After reading some interesting stuff on benchwork construction and seeing how heated it can get at times It got me curious as to how people on the forum have done theirs. So if you are interested please ad your [2c].
What construction method did you use to construct your benchwork???
L Girder
Box Type With Plywood
Box Type With foam
Plywood sheet.
A door
A Dogs Breakfast ( but got the job done)
Something else ( please specify )
As for me it’s box type with foam with a smattering of dogs breakfast.[:D]
I use 1" x4" for the benchwork and 2"x4" for the legs with 1’x4" for cross bracing and for risers. I use 1/2" plywood with 1/2" homasote and cork roadbed. I like the idea of spline and homasote but ripping the plywood into strips is something that I am not able to do. Friend of mine Ed Keith, who is a Master Model Railroader gave several clinics at NMRA club meetings in Asheville years ago about spline. Howard Zane is a big fan and uses this technique for the Piermont Division. Wish I had the capability! It would save a lot of material.
Box with 1x4 side members and 1x3 crossmembers. 1/4" ply on that plus 2 layers of 2" foam on top.
Legs are a 1x2 and 1x3 made into an L girder, with a short piece of 2x2 at the bottom in which I install an adjustable padded foot.
Benchwork is made in nominal 2x4 sections, and bolt together. Legs bolt on. Leg braces are 1x2, also bolted. It all comes apart and is easy to move (I can leave it in 2x8 peices and easily get it up tot he third floor). Reason for the 2x4 sections instead of 2x8 is that a) 8’ piece of wood don;t fit in my car and b) until recently when I said the heck with it and bought a pwoer saw I was cutting it all by hand. Reason for the L-girder legs is that I can’t find straight 2x2’s anywhere around here, and 2x3’s are way too heavy
I got the power saw because the other side will need lots of cutting - it’s goign to be 1 x 4 foot sections instead of 2x4, plus I will need some odd size pieces to fill things out as the room is not an even multiple of 4 or even 2 feet in either dimension. And the section across the door that will have a liftout is not goign to be at right angles to any of the other benchwork. So no more hand miter box, I have a power miter saw, just a small one but it’s plenty to cut 1x4 pine lumber.
Far more time is spent hand-wringing over benchwork than it would take to just build it.
Most successful mid-size or larger layouts use a variety of techniques depending on the situation.
It’s unfortunate that many layouts are built with a solid monolithic rectangular flat top that limits scenic opportunities and wastes material because the builders are unduly intimidated by alternative methods that are actually very easy in practice.
As Linn Westcott said in reference to benchwork, “Build bridges, not tables.”
Open grid (18"x72" nominal grids) with cookie cutter plywood/Homasote on nominal 12" risers above the grids, L girder on the end of the peninsula “blob”.
My N-Ovation and Northwest layout is a box frame with a plywood top. On the patio layout, I opted for a box frame with foam top for the ease of lifting and folding the layout up for storage.
Specifically, steel stud material and steel angle irons, erected C-acts like L girder fashion, with (nominal) heavy-gauge 2 x 4 main girders, lighter 2 x 4 main joists, 2x3 joists and upper framing, odd cut-offs for risers. I also use steel stud material rain gutter style for cassettes, and to carry tangent track in the netherworld of hidden thoroughfares underlying the visible surface.
On top of the steel risers is a subgrade layer of cookie-cut plywood, on top of which is a layer of thin foam roadbed, a cardstock track template and either flex track or the wooden ties on which I erect my hand-laid specialwork.
My most complex section, a 5’ x 12’ (maximum dimensions) ‘blob’ peninsula, has track running through it on two levels, with three more to be added. Any resemblance to the Himalayas ride at Disney World (before they put the skin on) is purely coincidental.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - on steel benchwork)
I use 1"x4" open-grid (box type) with 2" Pink Corning foam. However, for stability, my cross-bracing is at 12" intervals. It’s lightweight but very sturdy, especially considering my VERY limited carpentry skills.[:P]
Since most all of my benchwork was put up in the early to mid 1980’s, it is L girder, 1/2 plywood with 1/2 homasote, and homabed roadbed. About 3/4 of the e homabed is the original which was made many years ago in New York before the guy retired and the California guy bought it.
Used the “L” girder method, but with 1 1/2" boards (to make it lighter…and I had a bunch of it in the garage), then 3/8ths plywood and 1" styrofoam on top. So dog’s breakfast, maybe? It works, though.
My 11x15 two level is basically about 54 2x2 legs with 1x2 bracing below the “top”, and 1x4 bracing & fascia at the top. The track base is 1/2 inch 4 ply plywood with cork roadbed. Cookie cutter carpentry was used to go from the main to lower level. All that being said, I guess you could call it a “box” type.