Model railroad layouts plans

Ray’s been in touch with a great way to make HO scale circus tents:

“Hi Al,

I really enjoy getting your emails and I always get some great ideas from the posts.

I am adding a circus/amusement park to my layout and I have not been able to find a circus tent.

So I decided to try to make one from scratch using different size tooth pics, styrofoam, plaster cloth, paint and other scraps I had laying around.

Here are a few pictures of my results.

Best,

Ray”

A big thanks to Ray – an interesting take on HO scale circus tents.

“Greetings Al,

I have been following your blog for some time now and find it very interesting and informative.

About 30 years ago when I had small children, I bought a HO train set for my son who was 5 or so at the time.

It evolved over time to a small flat lay out with 2 main lines and switching. Never got any further because of lack of space and kids grow up.

We moved 1 year ago so the lay out was completely dismantled. I have twin grandsons who are 9 years old and love to watch model trains run. So I got to thinking, why not resurrect the train that I have and expand it. I am 1 year away from retirement and have more time to fool with this kind of stuff.

Anyway, I must quit rattling on about the past and get to present day. I am building a larger table for the new lay out (144 inches longX61 inches wide at one end and 81 inches at the other end.

I have attached some pictures if you are interested.

The first is of the main frame, the second shows the casters on the legs as this lay out must be moved to work on it.

The last three show the frame and girders finished. I call this “The Storage Area Lay out” for lack of a better name.”

Best regards,

Ken”

“This is my first post, I have been interested in architecture and architectural models ever since a bought my first Alan Downes book, so I have attached some photos of my efforts. I use cardboard scrounged/recovered from all sorts of places, for example, proper brand name cereal packets which use good quality card boxes, I also use foam board, which is lightweight but strong.

Peter”

We’ve had quite a flurry of scratch builds recently – it’s wonderful to see the different ways folk make their buildings.

I thought I’d show Ken’s bench because for me that’s the first step in getting started, and often the biggest step too. Over the years I’ve noticed the posts all have a common theme, once you have a space of your own, you are up and running.

A big thanks to Ken and to Ray for showing us his take on HO scale circus tents.

That’s all this time folks.

Please do keep ’em coming. And don’t forget the Beginner’s Guide if you want to get off the starting blocks.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

Mike has been in touch with his N scale oval layout:

“Hi Al,

Just completed a small N-Scale project over the holidays. 2X4 platform, a simple oval, paper houses, foam mountains. It’s my first N-Scale so nothing fancy just getting my feet wet on this one.

Best,

Mike”

And Cameron’s still beavering away (here’s his last post):

“Dear Al,

Yet another instalment.

With the three main building out of the way I moved onto the other minor structures. It may seem counter intuitive to build all the buildings and structures ahead of the scenery but on a small layout I find it helpful.

This way I can experiment with subtle changes to the locations of the structures before they are fixed in place. Even on a layout like this, where I am essentially copying a real location, there is still a bit of artistic licence.

The additional structures include a stock pen, power pole, loading guage, fences and trees. The stock pen is plastic but the other elements are largely brass and metal.

I found with my last layout is that scenic items like, trees and posts tend to get knocked around a bit as you are using the layout. By soldering these out of metal I can make sure they robust enough to handle my children’s enthusiasm.

The trees are made using wire from electrical cable twisted to form the truck and branches. I then take a small length of hemp or brown string and chop it up into small fibres only 3-4mm long. I brush a bit of white glue onto the very ends of the branches and scatter the fibres on top.

The visible parts of the truck are then coated with a mixture of plaster and white glue to hide the twisted wire. This assemblage is then sprayed with some grey/brown paint. Once dry I spray the tree with some contact cement (Quick Grip is the product in Australia) and sprinkle on some fine Woodland Scenics ground turf.

You can repeat the last process until you get the desired effect. Believe it or not it is easier than it sounds and best of all is a very cheap alternative to ready made trees.

The wire boundary fence is made from square brass stock with thin wire soldered onto the uprights.

Cameron”

Fantastic stuff from Cameron and Mike. Of course, I’m biased, but I loved seeing the printable buildings in Mike’s layout.

If you’d like to share any tips or pics (or whatever) please just hit reply to any of my mails. If you’re attaching pics, probably best not to send more than 3 pics per mail, otherwise they get lost in cyberspace. But send as many mails as you like to get them over…

A big thanks to Cameron and to Mike for sharing his N scale oval layout.

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you stop dreaming and start doing, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

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

Need buildings for your layout? Have a look at the Silly Discount bundle.

Cameron’s been in touch again, showing us how to build ho scale buildings from scratch.

If you missed his last post, it’s here.

“The prototype that I chose to model (St Kew Highway) had three buildings. A small signal box, a goods shed and a private owners store shed. This is one of the great things with such a small layout, there is not a lot of buildings to make.

What became more of a challenge for me was that none of the buildings on my prototype were available as plastic kits. I decided to use this as an opportunity to learn how to scratch build.

The first one I started with was the goods shed. Fortunately for me the original architectural drawings of this building were available on the web. I used these along with black and white photos of the original shed to piece together the structure.

The model is made using Wills plastic sheets along with Evergreen styrene sections and plain styrene sheet. It was very rewarding working up a building from scratch in this way.

Perhaps the greatest challenge with this approach is painting. All recorded images of the buildings were in black and white. To solve this I collected more recent colour images of buildings in the same part of Cornwall to replicate the colour of the stone.

For the elements of the building that would have been painted originally I sourced a copy of the Southern Railways painting specification from the 1930,s which provided a comprehensive specification for the paint colours and locations.

I’ll give more detail on the other buildings in the next post.

Cheers

Cameron”

---

And Cameron’s post encouraged John to send this in too:

“I am nearly complete with another layout and should be sending you pictures shortly.

It is another HO scale Inglenook designed for American pattern equipment. I hope my little layouts can inspire others who fear that they do not have time, space, or talent to build something they can enjoy. One of these days I hope to be able to order some of the very nice models so that I can send you something different from my usual fare.

In the meantime; here are some pictures of a recent project in O scale… It is a little freight house made almost entirely from cardboard salvaged from soda can boxes and cereal boxes…

Sincerely,

John”

A big thanks to Cameron for showing us how to build ho scale buildings from scratch. And to John – can’t wait to see the updates.

Don’t forget there’s lots of scenery you can make from the printable buildings – here’s a quick video of a scene John put together:

Quite a few of you asking about bus wires in the last post, and as always, there’s been lots of replies posted. I do love reading through the all the comments, questions and answers, so please do keep ’em coming.

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.