# New HO Layout



## vpchianese (Dec 31, 2018)

Well the time is getting near for me to jump into the pool. I had S gauge American Flyer as a kid but that was in the mid 50's. Now building a new house in S. Florida and the Admiral said I can have the third bedroom for whatever. I figure a 11'x11' room ought to fit some HO trains quite nicely. So I've been kicking the can down the track and here is what I have come up with.

I watched a video by a real live engineer that plays with model trains as well. JD's Trains I believe is his web site. He drew up a quick point to point scheme and I like it, or so I think. I figure 2' off of the wall all around the room except for the entry door would work for his idea.

Some background on where I' m thinking. I lived in a steel town in NE Ohio. Not uphill both ways but did walk to school every day. Over a large bridge that had several main lines (NYC, Pennsylvania, B&O and Eire Lackawanna to name a few. As kids we thought that standing on the bridge as the Lima Berkshires powered up with the passenger cars, spewing steam and soot all over us was great. My mother not so much.

I'm not going to be a "detail is everything" modeler. So I'm going to use some license to do what I want. The Youngstown Southern was a point to point that delivered mostly coal to the major steel mills in Youngstown. It ran maybe 50 miles from eastern Ohio and Western PA coal mines to the mills. Sometime in the 50's switched to Diesel. I believe it did some passenger service as well. I love the mechanics of the Shays. So guess what is going to be running the coal route?

So here is what I have come up with and I used Atlas track and anyrail track program. Tried Kato first but just couldn't get the correct curves for some reason.

Any help is welcomed.


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## JeffHurl (Apr 22, 2021)

Welcome!

I'm a life-long Ohioan, and I'm in the process of modeling a section of the Ohio River, somewhere south of Steubenville. My Mother's family was from Weirton, and my Father's side is from a little town between Weirton and Wheeling, so I have fond memories of watching trains and barge traffic as a kid in the 70s.

I was able to find a locomotive decorated in the Ohio Central scheme. I think it's pretty cool to have a locomotive from a short line rail service that still operates, not only in the vicinity that I'm modeling, but near where I live (just East of Columbus).


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## OilValleyRy (Oct 3, 2021)

A couple of things that jump out to my eyes:

1: The fly over of the main/interchange will have to be 3 inches high to clear the trains below. I don’t see enough room to go from 0” elevation to 3”. Unless I’m misunderstanding the plan.

2: No storage yard (at least discernibly). Although there is a great place for one along the bottom wall. So maybe swap the turntable location to the bottom right so you can fit some car storage in along the bottom?

3: The Atlas turntable measures about 9 inches IIRC; far too small for a Berkshire. Shays would probably be fine, I THINK 3 truck type would fit, 2 truck certainly would. Anything larger than a 2-8-0 would be pushing it. Walther’s 90 foot turntable is just over 12 inches (87 ft in HO = 1 proto foot). This is where a corner site would be useful, or making one shelf area a bit wider.

As a side note; I once had an HO layout in a similar space, with a very similar benchwork arrangement. I offset the aisle so one shelf was 18” and the opposite side was 30”. However it was point to point and the lack of a loop hindered things more than I expected… Especially when it came to outbound train length that would get swapped by hand for an inbound. 
Where I am going with this is what appears to be a tentative lift bridge near the doorway. If I’m reading that correctly, I highly advise such a connection. Lift out or up-swing may not be the best. A normal swing, half height door made of a couple 1x4s and a plywood brace (think giant shelf bracket) would work well, swing out of the way without any scenery issues(trees falling off or colliding with adjacent scenery i.e.). Having it and only using it 20% of the time is better than not having it and wishing you did 50% of the time. Lesson learned for me.


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## traction fan (Oct 5, 2014)

vpchianese said:


> Well the time is getting near for me to jump into the pool. I had S gauge American Flyer as a kid but that was in the mid 50's. Now building a new house in S. Florida and the Admiral said I can have the third bedroom for whatever. I figure a 11'x11' room ought to fit some HO trains quite nicely. So I've been kicking the can down the track and here is what I have come up with.
> 
> I watched a video by a real live engineer that plays with model trains as well. JD's Trains I believe is his web site. He drew up a quick point to point scheme and I like it, or so I think. I figure 2' off of the wall all around the room except for the entry door would work for his idea.
> 
> ...


vpchiaese;

The shelf layout around (or almost all the way around) the room is a great idea.
Is the area in the lower left supposed to be a yard? If so, wouldn't the various tracks be more parallel to each other? If its not a yard, that's a whole lot of spur tracks, and expensive turnouts, filling up an area to the point where scenery or structures may be squeezed out. 

The aisles are a bit narrow at 2.5 feet. Three feet is the minimum width in which two adults can pass each other without squishing against one another. Wherever possible, I suggest widening parts of the aisles by cutting away a little of the non-tracked area and curving the front fascia inward a few inches. This will create some "passing lanes" for folks to get by each other. You have a very good basic idea. It will just need some tweaking.

By all means make your layout sectional. That will mean you can take it with you, rather than destroying it, if you ever have to move. (Never say never.  )
It will also make it easier to work on, especially the "under the table" wiring & switch machines.
My own, N-scale, shelf layout is made up of 4' x 16" sections. I'm 73 years old, & partially disabled. Crawling under the layout is something I can't do without a lot of pain. However, I can take a section over to my workbench, and turn it upside down to work on the "bottom stuff" while seated in comfort. Speaking of comfort, you might consider mounting your layout low enough that you can run it from a rolling office chair. 

The attached files cover a lot of model railroad topics. Look through them if you wish.

Good Luck & Have Fun;

Traction Fan 🙂


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## JeffHurl (Apr 22, 2021)

If I was in your shoes, I'd consider something like this... either 36" or 30" shelves


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## vpchianese (Dec 31, 2018)

Thanks for all the hints. One of the problem I'm running into on the AnyRail program is I can't seem to get the sidings next to each other. Either I'm using the incorrect switches or I need a different track as the lead offs that Atlas has on their site. I agree that those sidings need to be straight off and closer together.


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## vpchianese (Dec 31, 2018)

JeffHurl said:


> If I was in your shoes, I'd consider something like this... either 36" or 30" shelves
> 
> 
> View attachment 578454


Thanks Jeff. That might work as well but I'll have ti redraw the whole thing. Maybe put the exchange siding along the wall.

BTW Kit car or Porsche. I had a 56 356 coupe. Got T boned. That car saved my life or at least my left leg.


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## JeffHurl (Apr 22, 2021)

It was a replica. The car was custom built by a company out of Knoxville that built a few dozen cars. Mine was actually mid engine. He took a subaru donor car (mine was a 2009 Legacy) and removed all the front wheel drive aspects, leaving just the rear wheel drive with the motor sitting where the back "seat" would be (if you could call it a seat, lol).

I always wanted a 356, and it scratched that itch. 

I used AnyRail to design my layout. It took me a good 6 months to finally land on something I wanted to build. I'd say keep playing around with it. 

What I did, was take a piece of flex track, and tell AnyRail to make it a curve that bent it back the same degrees that the turnout went in the other direction. For example, teh turnouts I used had an 8 degree diverging path. So I took a piece of flex track, and "curved" it by 8 degrees on a radius similar to other curves on my layout. A good radius in HO is 22." That gave me a short piece that I could then grab and drop into place to get the diverging route to turn back parallel to the main line.


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## vpchianese (Dec 31, 2018)

JeffHurl said:


> It was a replica. The car was custom built by a company out of Knoxville that built a few dozen cars. Mine was actually mid engine. He took a subaru donor car (mine was a 2009 Legacy) and removed all the front wheel drive aspects, leaving just the rear wheel drive with the motor sitting where the back "seat" would be (if you could call it a seat, lol).
> 
> I always wanted a 356, and it scratched that itch.
> 
> ...


Thanks Flex track will do that. Can you cut flex on anyrail or is the 36" all that there is?


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## JeffHurl (Apr 22, 2021)

You start with a full size piece. But before you attach it to another piece, right click on it, then choose something like "curve flex".

A box will come up where you can put the degree arc and the radius of the curve.

Anyrail will make the piece the right size, which may only be a few inches long, but the geometry will be correct to straighted out the diverging route. Drop it on place then add more straight pieces as you wish.


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## yardmaster54 (Feb 1, 2015)

vpchianese said:


> Well the time is getting near for me to jump into the pool. I had S gauge American Flyer as a kid but that was in the mid 50's. Now building a new house in S. Florida and the Admiral said I can have the third bedroom for whatever. I figure a 11'x11' room ought to fit some HO trains quite nicely. So I've been kicking the can down the track and here is what I have come up with.
> 
> I watched a video by a real live engineer that plays with model trains as well. JD's Trains I believe is his web site. He drew up a quick point to point scheme and I like it, or so I think. I figure 2' off of the wall all around the room except for the entry door would work for his idea.
> 
> ...





vpchianese said:


> Well the time is getting near for me to jump into the pool. I had S gauge American Flyer as a kid but that was in the mid 50's. Now building a new house in S. Florida and the Admiral said I can have the third bedroom for whatever. I figure a 11'x11' room ought to fit some HO trains quite nicely. So I've been kicking the can down the track and here is what I have come up with.
> 
> I watched a video by a real live engineer that plays with model trains as well. JD's Trains I believe is his web site. He drew up a quick point to point scheme and I like it, or so I think. I figure 2' off of the wall all around the room except for the entry door would work for his idea.
> 
> ...





vpchianese said:


> Well the time is getting near for me to jump into the pool. I had S gauge American Flyer as a kid but that was in the mid 50's. Now building a new house in S. Florida and the Admiral said I can have the third bedroom for whatever. I figure a 11'x11' room ought to fit some HO trains quite nicely. So I've been kicking the can down the track and here is what I have come up with.
> 
> I watched a video by a real live engineer that plays with model trains as well. JD's Trains I believe is his web site. He drew up a quick point to point scheme and I like it, or so I think. I figure 2' off of the wall all around the room except for the entry door would work for his idea.
> 
> ...


I have 9 Athearn 34ft 2 bay hoppers with kadee couplers and metal wheels. Each hopper has its own car number. Asking $140 includes shipping. These are all in Athearn boxes, although the box may not much the contents. For whatever reason I can't post pics on here. If you are interested e-mail me at [email protected] and I'll send you pics.


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## OilValleyRy (Oct 3, 2021)

In my experience (building my 5th layout now) exactingly precise plans on paper almost always end up needing some alterations when transferred to actual build. This can be for various reasons, right now most likely being supply of items.
In that sense, don’t worry too much about sidings being aligned etc. Every sectional track system has components to achieve that. Flex track solves that problem inherently.
I would focus more on a general idea of track placement not precise location, comfortable aisle width, make the inner corners 45 degree angles rather than 90s, etc. A semi-precise location and size of a TT needs to be determined early on, but turnout and spur locations can be “fudged” to accommodate proper curves and other “obstacles” as you go.


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## vpchianese (Dec 31, 2018)

OilValleyRy said:


> A couple of things that jump out to my eyes:
> 
> 1: The fly over of the main/interchange will have to be 3 inches high to clear the trains below. I don’t see enough room to go from 0” elevation to 3”. Unless I’m misunderstanding the plan.
> 
> ...


Thanks Oil Valley. All good points. That is what I'm here for.

I'll change out the turntable for something about 12" or above. I intend on fixing that yard as I could not get a good exits off of the switches but Jeff showed me how to do that with Flex track on the Anyrail program. Got to admit I have failed at the first couple of attempts but I'll get it. So I will have that cluster fixed up a bit. 

The Main Line enter change is a bit more difficult. There is no way for me to get to +3"'s in the distance I have. On this layout it is more for realizen to a real Short Line RR and a Main Line than real usage. Yes I could use the siding as a storage or representing a couple of cars waiting for pick up. But that would be done on the lower level anyway. So my thought is being as there will not be any traffic on the actual Main Line track I will put a 90* cross where the two meet.

I agree on the connector door but I'm going to leave that for hopefully the end.


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## traction fan (Oct 5, 2014)

vpchianese said:


> Thanks Flex track will do that. Can you cut flex on anyrail or is the 36" all that there is?


vpchianese;

A word of caution regarding JeffHurl's suggestion about turnouts, and curving back parallel. With most turnouts, this would be a minor issue. Its a good deal closer to a major issue if you use Atlas "Snap Switch" turnouts. First of all they're not very good turnouts, but you would also create a reverse curve, or a series of reverse curves in say a "yard throat" where there are several turnouts in a row.
The problem is that Atlas snap switches have a unique geometry. On the HO-scale version one route is a 9" straight track, and the other is an 18" radius curve. Other turnouts have two straight routes which diverge at the angle of the frog. (I think that's the type of turnout Jeff was thinking of.)
Using Atlas snap switches your train must go into a tight left curve, and then immediately, into a tight right curve. Atlas includes a short piece of 18" radius curved track with each snap switch. Attached one way, it simply becomes part of the curved route. The turnout, and this extender track, are now able to be substituted for a normal piece of 18" radius curved track.

Turned the other way, the extender track brings the diverging route quickly back parallel to the main (straight) route. (Too quickly) This creates the reverse, or 'S' curve. Furthermore, this particularly nasty little 'S' curve is so short that a car can't help having one set of wheels going left while the other set of wheels, (of the same car) are going right.

Now cars can get through this 'S' curve, Atlas has been using this same design for decades, but it puts a lot of strain on the car's wheels, and has led to many derailments. Putting a section of straight track between the two opposite curves helps. It is also possible to set the turnout into a track curve, and use the straight route to reach the parallel siding.

If you're using a different brand of turnouts, or even Atlas Custom Line turnouts, then the built-in curve doesn't exist. Its still good practice to be on the lookout for 'S' curves. They sneak into many track plans.

Traction Fan 🙂


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## vpchianese (Dec 31, 2018)

traction fan said:


> vpchianese;
> 
> A word of caution regarding JeffHurl's suggestion about turnouts, and curving back parallel. With most turnouts, this would be a minor issue. Its a good deal closer to a major issue if you use Atlas "Snap Switch" turnouts. First of all they're not very good turnouts, but you would also create a reverse curve, or a series of reverse curves in say a "yard throat" where there are several turnouts in a row.
> The problem is that Atlas snap switches have a unique geometry. On the HO-scale version one route is a 9" straight track, and the other is an 18" radius curve. Other turnouts have two straight routes which diverge at the angle of the frog. (I think that's the type of turnout Jeff was thinking of.)
> ...


Thanks Traction,
So can I draw up the layout using Atlas and use someone else's switches? This leads to two more questions. One, which size 100 or 80 and Two, what brands solve this problem?

Thanks again.

Vinny


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## OilValleyRy (Oct 3, 2021)

vpchianese said:


> The Main Line enter change is a bit more difficult. There is no way for me to get to +3"'s in the distance I have. On this layout it is more for realizen to a real Short Line RR and a Main Line than real usage. Yes I could use the siding as a storage or representing a couple of cars waiting for pick up. But that would be done on the lower level anyway. So my thought is being as there will not be any traffic on the actual Main Line track I will put a 90* cross where the two meet.


well if the mainline won’t actually be used, I’ve got a great solution.
Use no turnouts there as it’s too wasteful. Keep the mainline elevated at 3+ inches, with it going downhill as it goes toward the aisle. It doesn’t have to reach 0” elevation; the lowest point could be 1.75”.
The interchange track where cars would be spotted, keep that track at 0”. Do not have it connect to the mainline but instead run parallel. When it comes to ballasting your track, use a different color for the mainline and interchange tracks than you use elsewhere. This will further imply that the interchange track indeed connects when/where that mainline finally reaches 0”. 

If the interchange track ends at the fascia at a perfect 90 degree and has no bumper but runs right off the end, you could use what is called a cassette to swap pre-made sets of freight cars in/out. 
A simple cassette is three 1x3s screwed together to create a U channel, with track glued down on the inside bottom, and one end blocked off with string or 1x2. A styrene tongue fashioned to slip between rails for alignment added to the end accessible end. It’s far easier to just thumb the cars in than using throttle. That set of cars pushed in the cassette goes into a storage area below the layout or on a wall as a display, and a different cassette is loaded onto the interchange as cars dropped off. With enough cassettes you can keep that up all week long. 
I got the idea from magazines and the thought of modeling two C&O shelf layouts, 1 Michigan 1 Wisconsin, with the Badger car ferry connecting them as a cassette across Lake Michigan (being the aisle).

The elevated mainline needn’t be powered at all, and could serve as a sort of “display” track implying a passing train. Although with a grade, any cars with no loco would need wheel choks or a pin holding them in place.


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## vpchianese (Dec 31, 2018)

OilValleyRy said:


> well if the mainline won’t actually be used, I’ve got a great solution.
> Use no turnouts there as it’s too wasteful. Keep the mainline elevated at 3+ inches, with it going downhill as it goes toward the aisle. It doesn’t have to reach 0” elevation; the lowest point could be 1.75”.
> The interchange track where cars would be spotted, keep that track at 0”. Do not have it connect to the mainline but instead run parallel. When it comes to ballasting your track, use a different color for the mainline and interchange tracks than you use elsewhere. This will further imply that the interchange track indeed connects when/where that mainline finally reaches 0”.
> 
> ...


Thanks,

Gotta remember that. What a cool idea.


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## Magic (Jan 28, 2014)

vpchianese said:


> Thanks Traction,
> *So can I draw up the layout using Atlas and use someone else's switches? * This leads to two more questions. One, which size 100 or 80 and Two, what brands solve this problem?
> 
> Thanks again.
> ...


Nope you must use the turnouts for track planning that you'll be using on the layout.
Each manufacture of turnouts (Switches) has a different geometry.
Any other turnout but Atlas Snap Switch will work.

You will be doing a lot of switching so reliable turnouts are a must.
I'd suggest Peco or Walthers TOs, expensive but worth the cost in reliability.
They both have centering springs on the points so they can be thrown by hand to keep
the cost down if needed. Nothing gets old faster than trains derailing on turnouts.

You will be running at slow speeds and if you're running shorter rolling stock
(4 axle locos and 40 or 50 foot cars) number 4 turnouts will be OK.

You have a turntable so I guess you're planing on running steam locos, these will also have
to be a smaller variety no more than 6 driving axles. 0 6 0 or 2 6 0 etc.
EDIT just saw that you like Shays, not what would be pulling coal but your railroad your rules.
Just be aware that running Shays are hard to find, might need the 0 6 0.

Size of track is called code. In HO it's code 100 or code 83, you'll want to stay the same code
with all your track. For what you're doing I would use code 83, looks better.

If it were me I'd get rid of that center thing completely, doesn't serve much purpose.
Move that turntable to the front and put some interesting industries in the back.
Make your tables 30 inches wide to give you more room to work with.
Keep your track about 2 inches away from the walls and you'll be able to reach everything.
Put all your track flat on the layout with light ballast and then put a main line in
along the bottom of the plan on cork roadbed and ballast of a different color.
Stick a couple of tunnel portals on the walls and maybe a mainline steamer 
as a static display, 4 8 4 or 4 6 2. Just thinking out loud here.

You have a pretty good start but IMO it needs some work, keep at it and it will come together.
To come up with a good track plan you first need to decide what is it I want to do.
What rolling stock am I running, what era of time and how am I going to do it.
Don't just lay track for the sake of laying track, each track should have a purpose.

Good luck with the build and have fun.

Magic


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## MichaelE (Mar 7, 2018)

My only suggestion would be to use another 6"-8" of space on the left side, and take that turnout in the upper left coming off of the curve to use as a yard lead for a staging yard for complete trains waiting to go. You will lose some isle space, but you will still have more isle space on the left than you do on the right.

The yard can be slightly on the diagonal so as not to interfere with your switching yard at the bottom left. That will give you about 5'+ of up to six or seven staging tracks to park trains.


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## vpchianese (Dec 31, 2018)

Magic,
Thanks for the info. So I should just redo the layout with Peco or Walthers or at least a better quality switch.
My thought was to use someone else's switches anyway. Drawing it out in the program just was to give me an idea as to what to do and not do. I will be using Flex track for the most part anyway.

I'm working on one now using Jeff's idea of 36"'s on the top and bottom. I like the idea of moving that Main Line to the bottom of the table.

As far as the Shay moving coal I understand. So maybe it will be a lumber line and delivering to a Lumber mill.

MichaelE,
I'm working on a revision anyway so I will try that.

Thanks to everyone. I do not own on piece of rolling stock as of now. Don't want to have more to move to the new house if and when it is done. I'll probably buy a lot form a local (50-100 miles) dealer at first. Did that with all of the RC airplanes and radios. Later on moved to the internet to repair them after some not so well thought out landings. Just like the real ones they will come off the ground real easy but landing is a different story.

Vinny


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## traction fan (Oct 5, 2014)

vpchianese said:


> Thanks Traction,
> So can I draw up the layout using Atlas and use someone else's switches? This leads to two more questions. One, which size 100 or 80 and Two, what brands solve this problem?
> 
> Thanks again.
> ...


Vinny;

It looks like Magic has already answered your questions. I'm adding a file which gives lots of information on turnouts. Near the end are my own quality ratings of seven popular brands. I do have one update to that list. The Shinohara turnouts listed there are no longer made. The owner retired and closed down his business. Shinohara turnouts were sold through Walthers. When the Shinoharas went away, Walthers found a new source for turnouts. The new Walthers turnouts are very good. These are the ones Magic mentioned in his response. Unfortunately they are hard to find due to supply problems.

My recommendations for high quality turnouts are Peco, Micro Engineering, and Walthers. All three brands are excellent, so you can buy any of them, or even mix them, and end up with very reliable turnouts. That "internal spring so you can throw it by hand" feature that Magic mentioned in regard to Walthers turnouts, is also present on Micro Engineering, and Peco turnouts, so you won't loose that feature with any of these three excellent brands.

Magic is correct when he says the geometry of one brand of turnout may well be different than another brand.
Atlas Snap Switches are just an extreme example of this, with their one straight route, and one curved route. I'm an old analog guy, so I've never used Anyrail, or any other track planning software. However, Magic's caution to use the digital avatar of the brand of turnout you plan to use, makes good sense.

Code 100 or code 83? Either will work. Track "codes" are simply the height of the rail in thousandths of an inch. Thus code 83 track has rails that are 83/1000ths" high. The codes are all about appearance, not functionality. The code 83 rail simply looks more like a "reduced to HO-scale" model of real rail. The code 100 is oversize (by a whopping 17/1000ths") but is just as functional as the 83.

If you are about to move, you are wise not to start building now. Wait until you're settled in your new house. (I've attached a little "light reading" to keep you in a model railroad mood while you wait. 😄) Even after the move, I super strongly recommend making you railroad "benchwork" (the supporting wood structure) in sections.
You may need to move again someday, and even if you never do, sections are a whole lot easier to work on. The fact that I designed my layout in sections not only helped it survive a move to another city & home, but it also saved the hobby for me. I planned, & started building, my railroad when I was young and fit. Now I'm old and partially disabled. I can take a section to my workbench and work sitting down. I am physically unable to crawl under the table anymore, without a lot of pain.
You never know what the future holds, so it is wise to plan for the worst, and be pleasantly surprised if it doesn't happen. 😄 Or glad you prepared for it if it does. 

Good Luck & Have Fun;

Traction Fan 🙂


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