I am thinking about expandind my layout, but I am not sure how a stand-alone table will be stable enough to stand by itself if someone bumps against it. Please give me some ideas.
I don’t quite understand the question, how were you thinking to support your extension, are you talking traditional L-frame benchwork? Sawhorses? stacked boxes? (don’t laugh, seen it done). As long as you provide cross-bracing to the legs it should be just fine. Is the idea this would be portable or be able to be taken down when not in use? I have a small portable layout I take to train shows, it uses 2 of these folding metal sawhorses for support, there is a 1x4 mounted to the top of the sawhorse to screw the layout supports into, but those spindly looking legs have taken all the abuse a show setup can throw at them just fine, that includes, overly enthusiastic toddlers trying to virtually climb onto the layout.
36" luan door slabs with 10" pine glued and screwed to the bottom on each end. Then mount folding table legs to the pine boards. Works great and is portable.
BTW, top is pink foam. Cheers!
I built this simple wood box frame from 1x4 pine on the outside, 1x3 pine stringers inside and 2x3 legs. The diagonal bracing is 1x2 pine and the triangular gussets supporting the legs are cut from 1/2-inch plywood. The table is 5x12 feet.
Before bringing the table into the train room, I sanded, stained and polyurethaned the outside of the frame and the legs, which makes it more presentable and also reduces splinters. I set the stringers level with the bottom edge of the frame, so the 2-inch foam board would sit 1 inch down inside the frame, protecting the edge.
The layout has casters on the legs, and it rolls around on the carpeted floor. This is quite stable. However, if I had it to do again, I would have made the legs longer. I find the height awkward for working underneath.