Part of making any toy train layout work well is good wiring and turnout (switch) or accessory controls located where you can find them almost instinctively.  When I had my layout in high school, I was never ambitious enough to build a control panel that was worth anything, but in the case of my present layout with 11 turnouts and 7 uncoupling/unloading tracks, a control panel is essential.

Of course, as with all things in O-gauge layouts, space was at a premium.  I didn't want to cut off three feet of my layout to add a slanted control panel, so we used two vertical panels mounted to the side of the layout.  As you look from left to right, you'll see the Gargraves seven uncoupling/unloading track controllers and next to that the track diagram and turnout controllers.

The control panel consists of a vinyl tape design of the layout's track plan with turnout (switch) controllers appearing at the appropriate point.  These are the controllers which come with the DZ-1000 switch machines mounted on the Ross switches.  The folks in Ace Hardware in Kettering, Ohio found some very tiny nuts and bolts to attach the controllers in a secure, but removable manner, making future maintenance easier if one needed to be replaced.  There are also three yellow and three red pilot lights to incidate when the distant stub yard sidings are occupied in the missile rail car base.

When we installed the control panel, we put a piano hinge down the right side so the panel can be swung open for maintenance.  This also provide a nice shelf area where, eventually, the power transformers will be stored once we add a command control system to the layout.

Of course, I can't leave things at this point without mentioning the need to identify every wire along the way.  This photo shows how every wire on the control panel is labeled for future reference.  If you go under the layout, you'll see similar labels about every 18 to 30 inches along every wire so shorts or other problems, when they occur, can be quickly traced and located.  Fortunately, the wiring job came out well (as we planned), so we haven't had to trace any shorts yet!

Toy Train Layout Progress