Allright, so basic situation is the main-line for the layout I'm designing is essentially a very large dogbone shaped into a "G". What I wanted to confirm was if on the narrow portion of the dogbone I want to treat it as a double main-line and have crossovers between the two, which creates a reverse loop type situation. So if I isolate both rails at each cross over, and both rails at the end of the section where I want the crossovers (probably three or four in total, just over a 20 foot section). I can then purchase one of those auto-reverse loop things for DCC, run the wiring for that 20 foot section through it and then my crossovers and such work just fine right? I just realized how poorly all that is worded, but hopefully someone understands what I mean and can confirm my beliefs.
I would confirm your beliefs, at the basic level. It would probably be better to have two reversing sections, one at either end of the dogbone. But without knowing more about your running habits we can't say how big a difference it would make to you. If you run lighted passenger trains, it might make a big difference. My advice for when you lay your track would be to isolate a section at each end of the dogbone, and also to isolate at each crossover. Then you play around with different reversing block arrangements at your leisure.
No desire to run lighted passenger stuff, non lighted works just fine for me, only concern would be the actual locos.
Matt, Your layout description sounds very familiar. (I condensed the text of your post a bit and underlined what I think you meant to write.) The reversing loops on the Santa Fe & Cajon Pass are shown in green in the above picture. There are plenty of crossovers on the double track mainline. To avoid the short circuit in the crossover I decided to electrically isolate the switch frogs. Sawing a gap at the four points of the frog and testing to make sure that the frog is not being fed power from under the tracks will insure this isolation. With the problem of the short circuit in the frogs eliminated, the railroad can be operated as the advertisements state. I can now run my trains instead of the track. Because I want the trains running in opposite directions to be able to manuver throught the passing sidings which are hidden inside tunnels, twin reversing loop boards are necessary . In addition to the four passing sidings, I also put a reversing board in the Wye, and another in the loop leading to and from the staging area located in the lower loop. Also look at to see how the reversing loops are wired. I hope this helps Jerry
Yeah that was essentially it. You can see the track plan in the Layout Design Forum. There's 4 crossovers (if i posted the right version, if not only two) between the mainlines by the yard. Which does indeed create reverse loops. Looks like the more reliable way from what you folks have posted is to just gap the return loops and hook them into reverse loop controllers? Since that would essentially make the entire middle portion a point to point with no reverse loops.
