Beginner here,

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
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Hi guys, I just subscribed to MRR mag about 5 months ago, and decided to go online as I am dying to get into the hobby. However I really don’t know where to start and need some help from you guys.

I need some ideas for a 6x8 foot (or smaller) N scale layout, featuring Canadian National RR, however the design does not need to be very prototypical, and rather realistic, but not based on anything real. I am 13 years old and am also looking for ideas on saving money on this hobby, as it is expensive and my budget is extremely limited. Also does anyone have any ideas on how much making a 6x8 foot-ish N scale layout costs?

Thanks, and sorry for all the silly questions.

-K.T

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as far as costs go you kinda budget as you go. You buy some lumber here, or buy a car there, scrounge around for this, money is not always the issue, it depends how industrious you are.

MR or RMC had in their older mags the Dollar Car project, they had an article how to make a featured car using whatever, parts here or there, cardstock, wood pieces,…

Lumber, 2 4x8 pieces with one but in half might go around 20-40 bucks. Do you think you will have a solid table like 6x8? or the middle cut out for access/operation?

Cars and equipment, a good start point is the hobbyshop first, but hobby trade shows like swap meets often have good bargains.

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A good place to start is my Beginner’s Guide to Layout Design. You can click to it from my signature.

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Hey,

I’m 14 and well i know how you feel about money saving, and the best place to start is to buy A locomotive some rolling stock, and some track. May be you should start with a 4x8 layout and add on later, Buy a oval of track, a power pack, and tell us what you would want in a railroad and maybe i can give some ideas.

Tjsingle

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Hi There and Welcome to the hobby.

While I mainly work in HO here is what I learned helping my brother work on his N scale layout.

It is a good Idea if you don’t already have a locomotive, to go out and purchase a quality Train Set in the road name of your choice. I am not as familiar with N scale train sets as I am in HO but I understand that Kato and Micro-Trains make some high quality numbers. This will give you a base to start from, A locomotive, a small train of cars to pull, a loop of track and a power pack.

It is my personal opinion that if you can get conventional sectional track that that is a better route to go than with the modular road bed “Click Track”. With conventional Sectional Track you can easily transition into Flex Track just simply by connecting the flex track to the prevous section of sectional track. with modular road bed “Click Track” transitioning to flex track has to be done with a special adaptor piece that will transition from “Click Track” to conventional track or the Click track must be taken back up and redon with flex track.

You say you are looking for plans for a space of 6X8 feet. You should be thankful you have that much room. That is the equivilant of working in a 12 X16 foot Space in HO. A useful thing you might do is check out track plans for HO scale and reduce them by 50% to get an idea of how they would work as an N scale layout.

As for saving money, a few reccomondations I can make is buying well maintained second hand equipment. On this same note I would suggest learning how to repair, rework, and repaint equipment and then you will be able to turn what might otherwise be junk heading for the landfill into otherwise quite servicable model railroad equipment and having saved a signifigant amount over purchasing something similar at new prices.

I would not skimp on the quality of materials though as a means of saving money. Buy good quality track (Atlas, Micro Engineering, Shinohara are my top p

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Well I’m 14, so I kinda get what your feeling with money. One thing I’d say is get a job. Like lawn mowing jobs. It doesn’t have to be much, if you can make 20-30 bucks evey 2 weeks you’d be set. But you may need to wait a little bit to bulk up on cash.

Do you have an Idea for Eras? If you do the later CN in the 2000s you’d have alot of color, WC, GTW, DM&IR, BLE (Even though there locomotives didn’t move from there orginal location), IC, ect.

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[tup]

I applaud you WC…that’s positive outlook from a kid! So many these days want everthing handed to them.

Rotor

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Thanks Rotor. Lawn mowing isn’t half bad either, and after a little bit of saving up over a month or two you can have a good chunk of money depending on how much you get paid.

BTW: Another tip you may know already is, never impluse buy. It will bite you in the butt later on. You will also be stuck with something you don’t want. So first think about what you are buying.

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Could be anywhere from $20-$100+ per square foot. Too many variables for a more exact guess-tamate.

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First of all, welcome to the World’s Greatest Hobby!

Being in it for over 35 years, I learned a lot of it the hard way, as I’m sure many fellow modellers here did.

It’s been already said, but I want to re-emphasize - it’s important! There are quite a few ways to cut corners on layout building. Here’s one I’ve used; if there is any home building going on in your area, see if the contractor (or foreman, whatever) is willing to part with remnant wood pieces. They will throw them out anyway, and will usually give them to you. Also, if you live in the middle or eastern US, Pink or Blue styrofoam is used alot for insulation. It makes great terrain, is easy to work with, and doesn’t make your layout heavier than it needs to be.

PLEASE DON’T skimp on locomotives!!! Especially in N scale. The difference in performance between good and junk is vast. If you can’t afford it yet, like the bright 14 year old said, save up for it - you will certainly thank yourself later! Atlas and Life-Like/Walthers Proto Series locomotives are relatively in-expensive, and are reliable, smooth runners.

Don’t skimp on track either. Will also bite you hard with poor electrical connection and derailments. Atlas track is not too expensive, and performs satisfatorily (in my and my friend’s experiences). If you want to use a type of track that has ballast moulded in, you can’t go wrong with Kato Unitrack. It’s pricey, but performs well.

As I remember my start, a kid mowing lawns, I waited untill I could buy quality. The times I got impatient because I wanted to just get something running fast - well, those things have been a part of the local landfill for years!

Welcome, and you have friends here!

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Wow, thanks guys! I did not expect this much feedback, its great. I have read all of your posts, and I would like to thank you all very much!

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I know where you guys are coming from, as I started to get interested in “model trains” at 14, myself–more than 50 years ago. I join the others in welcoming you young guys to the hobby! We’ve been worried for years where the newcomers would come from, since railroads are way down the list, with so many other, more glamorous (in some opinions!) pastimes overshadowing ours. I got to thinking realism because my folks gave me an American Flyer (2-rail S gauge) train set for Christmas, back in Ancient Times (1954). The dollar went a whole lot farther in those days and I got one whole buck a week for an allowance, which included mowing our lawn and shoveling in the winter. This was okay for the first couple of years, when I was learning so much about the hobby. I was lucky to have an older brother who’d been bitten by the HO Model Railroading Bug while in the Air Force, during the Korean War. If you don’t have somebody to help you with technical questions, I’m sure all of us on the Forum will help out in any way we can. (At 16, I got a job as a bicycle messenger for Western Union, put most of my wages in the bank but kept $7 for myself. I had to save for several weeks to make any substantial purchases–and that helped my parents to see that I was really “into” model railroading!)

Mowing lawns for neighbors is a good money-maker and if you’re

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Where to start? Trackwork, you have to have track to run your trains on. The simpliest arrangement is plain old carpet running. Reduces the carpentry to zero. The drawbacks to carpet running (like hungry vacuum cleaners) will become clear to you shortly. The next step up is a train table. One sheet of plywood raised up on sawhorses, or a pair of two drawer file cabinets, or cinder blocks, or an old kitchen table, or legs. Sheet goods (plywood, MDF, homosote) come mostly 4 by 8 foot hence the popularity of that size. Was it me, I’d get a 4*8 up and running first, and then if space, energy and money permits, expand it.

The best table top is a layer of homosote (a gray soft insulating material made from chopped up paper) backed up with a piece of 1/2" plywood. The homosote takes track nails well and deadens the sound of running trains. The plywood backing keeps the homosote from sagging over time. It is possible to use just 3/4" plywood, no homosote, but you will have to drill it to get the track nails to go in. Or you can omit the nails and stick the track down with latex caulking compound.

Or, try a piece of insulating foam. It comes in blue, two inches thick, and is strong enough to hold up a train layout. You want the blue builder’s foamboard which is smooth and uniform in texture. The white crumbly foam is not good. Benefits of foam are light weight, you can shape it into terrain with a steak knife, and it deadens sound. Drawbacks, it’s soft and the edges will crumple under handling, and it doesn’t take fasteners at all, track and everything needs to be glued to it.

You can put road bed, either store bought cork, or hand cut foam board under your track. The purpose of the roadbed is largely cosmetic, it simulates the raised bed of crushed stone the prototype track is laid upon. A coat of grass colo

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Buy N scale trainsets such as the ones you find at Wal-mart, target, or a hobby shop for the track and you can also use the engines and rolling stock. as far as I am conserned, it is a waste of money to buy indivdual items