 1956, when it began passing through Victorville (without stopping) eastbound as Train 116 each day at noon, and westbound as Train 115 at 8:43 pm.

Here is the train with its new UP emblem on the front:

Since my modeled time period ends at the end of 1956, I can run this train through Victorville during the last two weeks of 1956.  It had nine cars at that time, but a 10th car was added during 1957, and then a second trainset, but the UP gave up on it in Sep-Oct 1957 and replaced it with conventional lightweight equipment.

While it ran over Cajon Pass, it needed a GP9 helper from San Bernardino east to Summit, where the helper was cut off.  Here's a photo by Eugene Crowner showing the Aerotrain with a helper approaching Summit:

Here's another photo by Crowner, as the train rounds the curve into into Summit:

 

Here's the train at Summit after the helper has cut off and backed into the engine track (hidden behind the train):

The train didn't need any helper from Victorville west to Summit, and I haven't seen any photos of the train in Victorville, even though it came east through town at noon every day.

Con-Cor made a nice HO model of the train, including extra cars, but the full-width diaphrams should be painted silver:

Here's a view of the Con-Cor loco (with UP emblem) and observation car:

I recently found this HO billboard to set on my layout when the train is running:

But enough of the experimental Aerotrain.  Next time we'll look at some kind of Santa Fe diesel that ran though Victorville.

As for my layout progress, I first decided to draw some diagrams for my friends, showing where all the final benchwork section boundaries are.  Here's a diagram using the upper level track plan:

 

And here's a similar diagram but with the section numbers added:

As I was drawing these, I realized that I had a big hole in the lower deck where more staging tracks could be placed.  The hole was where a new Section 3A is now shown on these diagrams.  

I had put the hole there for pop-up access to the far side of the Victorville scene, but now I want to trade away that access in favor of more staging tracks.  I can compensate for that loss by adding a raised platform in front of the Victorville scene, just as I plan to do for the wide cement plant scene on the other side of the layout.

So I measured for the new Section 3A and cut out an 18" wide piece of plywood for the tabletop.  I set it in place on sawhorses to check the fit:

Then I bought some better 1x4 boards and built a frame for 3A.  I set it on sawhorses in the same spot to test the fit:

Note that I also built six short legs, as seen here on the plywood.  I want to remove the row of four tall legs from Section 3 and move them to the far side of 3A, where they won't get in the way of the staging tracks.  I'll replace them with four of the new short legs, and the other two short legs will support some other areas of the layout that could use a little help.

Next week I'll work on removing and reattaching the tall legs, attaching the new short legs, and cutting some plywood rectangles to fill in the open notch holes where the tall legs were.  I'm glad I noticed the 3A problem in time to fix it!