New to Model train hobby!

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
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Greetings Fellow Train Fans,

My name is Jesse Red Horse, I’m an enrolled Tribal member of the Northern Blackfeet and new to model train building.

I was recently inspired to start my own collecting and building of layouts when I happened to visit a long time friend and he showed me his train room, he kept this hobby to himself until he learned that I was already building scale houses for some time now.

I plan on my first layout being a 10X4 layout because of limited room.

I have been on ebay and have found some great cars and buildings there, I scan the internet hobby shops and visit many department stores for HO scale goods.

During my visit with my buddy he let me run his 6 working trains and let me pull them into the train yard when I was done and that was soooo cool, I loved his mini community and the detail just blew me away, I felt like a gaint looking down on a town or two.

I plan on doing my layout to reflect the different phases of my life, my train will pull out from a small station on my Reservation (Browing Rez, Montana). the Rez scene will be complete with low rent mobile park, some tee pees in peoples back yards, a small clinic and basically a glimps into reservation life as it is today.

There will even be a scene of when the National guard had sealed off the Rez in 1969 for 3 weeks.

Next stop The housing projects where I spent 10 years of my life, the diorama will consist of the housing high rise, kids playing street hocky , broken down cars and the seedy more darker side of life.

Next the train travels on down to the Urban neighborhood that I was relocated to at the age of 10 that will show case the life of Native people in a more calm setting, the red house that I spent some time in and the alleys that we played “Cow boys and indians in”.

After this stop comes the Suburbs that I also spent 10 years in, this will look like most dioramas, nice neighborhoods, children playing in a real playground, teens fixing up cl

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Yep you caught the bug alright. Just take your time, your off ot a great start. Planning is the main thing, get your idea’s down on paper and keep working on it. You may want to think about a around the room layout as it gives you more area to play with.

[#welcome] to the hobby.

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Wait till you see how expensive those “low rent” mobile home kits are.[:D]
[#welcome]

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[:-^]

[#welcome]Red Horse,

You have found a good home not only in N.H. but here as well.

Yes you might as well not fight it, I think you have “Railroaditis” and you now must get used to living with it. (so must your wife). we hope.

I have gone through Browning many times in my life, and know it pretty well. We have spent lots of time in Glacier Nat. Park. A college buddy of mine lived there in Waterton Ab. And I now have a son living in Spokane Wa. So we always try different routes going and coming.

It is always amazing to me how fast you come out of the mountains and on to the Prairie and then there is Browning.

Keep us informed as you progress, tell us the size that you are working with and are you going with GN. or NP ??. Are you going to use HO or N scale ??. etc. etc. Any questions that you have will be answered for you by this collection of fine folk that gather here in the Diner or on any of the threads.

You have some great conceptual ideas going on in that head of yours. You are far ahead of many entering the hobby at this point. Look for a link to Spacemouse and at the bottom of his entry there will be a link to his beginners page. This is a wonderful starting point for you. There you will be able to get oriented as to how to plan your layout from those beginning ideas to getting those trains running through those towns.

Good luck and happy modelling. Remember always that it is the journey and not the end that has the most satisfaction.

Johnboy out…

James:1 Verse:5

The “Wobbly” is running with a plow in front this morning. Back into the winter weather.

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[#welcome]

It’s good to see another person who has been bitten by the MRR bug. Good to have you here. Your descriptions of your propsed layout indicate a vision that few of us had when we started…at least I didn’t! [:)]

Have fun, share your ideas and your troubles and enjoy the hobby. Let us know how you are doing and show us pictures when you can. [tup]

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Your ideas are great. I’ve seen a few magazine features on layouts that are a sequence of dioramas; is this what you have in mind? I’ve admired the ones I’ve seen, so it can be a great way to go.

Like the other guys have said, careful planning will save you a lot of frustration and money. It’s also a great way to get the money together for the first big push (when you first start building, there is a lot to buy). If you spend a few months with pencil and paper, you can set aside money for when you build and you’ll have a lot of the challenges/problems figured out.

Anytime you have questions, post them here or send me an e-mail. I’m no guru, but I’m happy to help.

-Phil

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As one Native American to another, welcome to the forum.[#welcome] You have been well and truley bitten by the train bug alright. I’ve been in the hobby for 40+ years now and have built many layouts for myself and friends ranging from Z scale up to G scale. My favorite is HO. If I see anything I can help you with, I’ll put my [2c] in.

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[#ditto] Welcome to the hobby and to this forum. We have a great bunch of guys here and we are always willing to help and to answer your questions.

Enjoy yourself-Bob

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Hey [#welcome]

This is a great place to learn about model railraoding. I have found it really helpfull!

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[#welcome] to the MR Forums Jesse!

I like your ideas for the layout plan telling the story of your life, and that is really unique!

There is a wealth of information in the MR Forum and other online sources as well. Once you start digging you will find more information than you may have bargained for, but it’s all good!

I like to learn at least one new idea each day, and your layout idea is one of them!

Welcome again and have fun!

Cheers,

Ryan

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Welcome to the forums and to New England. I spent a year and a half in Great Falls in the late 60’s while in the AF.

Nice idea to follow your life, I hope to have some of the structures I’ve known when I get to that point.

Read, read, read and ask questions. Experiment as different folks seem to have good luck with different methods, none are wrong if they do what you want. Most things are fairly easily correctable, though sometimes redoing can seem like a pain.

Again, welcome, keep us posted.

Have fun,

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Thanks for the warm welcome and the warning signs of Rail Road Itis!, Yup, I think I have it!

I wanted to do a "Round the room layout but can not figure out what to do when it comes time to go past the door opening, I can’t be crawling under a shelf built across the door way to the room (Bad Back).

I’m selecting HO scale because I’m going to incorporate my Match Box collection into the dioramas.

I’m doing all my planning through this winter and come spring the build will begin, by then I’ll have created most of the buildings I’ll need and hopefully collected some cool train cars.

I’ve decided to buy train cars that have advertising on the that bring back fond memories of growing up, I seen a great “good and Plenty” box car on eBay but the auction price went to high for my taste, I’ll spend an average of $20.00 on a train car but that’s about it unless it is really rare.

I plan on marking special days in my life with a new car, like on my anniversary I’ll seek out and buy a car that reminds me of my wife, and on Halloween I’ll look for a box car in black and orange and date it under the bottom like a keep sake memento.

I think you get where I’m going with this.

I am looking for a source of modeling clay that air dries hard, I built a foundation to one of my HO scale houses out of a clay that was supposed to air dry, but after 10 days it is still some what dentable.

If I can’t pull off an "around the room " layout I’d like to do a 8’X4’ to start out and add to that as I go along.

I’m so happy to have found help for my new addiction, you are all enablers but it’s all good!

I try and check this board at least once a day.

Thanks for making me feel welcomed, and it is so cool to find a Native Brother here also!

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I may be wrong, but I think sculpt-a-mold is the way to go.

[#welcome] to the Forum. You’ll find lot’s of great stuff here.[:-^]

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“tell us the size that you are working with and are you going with GN. or NP ??. Are you going to use HO or N scale”

Sorry I forgot to ask…what is GN and NP?, if I knew what this was I could probably answer these questions…Remember…I’m a new bee to all this.

I do know that I want to get into HO scale because that scale seems to have the most of after market kits and so on.

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Make a continuos run type setup that doesn’t cross the doorway but turns and runs back the other way. Have it do this on both sides of the doorway. This not only solves your entry problem but also doubles the length of your mainline run. I did something similar some years ago in a 20 x 20 room. There were two mainlines that dominated the outside area of the layout while the industries and yards were in toward the walls.

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A lot of people have built swing out bridges to deal with doorways and avoid duck unders. There is an article in the subscribers area on the MRR site dealing with just that.

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I’ve never built a layout with a drop/swing out because I worried about reliability (track alignment problems and electrical problems), or that I’d forget to set it up and run a train onto the floor. Were my worries unfounded? Anyone with experience, good or bad?

-Phil

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I ran a train onto a siding one time that was supposed to take it onto a train lift. I forgot that the train lift was already at the top deck. The train was on the lower deck, then it was on the floor in many pieces.

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That must have been awful!

I’ve thought about interlocks, but the only thing I can think of that would be completely and absolutely effective would be one that prevents the layout from powering up if the bridge is out.

My layout is a folded point to point along one 16’ wall. It has a furnace in the middle (you use the space you’ve got and make the best of it).

-Phil

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What I did on a friends layout was to install a metal runner across the bottom of a liftout bridge. This completed a circuit for that particular block on the layout. If a train was running while the bridge was out of place it would immediatly stop when it hit the block for the bridge. The block wouild be powered only when the bridge was locked in it’s proper position.