I saw that the latest MRVP video talks about MRR selling some project layouts. Since I don’t subscribe to MRVP I can’t watch the video to find out more. Does anyone know anything about what is for sale and for how much?
You should subscribe to MRVP… it is well worth the money.
The only project layout I know of that Model Railroader let go was the N scale Clinchfield built by Gorden Odegard. That one ended up down here in Southwest Florida, and I have a few stories about it.
The Clinchfield was given away in a promotion.
That was decades ago.
-Kevin
According to the MRVP video, the Rice Harbor project was sold years ago. At the end of the video, David says that the Virginian project railroad is for sale…
A guy who had another forum owned the Clinchfeild bought from the original winner and had it modified for him so his wheelchair could get in the middle, didn’t know he had sold it.
Dang, ever since 2014, Ive been trying to recreate the Virginian layout. My layout isnt even close to done, and it already looks worse than their project layout. I really hope whoever gets it preserves it.
He could not have bought it from the original winner unless that other forum owner is also the owner of Prestige Model Productions in Lehigh Acres, Florida.
The original winner, or maybe a second owner, sold the N Scale Clinchfield project layout to Clear Track Limited, a local hobby shop in Fort Myers, Florida over 30 years ago. One section of it was in their front window for a while and it became very damaged from sunlight.
From there, it sat in storage for years, and the evil Florida palmetto bugs did a number on the layout.
Scale Rails of Southwest Florida was going to restore it, but instead decided to build an exact copy for train shows. An old guy named Walter was the lead on this project, and he irritated the living daylights out of me (I was 22 at the time) by how dedicated he was to duplicating the original. Since we actually had the original to work from, the copy was pretty darned accurate. The copy was completed in early 1990 if I am remembering correctly.
In 1992 Scale Rails built a second portable N scale layout, the NORFOLK STRATTON, which I designed and was lead for the construction project. The NS was (in my 100% biased oppinion) a much more effective display layout than the Clinchfield was.
Then, somehow Kalmbach got ahold of Carl, the owner of Clear Track Limited, and wanted to do a new article about the Clinchfield project and take it to the National Train Show. The Clinchfield was sent to Kalmbach, and by this time it was in truly awful shape.
The original layout was restored, Kalmbach ran an article about the restoration, and the layout went on a quick tour.
I don’t know what issue had the article about the Clinchfield layout restoration. Maybe someone with access to the all time ar
I’m pretty sure you are talking about the PRR Middle Division that Dave Frary built in the early 90’s.
Yeah, it was Frary’s PRR Middle Division that got sold, then added on to and lowered so the owner could get around it in his wheelchair. That addition was features in MR a couple of years ago (fairly recently). I always liked that layout, and if I didn;t have a lot of room, i would build something similar, just change it to Reading, and change the town names to suit.
–Randy
You must be right, maybe he was trying to buy the other, he bought alot of stuff. Dave I know helped him restore the PRR one I know. Jimmy is the guys first name and he bought the rights to FSM castings along with a few companys. Used to comunicate with Dave when a member on that forum.
MRR give away their N Scale Salt Lake Route project layout to Kato.
Which I thought was a dumb idea. They had two layouts one Red Oak looked good for that Midwestern feel but had three videos on it I think for product reviews. The next was Salt Lake Route of long desert railroading in the West which had numerous screen time. Plus the Canadian Canyons layout wasn’t done and it’s going to look weird with American locomotives than Canadien ones.
The last time I was visiting friends at Kalmbach I saw several of the project layouts were taking up a huge amount of space and seemed to be tucked away in every available nook and cranny, including in some hallways that could not have made visiting firemen very happy thinking about escape routes in the event of a fire. Don’t forget that Classic Toy Trains also creates its share of project layouts including some really nice ones. Kalmbach has been cutting down the amount of space they take up in the building and I suspect some hard decisions had to be made.
I think they were even more ruthless about project layouts at 1027 N 7th St. When I visited there I didn’t see any of the prior layouts, just the then version of the MR&T. I had been hoping the Sierra Pintada from the late 1960s would be there but it was not, nor any other of their project layouts from that era.
Dave Nelson
PS amended posting: the March 2002 issue of MR says that a guy named Jim Deignan acquired the Clinchfield, Pennsy Middle Division, and Cactus Valley project railroads “as they become available” which to me means he did not buy them from Kalmbach. It was he who hired Dave Frary to restore them; Frary had built the Pennsy and Cactus Valley.