I have been reading your site for some time now and have learned a lot. about a year age I dug out all my old Lionel trains. Back in the late 40 and early 50 my Mom and Dad started a 027 Lionel set.
Every year at Christmas time they would get another piece. I packed everything away years ago. I am 69 now and retired.
I got everything out and started refurbishing it all. well now I can start the layout. I have been going to swap meets and picking up all kinds of parts. you can get a lot with a little money if you don’t mind fixing it up.
All the tips I have been reading about on your site I put to work. I took a 2′ X 2′ X1″ form and starting to play
around with it. my goal was not to spend any money. Well I have about $10.00 in it. It is all sawdust branches
and anything else I could find. i am happy with the way it turned out and looking forward to starting my 6′ X 9′
layout. I am working in 027/0 scale.
Steve from Toms River NJ US”
A wonderful example of how space and money doesn’t have to stop you enjoying a layout. Big thanks to Steve!
This one I call my “No-Excuses layout” — I have tentatively named it “Terrapin Sidings”
The scale will be On30 and the baseboard is 12″ by 41″
It should fit on an Ironing Board… One of the inspirations is a popular British layout called “Ingleton Sidings”
Why is it “No-Excuses”? So far I have less than $10.00 in the baseboard… I expect the total to be less than $20.00 when all is said and done. The track is all brand new Peco and Atlas… So far less than $55.00
The baseboard is Foamcore board… a thin foam sheet that is backed on both sides with heavy paper.
It is easily cut with a straight-edge and a single edge razor blade. The whole thing is clued together with PVA (White Glue). This pretty much wipes out all potential excuses about why one cannot build a layout to run their trains on….
A little more progress..
The “Sleeper Thief” has been in action… The goal being to offer a kind of industrial tramway look to it.
I thought of sending the picture with this caption “The Notorious Sleeper Thief, Sir Charles Bullhead, has struck at Terrapin Yard”.
Also, here are a couple of photos concerning the wiring… Simplicity plus with the power soldered to the rail joiners and running through a pair of holes poked in the baseboard with a coat hanger.
Here are a few more photos on how I operate my turnouts (switches).
I use piano wire with a small hook at each end. I run the wire through a small channel cut in the baseboard and I cover the channel with tape.
Most of the track has now been pinned to the baseboard now.
Sincerely,
John”
“Here are some things that I use:
1) Grape Myrtle ends after the blossoms die make great trees. I then add lichen painted different shades of green.
2) Get dried blocks of clay and crumble for use as real dirt.
3) I collect different sizes of saw dust and can use food coloring to make grass or other items
4) From Home Depot I got returned cans of Venetian Plaster to use to make and cover hills and stone walls make from chicken wire and newspapers with wall paper paste.
5) Go to the fabric store and look at felt to use for grass, gray for around track and brown for dirt.
6) I save any wire I get my hands on (telco, low voltage, old lamp cord, etc.)
7) I look for moss and when dried paint different color green or brown as needed.
Larry”
Thanks to John and Larry! Please do keep ’em coming.
“Welcome everyone. After following Alastair Lee for about two years now I am at the point where I thought that I wanted to add some pictures of my own as I can always benefit from comments and feedback.
Having always had an interest in the American west I wanted to convey a time when steam was starting to replace the old wagons heading west. I entitle the layout Westward Ho! simply because I have not really thought of a more creative name.
Although much of the history comes before, our story begins in the town of hole in the wall noted in the rough cut tunnels that blasted through the rocks in order to allow for the train to come into the town founded around a watering hole that protrudes from a rock. It was at this very hole where the Native Apache Indians used to stop and drink. It is near this watering hole where our settlers first came out of the parched desert to the rock from whence the water flows, or the watering rock as the Indians and the early pioneers referred to the land until the coming of the steam engine.
Just as the Native Americans were pushed west, so too do we find the early pioneers wanting to escape the industrialization era. And so we see them loading up their wagons and moving to . . . where we do not know just where they are moving to but is is anyplace better than hole in the wall where cattle barrens and outlaws have come brought there by the water and the greed of gold believed to be found in the nearby hills and barren wasteland.
Ken”
I thought Ken’s layout had bags of character – and a nice narrative too.
Please do keep ’em coming. And if you haven’t had a look at the ebay cheat sheet for a while, now’s the time to too. Have a look at what’s there.
