Operating a Two by Three Railroad The MRC Tech II Dualpower throttles run the upper and lower levels independently. The upper level is all one block, including the industrial spur. The other three blocks are the lower level's mainline, the lower level passenger spur, and the lower level trolley spur. Standard operations involve leaving the upper and lower level track toggles ON, but the passenger and trolley spurs OFF. One can run either the trolley or the passenger train on the lower level, and the block switches that control these spurs are toggled only when changing operations from one to the other. The trolleys will stall if one runs them too slowly over turnouts, so care has to be exercised to conform to appropriate speed requirements. It's reassuring that the great technology from MRC and Atlas can empower hobbyists like my wife and me to build a show layout that can run so well, for such long periods of time, but with so little maintenance. |