Hi Everyone, I am returning to railroading after 45 years off. My first layout was with dad back in the 70's it was a 4x8 with the obligatory paper mache mountain and fun for the time. I have been working on a N Scale layout design with SCARM for the past year and have a pretty nice layout but I have been hesitant to pull the trigger and build it. I ordered some used rolling stock off of Ebay to practice my weathering and are concerned at how tiny these things are. I love modeling and building the buildings and the detail work to make it look good. N scale provides a ton of opportunity to do that, but If it is too small to see the details, that takes away from it IMHO. I started thinking about building in HO instead, but I do not have a ton of space. I found a layout online from the December 1967 Model Railroader Magazine and modified it to fit my space (it was 4x8 originally). Mine is 11 feet long, the "L" bump out is 3 feet long by 4 feet wide. It is a double reverse loop setup (I have no earthly idea how to wire that). I will make the "L" detachable and both pieces will be on wheels for easy access. - No curve is tighter than 18" (is 18 too tight?) - This will be DCC - If I were to do a helicoil to a second (lower) level for a large yard (also 4x11), where would you put the ramp down (am I asking for trouble with that)? I APPRECIATE any input on this....
I think a number of us returned after a long absence . Can you get all the way around the layout? The two reversing sections could be controlled with switches but for easier to do it with auto-reversers. I bought Tam Valley but you can find them from a number of sources. Easy to wire in and work automatically. On the curves 18 inches is great but most equipment will operate at 12" or less. The main determination is what do you want looks wise. I'm going pre-75 and I'm going with 16"/18" on the main and trying to keep it 14" or more in other areas like into industries and the engine facility area. Even though I'm pre-75 there were some long locos then also but running with 12" and less on my test track have found that all of them will run on that . Sumner
First, welcome aboard! Walk-around access to all sides, except possibly an end, or the side of the roundhouse extension, will be required for a layout this size. Do you have room to walk all the way around this? I would draw up the room outline around your track plan and benchwork extents, including any doors, windows, and furniture you need to keep, to see how well your layout fits when you add the necessary walkaround clearance. A 4x11 storage yard will have to be substantially lower than the main level (for reach-in and visibility from the nearest side), with a helix to reach it. You could run the helix around the outer edge, but then you lose access to the yard for fiddling. But you'd still likely want a smaller operating yard on the main, visible level; the roundhouse complex would look lost without it. You could build trains using that yard, then run them below for staging later. By the time you create a layout that large, getting around it on all sides would take up more room than an around-the-walls layout (limited to ~2' wide for front side access even into corners) with an aisle in the middle. You could balloon out the ends for the turn-around curves. The topology would be like an open, folded dogbone. For your provided track plan, I would seriously consider adding a crossover at the upper left end of the spur that leads to the roundhouse, etc. That would create a nice long passing siding along the upper side of your main loop. I would also strongly consider installing an operating yard in the left end of the middle loop on the main level. As for N vs HO scale, that'd be an easy choice for me: N scale! But then I have far less room than you apparently have. I don't see N scale as being too small for details, its just the size of the smallest details you want to model and/or can see from viewing distance. HO can show more apparent detail, at the cost of additional space. And there are more choices in rolling stock, locomotives, and structure models in HO than in N. Still, I'd love to have that much room for an N scale empire! I'm building my 'empire' on a 36x80" hollow core interior slab door. But the #1 rule of model railroading is to have fun doing what you want to do, not what all us other curmudgeons would do!
Thanks to both of you! This is going to be up against two walls for operations, but will be on wheels so I can work it as needed. Have a look at this revised plan. Is that something like what you mean? If i run the yard this way I still have a lot of room for stuff.... For a lower level maybe I make it only 2 or 3 long tracks toward the front and not a mega yard? I had planned an N Empire for this space, I wanted a nice town, mountain, swamp all of it. I am still waffling back and forth. I also have an N scale Kato Silver Streak Zephyr set that started all of this madness. It is a true marvel of precision machinery....
Just for fun, here is my n scale layout idea . The bump out is a foot smaller length and width than the HO. The left is a mountain area, the center a town, the far right a Bayou like area with Marina. The huge appeal of this is of course you can put a ton of cool stuff in that space....
If you are going to be operating to the right of the roundhouse have you considered flipping it. Or maybe there is going to be no roundhouse there, just tracks. If there will be a roundhouse, personally I like looking at the doors (open, closed, partially open) vs. looking at the back of the roundhouse. It could be rotated to any direction and there could also be an approach to the turntable off of the main at the bottom of the yard area along with the present approach as you have shown. One approach could be more of a service track to fuel the engines, etc.. Sumner
Yes, the single crossover you added to the HO layout is exactly what I was thinking. I also agree with Sumner about the orientation of the roundhouse. For some reason most people think the entrance/exit should be on the opposite side of the turntable from the roundhouse stalls, but that is not necessary. I would definitely put the stall tracks (roundhouse or not) on the left or above the turntable, rather than to the right. For reference, 36" is the height of most kitchen counters, and 30" to 32" or so is the normal height of dining tables. Reach beyond 30-36" is difficult for most people, and less if the layout is taller, especially if there is no guard board protecting scenery along the front edge (from your belly, etc.) Kitchen counters are normally ~24" deep. Get yourself a sheet of 4x8 plywood, and set it up on sawhorses, boxes or something to simulate the height you want. Now try to reach across it... Murphy says problems and derailments will occur at the furthest point of reach the most often. 4' is completely unreachable (for non-NBA players) for addressing any issues (re-railing railcars, un/coupling etc.) You would also need to roll it out to un/cover it from dust when not in use. Add to that, the roundhouse area really gives you a longer reach into the back-left corner. All switches back there must be remote controlled (easy with Kato Unitrack). I would definitely add some grade-crossing tracks (sans the separable crossing ramps,) since they have build-in re-railers, in inaccessible track areas (especially tunnels) just in case. Assuming the upper left corner will be located in the corner of the room, you might think about mirroring your layout left-right (roundhouse on the right end). This reduces reach into the left rear corner. Or if you have room to leave it ~24" or more out from the wall on the left end, that would certainly help too. The yard tracks you added are kinda where I was thinking, but I'd move/flip them closer to the front, since uncoupling will be easier to reach, and you will have lots of that activity in the yard. Scenery does not need continuous access (except when building it) like siding/yard tracks and railcars on them do. I actually like your N-scale layout better; mostly because it has room to compress in depth to a 36x96 space, especially if you reverse the yard left-right, which also puts the run-around (between the dbl-xovers) at the head end of the yard, where you'd want it operationally. The reduced depth eases a lot of the reach issues. Again, I would mirror the layout left-right to avoid reaching around/over the round-house into the corner (assuming upper left is corner of the room). I also like the outer beltline for unmolested continuous running while you operate on the interior with other train(s). I would not be surprised if you could eliminate the flex track sections with some trial-and-error with various radii curves and lengths of straight sections. I would also strive to use as long pieces as possible in the straights, to reduce the number of rail joints and improve electrical connectivity. Some will say every section must have its own feeders, but experience has shown many of us that that simply is not true with Unitrack. Just don't get in too big a hurry to build it. Design is easy to change while on paper (or in the computer), but once you start building it, it gets more firm by the minute, and harder to change and adjust. Even then, run trains on it as soon as possible, so you can find out what works well and what doesn't before you have too much scenery and all to easily make adjustments (one of the advantages of Unitrack with built-in roadbed). If your track planning software allows you to simulate running trains on the plan, do so as much and early as possible. Oh, yeah; HAVE FUN!!! That's what this hobby is supposed to be all about!
ANOTHER STEALLAR response - thanks! I truly appreciate this, I know I am wishy washy (some on this thread have put up with me for the past year trying to decide this elsewhere as well- THANKS), but this is going to take me years to finish either way (a big plus for me) so I want to make the right choice. Two other things, my wife is pushing to go HO (though she supports it either way), and we have 3 large bins full of HO rolling stock and a few loco's from her family from the 60's and 70's, second it is much easier to see. My concern really comes down to HO limiting the amount of things I can add to it like houses and buildings and scenes. Part of me thinks that is fine, just strive to make each and every thing that goes on the table as great as it can be by itself, but the other part says it is very difficult to depict a scene when you can only fit a small amount if things in it (like a town)... I will move the bump out to the right (the open part of the room) or I can just dump it all together and make it 5x11.5 instead of 4x11.5 (this is a rolling layout so I can get to both sides), not sure what that would give me... maybe a rail yard down front instead of the middle? That still leaves 4 feet to the opposite wall and a simple table build. I picked up the casters yesterday and the steel to make some folding hinges for the legs on each of the tables. It is time to build.... I have the plywood, I am going to set it up in the space to get a better idea. It may be bigger than I am thinking in my mind.
Here is my HO thought with the bump out removed and going to 5x11.5 instead of 4x11.5. I lose the turn table and move the yard. Gives me some town and more industry area. For scenery I had to drop the cross over at the top right, I think I can put another elsewhere. This yard does not look right to me... It is funny how something so simple can get so complex. I welcome your thoughts as always.... What kind of track should I use for this? Something like Peco Flex and switches? It seems like I have jumped down the rabbit hole, may as well get away from EZ Track as in HO it will be harder to hide it. THANKS!
At 5' deep you'll need to have walk-around space behind this layout, and probably not just temporary (it's still a 30" reach from either side to the middle). So add a couple feet for that aisle space behind the layout, and the bottom edge of your layout will be about 7' out from the wall. Like before, I would add a single crossover between the left end of the top two tracks to create a run-around outside of your yard. And move the top two tunnel entrances left to accommodate it. I have no experience with HO track (not since I was a kid, anyway), but I started out with EZ track (from a B-mann trainset) in N scale, and I cannot recommend it at all. Maybe the HO EZ Track is much better. Kato has Unitrack in HO, but there is much less variety in the available pieces, compared to N, so I'm not sure I'd recommend it either. Surely others here have relevant experience and can recommend good HO track. You could gain some yard length by using a LH switch for the last bit of the curve at bottom left (like you did at bottom right.) I would also tie the next to bottom yard track to the yard ladder at right. I'm also not sure how the grades will work out to gain clearance over/under other tracks in some places. I would add grades to your design and see what the relative elevations and clearances look like around the layout. Think of where rainwater would drain to if this were real. If it pools somewhere on the layout, there would be a lake or at least a marsh there (unless this is in the desert, and then it would be a dry lake). You may need some elevated tracks/trestles to allow for a natural terrain with "drainage" off layout. That curve at upper right might look good on a trestle. Also think about how running water, over eons, would shape the terrain via erosion. Operationally, the yard leads (either end), when occupied, would foul the mainline when a long train is being handled in the yard. That makes it hard to have one train orbiting on the main while you are busy in the yard. Hidden switches in tunnels are an invitation for trouble (switch to yard lead on left end) since you have no visual indication of whether a train on the yard lead has cleared the switch, or for that matter whether the switch is thrown correctly for the route intended. Maintenance of hidden switches is difficult without lift-out scenery, which creates other visual problems. You could add an engine facility at bottom left by changing the lower left curve of the yard to a switch, with another switch or two to the left of that for locomotive storage and service tracks to the left of the main yard.
THANK YOU SO MUCH ANDY!! An engine house is GREAT, I was stuck on turntable or nothing, now love this idea. I will get back into SCARM and see if I can get some of those changes to work. I REALLY APPRECIATE IT! You guys have helped me from getting derailed yet again. Rob
