I hope I’m not the Lone Ranger in this, so I guess that’s why I’m writing this post. In my previous HO 11x15 layout (1993-2008), I had a Walthers 15 " truss bridge that fit perfectly and looked pretty good with mild weathering, guard rails, and rockwork end supports. It was one of the layout’s “eyecatchers”.
Well, the layout got taken down, and a new one is under construction. While I have planned out the need for a couple of girder bridges and a small truss bridge, the “big one” just has no place to go.
This situation bothered me for awhile, until I realized that I had a Cornerstone grain elevator all built up and weathered that would fit on the new layout. I bought this when they came out - but never could find the right place on the old layout that “worked”. Ha, I guess it all evens out.
I built a old barn craftsman kit that I have no place for. It turned out to be a great project and the end result was way more then I expected. I really need to find some place for it, maybe when I start my second level it will finally have a home.
If you only have a bridge and one other structure that have no place on the layout, then you sir are an amateur, and almost not worthy of the title “Model Railroader”.
It is a requirement that one has several structures, built and unbuilt, that are surplus to need. Likewise, there should not be physical room on the layout to place all the locomotives and rolling stock, let alone actually operate it all!
To be a true Model Railroader, when your friends kids start looking under your bench, they think it is like Christmas opening boxes finding items the owner forgot he had.
The swing bridge was a gift kit that I enjoyed putting together, but at the time my layout did not boast even a harbor to put it on. I built the harbor with the swing bridge just beyond Waterfront Willy’s, (at the entrance to the harbor). To justify the swing bridge, I built a huge mountain with a mine, and electrical Skate&Ski Resort at the top, and six tracks under the mountain (with access portals for repairs) At present, I am installing two Hulett Unloaders on the dock of the harbor, with 5 tracks servicing the unloaders and the blast furnace and rolling mill behind. Of course, I was one of the lucky ones with plenty of layout room to spare. My next job is to animate the two Hulett Unloaders with mechanical levers. Pictures and “How-To” advice will appear soon. This photo shows the cardboard footprints of the two Hulett unloaders, with the blast furnace and rolling mill behind.
Thats a given as one poster mentioned, and thats why you build extensions on to the bench work.
I built the Walthers back-shop after reading the directions before building it I decided to add another kit to it making it 6 bays. Took my time weathering it, detailing it and adding all the interior details such as over head cranes, with real chains tools work benches workers,interior & exterior lighting, parts you name it I like to put all my structures on either Masonite or homasote bases with a thin piece of plywood underneath for support so I can just add a module so to speak. Well guess what, when I walked it from the shop to the layout to temporarily plant it so I could layout where the track was going to go it wouldn’t fit. So I decided to add a small section behind the roundhouse but now wouldn’t a six bay back shop use a transfer table Hum?
I have a similar situation. My layout is set in the Oklahoma wheatbelt in 1989 and there are 13 grain elevators of varying sizes on the railroad. Some are Walthers kits expanded, others are scratchbuilt.
I wanted to do a new elevator with some new ideas, no place, so I built the elevator with a footprint that would fit exactly where an existing elevator is located. Now I can interchange them. Think I will do the same with some of the others.
I beg to differ… I have several (20 plus) structure kits that were bought for the old and new layouts that have never been built. Last November the number was 36, but 15 of them were sold on Ebay as they just wouldn’t fit into the new layout plans.
I guess having only one major structure that is built - with no place to go - probably does put me in the minority of what you call Real Model Railroaders! But you know, having been playing with trains only since 1956, I guess I am a “newbie” to some folks, but somehow I don’t think so…
Yes , I have a Draw Bridge , an engine terminal 3 train stations and several other buildings that don’t fit my current layout . I keep hope alive that some day I will have the room !!!
June 1962 or 1963 (my memory ain’t what it used to be) Model Railroader featured a small layout where the author deliberately changed out his structures and some scenery on a regular basis. He rotated his excess structures the same way some of us rotate excess cars on and off the layout. Iain Rice advocated a similar idea with identical jig saw puzzle pieces of layout to be changed out at the owner’s whim in his Kalmbach Book on small and friendly layouts. Changing structures and key scenic elements like signs and vehicles also allows you to change the era of the layout within reason.
Another idea is to build some Free-mo modules to display and use the structures. The module(s) could be as simple as a straight, run-through to modeling a small town. The modules could be stored on shelves as dioramas while waiting for the next setup.
I have tried to limit myself to purchasing only structure kits that would have a logical place on the layout. But we all know how that goes. Ideas and plans change. No, you are not the Lone Ranger. I seriously doubt that there is one of us who doesn’t have a locomotive or car or two that no longer fit the layout.
I was a big fan of Art Curren’s kitbashing articles, and so had accumulated dozens of Hotel Belvederes, Mt Vernon Industries, and the Burlington Mills (in its myriad incarnations), so many I condensed them into like parts and placed in drawers. I just finished the Hulett Unloader, and am working on the Blast Furnace and a double-size Coke Oven…I have no idea where they are going to go. Someone stop me please! [;)] (Nah, structures are my favorite part of model railroading.)
I’m in the process of doing up a feedmill/elevator that’ll never fit my layout. It is going to be a somewhat compressed version of one that a friend of mine and I came across in Hensell ON. It’ll be on its own diorama----as it is a little on the wide side–as in blocks
Just a glimpse—there is at least 5 of these along the GEXRR ROW
Yep, have a lemon packing shed that measures 4x8 feet, I built it to explore various products and assembly techniques, it is based upon a existing though now much reduced in square footage prototype, obviously “select compression” need not apply in this case. It will be but one large structure required for my future layout.
Similar to what Pastorbob has done, I have prepared several footprints where I can rotate different structures, just as I rotate rolling stock from time to time. For example, I have a steel fabricating company that fits on the same footprint as a chemical warehouse. My Walthers Medusa Cement storage disappears and a large scrap yard takes its place. It adds interest to the way the layout looks and makes operations more interesting, as well.
Two years ago I built a big diorama. it was 18" x 24". I decided to build Fine Scale Minatures Wilfred J. Brambell on it because I had a great place for it. Well after 5 weeks of building and weathering the place for it was rebuilt into a service yard for steam engines. Not knowing what to do with it my wife said put it on Ebay. I did and in 3 days sold it for $2615.90. Since that I build a few great kits a year and sell them on Ebay. People will pay 1000’s for a great kit, it’s amazing, LOL. But not having a place for that first kit got me into Ebay selling.
I feel for you, my friend. [:P] I have an entire town packed away carefully in a box just waiting for me to get my act together and build an extension on my MR to locate it.
Ah yes, you can say that I’m REALLY Planning Ahead, LOL! [:-^]
That’s what they made urban areas and cities for. lot’s of density. Actually have whole bunches of buildings that will never fit in or have a place for (unless I more into a much bigger house or build a second layer). Good thing there is an ebay or hoyardsale (not so good for structures).
