Model railroad layouts plans

Bob’s been in touch with his scratch built HO scale trolley line:

“Hi Al,

Love all the posts,ideas,and videos from your subscribers.

Every bit of it makes me think of different ways to accomplish various parts of my layout.

Attached are some pics and a video of the Trolley Line that I put on my Basement wall.

It has all hand made houses, trees and the sky background which I also painted.

Lots of people and the businesses are named after various family members. Cathy’s (my wife) Chocolate Chip Cookies, Bob’s Train World etc…)

It is HO scale, runs on DC, ( I also have a 5’ x 10’ HO Train layout that is all DCC)

The Trolley is controlled by a Circuitron AR2 Auto Reverse module coupled to a Circuitron DT-4 module which allows it to stop at intervals designated buy the Opto-Sensors located in the track.

I live in Springfield Pennsylvania, just southeast of Philadelphia, in the good old USA !

I hope you and your readers enjoy my little world!

Thanks for all your hard work!

Bob”

Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

Loved what Bob has done.

It just goes to show (again!) don’t let lack of space stop you having fun.

And best of all, starting small lets you get your feet wet, and in no time at all, you’ll be hatching plans for the next one.

It’s a great way to go from the armchair, to actually laying track and enjoying yourself.

And now on to Tony:

“Hi Alastair,

The task was how to integrate my love of model railways and the grand kids desire to race their model cars around a race track.

Main board is 8’x4’ then extended across window into goods yard and made a loop back to main side.

Please see finished project which has us all happy now!

Love your posts and ideas from members!

Kind regards

Tony from Stockport”

That’s all for today folks. A huge thanks to Bob for sharing his HO scale trolley, and to Tony too.

In fact, it’s given me an idea, I think I might do a post linking to all the layouts that don’t take up a lot of space.

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you get started on your layout, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

PPS More HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.

Lawrence has been in touch again – he’s added some HO scale medieval figures to his layout!

You may remember him from his HO helix post.

Well, I have to say, I do love his stuff – you can tell he has a lot fo fun with his layout:

“Hi Al

Another Update. As a member of the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism = recreation of the middle ages) I was thrilled when I found out that the Renaissance Faire was coming to town.

There are companies that are starting to make Ren Faire stuff but not on the market yet. So, it is time to ad-lib from what I have see by going to the Ren Faire myself.

The first picture is the clearing of the field and setting the boundary. The second picture shows the walls in place, made from food scurs. The shields are pictures from the web on thin styrene. Most of the devices I recognize from registered devices from Baronies, Shires, and Cantons in the SCA. The third picture shows the entertainers arriving and a food court set up for them. Now we see the full Ren Faire set up for the customers. With some of the entertainers practicing their art (dancing and jousting).

The Ren Faire is officially OPEN. Customers are arriving with the police helping to direct traffic.

The Ferrier shop in the picture has been shut down and the Ferrier is now available for the jousting horses as needed.

The motorcycle club arriving is the Booze Fighters, the oldest motorcycle club.

Picture number 6 shows customers arriving and starting to enjoy the festivities. But to get in they have to pay and get their hands stamped with an ink device. To allow them to leave and reenter the same day without paying again. The shack just inside the entrance checks for the hand stamps.

Now the fun begins. In the eighth picture people are seen to wander around in normal street clothes, Renaissance garb and even SCA (medieval) garb. The multiple attractions are the jousting, dancing, food, mead, and of course turkey wings. The next picture is a close up of the jousting. The jousting poles are actually balsa wood so that they shatter on impact with minimal damage. Then there is the general area for the food and mead. You can order at the counter or be served at a table. The kiosk in the rear of the picture sells the turkey wings. The last picture shows the dancers, usually to an Irish tune.

Lawrence”

A huge thanks to Lawrence – I do love it when I see his name pop up in my inbox. Over the months he’s sent in quite a number of posts, and I hope he keeps them coming too.

And now on to Dangerous Dave. I know I post a lot of his stuff but it’s just that if I start watching something, and find myself watching all of it, I generally post it. I don’t know what it is about Dave’s layout, but it seems to get me everytime:

“Bit of fun running for the weekend Al, tried to name each one for those not knowing which type is which…

Regards

Dave”

Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

That’s a lot of locos Dave’s got there. Great to watch.

A big thanks to Lawrence for sharing his HO scale medieval figures.

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you get started on your layout, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

PPS More HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.

Bill’s been in touch with his Lionel model railroad:

“Al: I have been enjoying your daily emails for a number of years.

Many of your contributors have much better train layouts and more realistic landscapes than I do and they certainly have nothing to learn from me. Nevertheless I think that there are a group of model train enthusiasts who might benefit from my story.

In 1950 when I was 11 years old I received a much sought after Lionel 027 starter train set. Our family had no space for a permanent layout so I assembled and disassembled it many times. After I was married I sometimes set up a layout around the Christmas tree to entertain our children, but I took it down after the Holidays.

When my grandchildren were young I set up the train set at Christmas again. The second Christmas with grandchildren I put the layout on a couple of 4×8 sheets of plywood supported by saw horses in a spare room in the basement and added some rudimentary scenery.

For Christmas in 2007 my children (who always find it difficult to buy me presents) recognized my interest and bought me a new Lionel model railroad, the Polar Express set with Fastrack. For a while I had a mixed layout with part tubular track and part Fastrack. But the trains ran a lot better on the Fastrack and over time I replaced all of the tubular track.

The layout expanded until it filled the 15 x 17 foot basement room. I sometimes regret not taking the opportunity to switch to HO gauge so that I would have room for more train equipment.

Above is a SCARM diagram of my current Fastrack layout. I run two LionChief trains and occasionally a third conventional Lionel train. The layout is not meant to represent any particular time or place. The scenery however is typical of the sandstone cliffs in the Yellowstone Valley, where I live.

Although it is not clear from the diagram there are three tunnels, indicated with blue track, and the bottom left section is a level above the rest. The tunnel on the right is actually in a closet. (The closet door is open in Figure 02.)

I have wired the sidings in the closet with Azatrax’s D2X Exhibit controller with infrared sensors so that without human input two trains can run alternately in opposite directions around the upper loop.

Most of the scenery is carved from 2 inch sheets of insulating foam. The sheets of foam are supported by a simple framework as shown in Figure 05. No attempt has been made to conceal the line between layers of foam in many places, as it is meant to represent the layers of sediment in the sandstone cliffs. I found the best tool to carve the foam is a drywall saw, with a Shop-Vac handy to control the mess. (See the saw in Figure 06, next to the waterfall). The carved foam is painted and sprinkled with Woodland Scenics turf.

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On the mountain side, the left side of the track diagram, the trees are mostly pine. They were meant to be table decorations. I purchased them in an after Christmas sale at Hobby Lobby. The deciduous trees are home-made … twigs from sage brush with bits of foam glued on (also from Woodland Scenics).

A few of the structures are Plasticville kits but most are scratch-built from 3/16 inch foam poster board covered with printouts from Evans Model Builder computer software. Most of the structures are lighted. I cut up strings of battery powered Christmas lights and use 3 AA batteries to power the lights. The asphalt roadway is cut from asphalt shingles left over from my recently repaired house roof.

In order to provide more track power than the Lionel CW80 transformers I acquired with my LionChief train sets, I recently purchased an MTH Z1000 transformer from a local hobby shop. When I was in the hobby shop the other day I mentioned that the Z1000 was working fine. The salesman said “Lionel model railroads make you feel like a kid again, don’t they?” I think it was a rhetorical question, but I answered, ‘Yes!’

Bill”

A huge thank you to Bill! It’s great to see a Lionel model railroad.

I hope you enjoyed this post as much as I did. Not only is it a wonderful layout, the narrative behind it makes this hobby what it is.

That’s all this time folks. Please do leave a comment below, and keep ’em coming.

I leave you with this thought – if today is the day you stop dreaming and start doing, the Beginner’s Guide is here

Best

Al