The past several days have been really exciting-- you know, in that fun, thrilling, scary, omg-what-the-heck-was-I-thinking sort of way… As my Xmas & B-day presents, my wife gave me her blessing to-- um… “re-design” the basement a little…
Here is a CAD drawing showing the “Before” and “After” views of the basement space:
Note that in both views, there is a leg of the layout that runs down the left-side wall, at about 60-inches, around the bottom wall-- there will be a small yard here-- and on through to the office and up along the right-side back toward the main part of the layout. Originally there was going to be a branch toward the left running around the office, along the angled-wall and back around to the layout. This leg may need to be revised, and it throws a major monkey-wrench into the track-plan concept I had going-- I’m trying to figure out how to resolve it or redesign it another way to achieve the same general concept… but its a Class “A” sort of problem-- figuring out what to do with all the new space! [:)]
Here are some shots of the actual (de-)construction and moving of the mechanical room components (HVAC, air-handler, Water-heater, etc.) to their new location, and the removal of the walls in the upper-right portion of the space-plan drawing. We’re leaving the bathroom but the mech room and closet behind it are coming out. This will add approx 15’x12’ new feet to the available layout area, for a total of about 35’x20 (on the one end) and 35’x12’-ish on the other. This portion will be all double-decked in a manner similar to what you see in the pictures below. The remaining portion that encircles the rest of the basement will be single-decked at about the same hight as the upper deck here, a
I’m eagerly looking forward to getting back to layout construction and laying track! Even if all I do is extend the “temporary” layout a bit more around the room while I get the rest of the basement back in-order, that will still be a nice improvement and will make it more fun to run trains. Especially since I can now add some under-layout staging.
Heh- I bought the pink foam primarily to build some “temporary” layouts with-- so I can pin track down easily and pull it back up without a lot of hassle. That lets me try stuff to find out what I like and how things fit, etc., without gobbling up a lot of track or time. Plus its fun to operate with my son-- its a blast to watch him having fun running the trains.
I’m hoping I can get past the benchwork phase soon. I was nearly there just before the HVAC / mech room move. But I’m glad things are working out the way they are. I think I’ll enjoy it more, and the trains will fit the space better. And my wife will enjoy it more and be better able to utilize the remaining space for her quilting stuff, and the kids will like it (but they would have liked it either way anyway…
One of the hobby magazines once published an article titled something to the tune of “It takes a shoehorn . . . . . !” relating how the author had overcome the problem of fitting his layout into coexistence with a water heater and a furnace. He was going to have to have both moved ever so slightly to clear a space for his double track main. When he got thinking about it he wound up moving it an extra foot and turning the gap behind into a multi-track hidden storage area.
Like he said, “It (sometimes) takes a shoehorn . . . . . !”
Basements, as you may have surmised, are rare here in Arizona but some builders offer them but albeit at considerable additional expense. My wife was not particularly enthralled with basements but in 1988 we visited a subdivision that was being offered with them but, as I will relate, I got driven out of that market.
There are two parts to this story. The first part involves an idiotic saleslady and her upline sales manager. The second involves the builders who turned out to be real RPPs–thats Royal-Pain-in-the-Posterior.
I originally found a house plan which I liked and their basement layout fit perfectly into my plans except for the location of the water heater and furnace . . . . . they were in the way! So I enquired about moving them into another area adjacent to the laundry room.
“I’m sorry, we can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“Because that’s not the way the plans are.”
“Look,” I stressed, “All this entails is building a new wall two frames over. If the current wall is a supporting wall . . . . .”–it was–“. . . . . you can leave it intact and put the water heater on one side of the wall and the heater on the other.”
Tell me about it, sheesh. The irony is that when we were looking for our house we looked at one that was literally about 500 feet away, one subdivision over, that was nearly identical in design to the house we have now-- some cosmetic differences but essentially the same layout-- except for the basement, which (IMO) was ideal for the layout. It had everything in the center, the stairs down, the utility closet, the mechanical room, the electrical panels, the bathroom-- everything in the center. And except for the usual high-up tiny windows, nothing on any of the walls to obstruct or interfere with the layout except for the walk-out doors to the exterior. It also had a nice big area behind the central stairs & whatnot that would have been perfect for a big workshop and staging yards and the whole bit. Plus it was unfinished-- it would have been darn-near perfect for the purposes.
But it was “unfinished”-- good for me, a show-stopper for my wife. Go figger.
In general, basement and layout potential notwithstanding, I actually liked the house a little better. It was arranged slightly differently than the house we have now, essentially the same, just some room placements rearranged (office vs dining room, etc., that type of thing). But the guy wanted $75k more than the price for the one we ended up getting-- we tried to negotiate with him and he came down a little, but not enough so we got the other house instead. An irony there is tha
I totally agree. But while the problem is a good one (a type “A” problem), the issue has unexpectedly become “back to the drawing board” as far as the track plan goes. The old track plan is all but unworkable in the new basement space-- mostly because the walls that were going to support the various legs in question simply are no longer there. And now I’m working to re-juggle (re-map) the geography in my head and come up with a new concept of it that will permit the previous concepts to work.
I realize that there is a simple solution of making everything linear, as in the style of the dominos (though not modular), but I’m hoping I can figure something else out as that seems to me like it will be rather imposing and not have the aesthetic I’m hoping to achieve as something that co-exists in the family hobby space.
So until then I’m just thinking.
Maybe when I get sick of pink foam something will occur to me… [:)]
Thanks, its getting there, but there’s still a mountain to climb (and several to build) to get it finished. This is just the “temporary layout” giving us something to run on while we anticipate and build the “real thing”.
I had hoped that the coast would be clear to start building (the layout) again but its apparent that I need to do some finishing up on the basement before I can really continue-- especially since I need it to look reasonably good for my wife to accept it. And also since I have a project out there “hanging” since before Xmas. I had to re-plumb the shower in our master bathroom due to a burst pipe from before we purchased the house-- we stubbed it off with a valve immediately to shut the water off to it, but I just gotten around to actually fixing it-- and now I need to wall (tile) it back up so it will be finished-- you know the old “honey-do” versus “layout-time” time contention… (sigh) I wish I had a wife who was into Model Railroading-- or at least more tolerant of it. It would make life so much easier (and more enjoyable).
John
EDIT: Brenda, darling, if you’re reading this-- this is some otherJohn who’s talking about some other wife named “Brenda” with some other list of “honey-do’s” and some other photos of a basement that happen to look amazingly like ours… and I know how much you just love the trains and everything about Railroads!!! [:-,] [(-D]
John, you are such a wus. Just tell her you will get to the rest of the basement when the trains are at least up and running. Just make sure that she doesn’t have a a chunk of 2" X 4" lumber in her hands when you tell her. [(-D][(-D].
Seriously though, it looks as though you made a good deal with, “She Who Must Be Obeyed”.
