Has anyone built this track plan or have any tips on builing this track plan?
Hi BRS,
The Iron Rigde & Mayville is a very nice layout for short steam powered trains. No staging however and a few issues. And as always an 8 x 4 is not the best use of your room. For several reasons it is not easy to change it into a “around the walls” plan.
Building it will require flex-track and probably some trimming of out-off-the -box turnouts, i do not see major problems.
Paul
But it is relatively easy to make it into a point-to-point shelf plan - just drop the optional continuous run track, cut the plan down along backdrop and unfold.
Smile,
Stein
For myself, I have not found N scale to be the best for small steam. Nothing against N scale here, I modeled in it for about 15 years. It’s just that small steam tends to be light to start with and lighter still in N scale, meaning poorer electrical contact and harder switching. Not that it can’t be done, there’s always someone who is successful. But that is one thing that made me change to HO as I grew more interested in small switching instead of double headed mainline runs.
AM I confused? Wasn’t there a plan with that name in 101 Track Plans that IS around the walls, with the center open, point to point? I don’t have my copy handy to look it up, and the recent N scale one is the only one that comes up in the track plan database.
–Randy
Yes, plan #68. Basically the N scale plan is the around-the-walls plan from 101 Track Plans folded onto the 4X8 Sacred Sheet, incorporating some of the same issues and limitations.
Since the Original Poster mentioned in other earlier posts that he is modeling in N scale, folks probably assumed that he was asking about the recent N scale version from the Mar 2011 MR.
Well, that opens up an alternative suggestion - build the version in 101 Track Plans except in N scale. Same dimensions, same curve radii. Could make the shelves narrower and squeeze the whole thing together while maintainign the same open space in the middle withotu compromising too much to go to N scale. I’m guessign the N scale newer version was put on the 4x8 because doing the usual shrink by half to the original HO plan would make the center space too small to be useful.
The name was familiar because in my catch-up reading of the MR 75 year set I’m in the mid 50’s which is when the version in 101 was first published.
–Randy
Hi Randy
the original, along three walls, design by Russ Larson was 16 x12 in HO or 8x6 in N-scale. With a 3,5 ft wide aisle in N-scale no adjustments are needed. In 101 TP’s a lot of layouts are not designed for a specific scale. Anyway openings and the width of aisles are often a clue. It is revealing to see how large the influence of John Armstrong is on track-planning. The (almost) absence of walk-in and walk-along layouts, like the depth of scenes is remarkable.
If i remember well the Iron Ridge and Mayville was part of a series of designs especially made for our sacred 8x4 sheet. Neil Besougloff did an easy cut and paste job. What i did like on Neil’s version were the buildings, even a roundhouse, between the edge and the tracks. Keeping this placement made the change into a donut style or an along-the-walls style plan difficult.
Interchange or/and staging would be a nice additions. One of my concerns is the height of the layout…low enough to enable easy switching and working on the layout, high enough to enjoy the views. IMHO a reduction from HO to N should not be done by simply dividing everything by two. A reduction to about 70% would be a better choice. Resulting in a 11x8,5 layout; though an island type rectangle plan could be very well done in a 11x5 space.
Smile
Paul
I am pretty sure it was Tony Koester who wrote the article on taking a copy of a Linn Westcott track plan and then taking a sissors to it, making an oval into a point to point, perhaps L or U shaped. He also advocated buying a 4x8 sheet by all means – and asking the lumber yard to rip it into two or three 8 foot lengths.
By the way Iron Ridge and Mayville are real places, well known to Milwaukee area railfans, located on the old Milwaukee Road line from Milwaukee to Horicon and beyond – some of the oldest ROW in Wisconsin – now operated by the Wisconsin & Southern. There was actual iron mining in that area. Google Iron Ridge and Iron Mine in Google and Google Images and you’ll find all sorts of neat ideas. Iron Ridge sees a little rail activity in addition to run throughs, but a period pike in that setting could be really busy.
http://www.seii.com/bats/mine/default.htm
Dave Nelson
You are not confused, there is a plan in101 Track Plans and it is an around the walls point-to-point and can be modeled in any scale depending on space. I have always thought that it could be a neat looking layout.
I went back and looked. It actually was PAUL Larson who did that one, long before Russ was an employee. When those layouts were the “track plan of the month” in MR, there was a lot more info given then presented in 101 Track Plans.
–Randy
Hi Randy,
Paul Larson indeed, thanks
Paul
Do you know which issue it was that the Iron Ridge and Mayville (around the walls) plan was published? I have it only in the 101 track plans and the 2011 issue (in the not around the walls version.) Looking to build it and hoping that extra information you said was in the original ‘plan of the month’ article might be helpful . Thanks a bunch!
That was the June 1954 Model Railroader.
The original article assumes handlaid track with turnouts laid-to-fit. It’s designed for very low-key operation, basically one branchline train per day and no additional staging beyond the very modest yard in Fond du Lac.
The “extra information” is mostly about the real-life branch. There’s not much on construction of the layout, if that’s what you are seeking.
Byron