going to build ‘n’ scale layout (2’x4’) & would also like to have a stretch going along a wall (shelf). for base, plywood or pinkfoam? what goes down first that the track is layed upon? what type/brands of track? power sources? any other advice will be greatly appreciated. I did look through the discussion forums and did learn some things but no luck on these questions. Thanks
First off: [#welcome] to the forums. best advice is to get out now while you still have sanity and money.
That my good sir, depends a lot on you. I’m no expert, but here’s the basics:
If your cutting valleys, foam am good. Usually placed on plywood or some form of a support structure, not always. You can build scenery directly on wood, but i hear it’s a pain in the FRED (flashing rear end device so you ge tthe youthanism) to do and change. If your doiing simple flatland, all you need is plywood sheet on legs. If your gonna eventually need to do some major grade changes, I suggest looking into open benchwork sop you don;'t have to punch through the sold Plywood. Open frame also has the benefit of letting you into other places for reach, but a 2x4 plus some isn’t so far out of reach distance to need this as a 20x40.
Track: What you want is good, affordable baseless track. Sticklers for detail reccomend Code 83 in HO, I dunno the codes in N. All that means is how tall the rail is. Code 100 (HO) is the taller rail, looking to some as unrealistic, but also more trustworthy to keeping trains on the track. If your good with wood, a few people will build plywood subroadbed and just nail the track to that and add ballast to that. This is good and easy for tunnels where people can’t see what your track is, so anything goes. Others reccomend cork, or foam. Woodland Scenics sells foam flex base, and risers to help you with making grades in HO, I suspect this can be sude for two track N as well, there may be similar products in N.
For your size, you can operate on what;s called DC power. That’s just the straight, out of the box plug in the transformer to the wall type power. But we reccomend going DCC for a little extra, for more control. Either NCE or Digitrax. Reccomend the Latter before the former. these are usually adaptable for any scale.
We reccomend reading alot as well. Though personally,
Foam allows you to carve hills and valleys with just a steak knife. The 2 inch stuff is strong enough to hold up a model train all by itself. Foam is soft, and the edges of a foam layout will crush in and look shabby after some handling. Foam will NOT accept track nails, spikes, or any kind of fastener, it’s so soft that fasteners just pull out. Everything has to be glued to the foam with latex caulk. Net rumor has it that solvent based adhesives and Liquid Nails will eat foam. Foam cuts easily with wood working tools. I used my radial arm saw to cut my foam to size.
To protect the edges of the foam I made up a frame from 4 inch boards. To stiffen the frames I made bottoms from 1/2" plywood. The bottoms give something to attach under table switch machines, and wire bundles too.
You can lay snap track or flex track right on top of the foam, using latex caulk for adhesive. A lot of folk put “roadbed” under the track to simulate the look of the prototype gravel/crushed rock ballast bed. They sell cork road bed for this purpose, I made my own road bed from pine, others have made it from 1/4" foamboard.
Track can be sectional (SnapTrack) (comes in short rigid sections and goes to gether with rail joiners) or flex track (three foot long bendable lengths). Atlas. Peco, Micro Engineering and others make excellent track of both kinds. Flex track has fewer rail joints than sectinal track does, which
Best advise I’ve ever heard!
In all honesty, keeping an interest level up on even a small project will make the whole project finish up with a lot of fun.
As for all the particulars, get some books, Atlas publishes some excellent beginner books for not a lot of treasure, Kamlbach and Carstens also publish great books on the hobby’s various aspects.
There is only one issue with running trains while doing the “messy” parts of ballasting and scenery, that being scenery adhesives are good insulators meaning one must keep the track clean, or better yet covered duing consturction. N scale is really suspectable to this, for that matter, even O scale has issues with scenery glues blocking current from getting to the motors.
Good luck, and most of all HAVE FUN!!![#welcome]
he is right,
my advice start out at a starter set and work your way up, for egzample get a starter set then move up by buying locomotives and cars for other consists and keep building from there.
(there is no ranking system on how much you have, i only have a few to type this in)