OK, after a year racking up a nice credit card debt, I have more locos and trains that even my new 8X5 layout in N scale have problem handling by a long shot. So the question is where and how do you normally put your unused equipment? I don’t have a stage yard but do have a automotive and internmodal yard but even that stores only about half of my double-stack and auto-racks. I thought of putting the locos back into their original box and put them nicely on a shelf under the layout but a lot of them have separelty installed details such as sunshades and would get crushed if lay on their side. I have solve the rolling stock problem with those train storage boxes but again, a lot of the tall equipment have problems.
Just wondeing what people do and if ayone have a smart train inventory solution.
I haven’t had too many problems with the details coming off my Atlas locomotives, when I store them in the Atlas boxes.
I keep all my rolling stock in thier original boxes, and keep the box in plastic flip-top crates:
Nick
I use MiTrains and like it very much. It lets you store photos of your items and for rolling stock, you can print out very nice car cards that are completely compatible with the MicroMark car card routing system. Their waybill software is pretty cool, too. It includes a complete industry database with thousands of actual industries in the US that ship by rail.
Hi, thanks for that but where and how do you store your stuff though? I know the best way is to have endless storage/staging tracks but I have neither…so…hmmm…[%-)]
I store my equipment one of three places:
On the layout, in the original boxes, or on shelves in cabinets.
For the original boxes, I bought a large mail-sorter shelving unit from work when they were having an auction, and it’s perfect for rolling stock kit boxes. It looks similar to what you can buy here.
Another option is shoe storage units like this one at Target. You can get it and just rotate it 90 degrees … then the kit boxes should fit into it nicely. You should also be able to stack these units to get an entire wall of kit storage if you like.
I also just bought some ordinary cabinets (with doors) like this and store off-layout equipment there.
I had a friend build a custom size cabnet for under the layout then lined the drawers with foam for car and loco storage
There are 11 cardboard boxes stacked neatly. Near those boxes is a hard cover book with pages with lines. In those pages listed by box, roadname, road number, stock number and brand are all of the stuff.
Everything else has been sold off.
And no, we dont carry credit card debt anymore, we might buy a .50 cent candy bar once every 6 months or so to keep the account showing activity and open. Once in a while I will get out the card for internet purchases, but only if I can transfer the payoff the same day.
I have tried software in the past but nothing beats a good notebook with written data sorted just so.
I use those Sterlite flip top boxes and the 4 draw thin draw units Walmart sells they work great.