I have been stationed in Iraq for almost six months now and part of what I do to keep myself occupied when not on missions etc is to try and design a HO scale layout that will take advantage of the space I have in my home. I have come up with many so far but none that give me that warm and fuzzy. My layout room is a 12’ X 29’, walk in room. the door is centered at the entrance of one of the 12’ walls, which leaves me approximately 53" of space on either side of the door. The two 29’ walls are 56" from the floor to the point where the walls angles in toward the ceiling (much like the shape of a barn).
I am very new two layout building / planning but, have built one small layout in the past which only consisted of the ole 4 X 8 sheet of plywood. I have read many books on the subject of design/layout construction and have learned a lot as a result but, I just can’t seem to find what I am looking for.
I want to model coal operations in HO scale in the late 60’s to early 70’s era. I have studied “The Coal Fork Extension” by Tony Koester and love what he has done but, would like to add a yard to his plan and staging which I could develope in an adjacent room. I would some how like to expand on his work to fill my entire room.
I have pretty much settled on an around the room type layout with a peninsula in order to have a longer main line run. I have also been experimenting with xtrkcad and have come up with a bench work arrangement that I really like. At its tightest point my isle space shrinks down to a bit over 24". The peninsula is 5’6" wide. My minimum track radius would be 30".
I would like to incorporate a decent sized yard with diesel loco maintenance and car repair facilities with realistic operations for the entire layout.
I’d go a couple of ways if I were you. Try and get some other tracks plans to study and get a feel for what the designers were doing. Since you have xtrkcad do a SAVE AS and delete parts you aren’t in love with and try again. I don’t think you are in any rush.
I have a similar space, 12x23 with a small alcove and the door is in the middle of the 12 ft wall.
If you want the layout on the walls, your basic footprint breaks down to about 3 variations.
Around the wall with no peninsula, benchwork can be up to 3 ft deep.
Around the wall with a narrow peninsula, that means that the bench along the walls will be about 2 ft deep and the peninsula will be narrow 1-2 ft wide.
Around the walls with a wide peninsula, that means the bench along the walls can only be about 12-18" deep and the peninsula will also be about 36" wide (an 18" deep scene on each side). The peninsula will have “blob” on the end of it that will be about 5 feet wide (enough for a 27" radius curve).
A critical decision is whether you want to cross the doorway, if you do you will need a duck under or lift out section.
If you do not want a duck under or lift out, then you have to decide whether you want continuous running capability or want to run point to point. If you want continuous running then you will need “blobs” for the loops. There are a several options.
You can put one blob next to the door and the other blob on the end of the peninsula.
You can put one blob next to the door and the other in the diagonally opposite corner.
You can go with the longest run and put one blob on either side of the door (probably have to be a smaller radius) and then have the blob on the end of the peninsula (which will require a shorter peninsula.
You can put a connection at the base of the peninsula forming a dogbone on the peninsula, that is only used for break in and open houses (what I did).
As for the track plan there are many options. I will boil them down to three general ones.
I’d recommend getting a copy of John Armstrong’s “Track Planning for Realistic Operation.” It’s an older book, but still in print and still relevant today. It covers a lot of things about prototype track plans, and explains how the same things may be done in a scaled-back fashion for our smaller models.
Thanks for your service and for wearing the uniform! I don’t know how you find the time to do model railroad planning but you came to the right place. There is a wealth of experience here. God bless you and your fellow soldiers.
I know I have sang this guys praises a few times here but go check out his website I think maybe you’ll get a little inspiration. Cliff Powers has his railroad in a free standing building which is 14x32 he has three levels of operation a heck of a lot of main line running for such a small space. Your space is just a tad smaller then his so maybe some adjustments would be required but I think the one thing that is key as much main line running as you can possibly squeeze in and still keep it looking clean. I opted for wide isles in th emain area and put things where I thought they should go at the time but now realize I could have gotten a lot more mainline down. The sidings, branch lines, industries etc. can be fit in any where and still be made to look believable but if you have the train going though one scene and can still see the other end of it in another that kills the whole thing. Just my thoughts. A few things that are going to be a given are you will need lift out or swing bridges to enter the room and if you did decide to go with multiple levels you may have to start the first level off a little lower then you would if your walls were higher. If your concerned you don’t have enough room for a helix to get you from one level to the next, if you plan your mains with a slight grade you should be able to make the climb with a still decent grade. approx 1 to 1.5% if you use the entire 82’ you have available
Yeah almost for got keep your head down and your eyes open, hang in there man home is waiting and thanks for gettin it done troop
you do like the footprint of your future pike and you know where the future staging area will be. Why not make a drawing of both and post it?
And you have drawn a couple of trackplans you do not like so much. They can be pretty informative about what you don’t like. May be there is someone around who gets the right feeling and comes up with an alternative after having seen them; so share the plans as well.
Your wishes are pretty clear, but at first glance I see two problems; layout heigth and radius. And both are related. I do not know your past in the hobby; John Armstrong designed with squares and your pike must be at least 5 squares wide. The shelves along the wall will be half a square each, one square for each aisle and two squares for the peninsula. Square size will turn out to be 28"x 28", so a radius of only 23" will fit in conveniently. Give and take an inch of course; but far away from the 30" you want. If you try to squeeze in a to wide curve the trackplan will never comes out warm and fuzzy. Building your dreampike high (shelf heigth at 56") leads to an even much smaller radius.
Radius has to do with the equipment you like to use too. For a pike in rural country a 1:3.5 to a 1:4 ratio between your longest car and the minimum mainline radius ain’t bad. In mountain area’s a 1:3 ratio could be considered. Devide your radius (23") by 3.5 and the longest equipment can be 7 inches. OK for the 50’s but a bit short for the early 70’s.
At stake are your druthers, or your priorities. Switching the mines against a longer mainline; having a large yard for breaking or building up trains (classification) against maintenance and repair facilities.
I will give you the websides of two professional designers (and two others). Both start with a long list of questions. If you want repley’
How about thinking of the room in the long dimension as the width; a lot more peninsulas that way with a depth of 10.5 feet (30 in aisle on one long wall except for the far end)?
Above all else, come home safely. With that said, if you want something to tinker with in your layout design, try downloading RTS from Atlas RTS 8.0 It uses only Atlas track in its library, but I used it to design my 27x18’ layout.
That creates a lot more curvature in the tracks than would a single long peninsula. At any reasonable minimum radius in HO, much of each short peninsula would be minimum radius turnback curves.
Have you thought about doing your layout in N scale? You’d be able to get a lot more RR into the space that you have with larger radius curves. There’s plenty of locos and rolling stock available in N scale that would be appropriate for a coal-hauling RR.
Mike, thank you so much for serving our country. Its very much appreciated and your welfare is always everyones concern… all of you. I don’t have anything to contribute, I’m a newbie here … just want to tell you to take care, stay focused on the job and God Bless you.
As nearly everywhere on the real-life railroad, most folks run their model trains in both directions (e.g., east and west). What is uphill for half the trains is downhill for the other half. There are exceptions, like Cajon Pass, but they are few and far between.
First and foremost, thank you for your service to us and to our country. Stay safe and keep you head down, God bless !
Think N-Scale. I have a similiar sized space but a little wider and wanted to do the same things you are talking about. Luckily I made the switch (mentally of course) to N scale before I bought my first piece of equipment. Now I run 30-35 car coal trains pulled by 2-3 locos, in N-scale that is about 10.5 ft. They look beautiful and looooong.
Post some pics or drawings of what you are thinking about on hear and you will get much better feedback.