Ok so after many ebay wins and alot of code 83 being collected with turnouts various scenery objects and some diesel loco’s I am now at at my wits end. I have forum hopped from here to other places and I cannot find a decent layout I am happy with. I have a 36 x 80 hollow core door its the only room Ive got at the moment. Please oh please help me with some of your guys’s wonderful ideas. I want some switching as well as some running with the option to expand later. I want to include a creek as well as a bridge on this layout.A couple of buildings I really want to try my hand at scratch building a warehouse. Im just at a blank and cant make a decision. So here I leave it in your hands…lol thanks guys
Since you say you have code 83 track, I assume you are modeling in HO. To get your track to fit on your door, you will have to have less than an 18" radius which is tight. You will only be able to run short, 4 axle diesels and short cars. Hollow core doors work well for N scale layouts or sections of an HO, but difficult to get continuous running on one in HO. However, it can be done if you use flex track for your curves. A small switching layout, which could be expanded later would be a much more realistic goal, in my opinion.
I would suggest you make a list of givens and druthers, you have some of them already. After you have your druthers listed, think about them for awhile, which are the most important, which can wait. While you are thinking along those lines, you could start working on your scratch building. Nothing says says you have to have a layout before you build something. I have a friend that had many completed buildings before he had any benchwork done.
I get the feeling you are just trying to think of too much at one time. Think about your druthers, put them in the back of your mind, do some building. Think some more, then build a little more.
If you are a MRR subscriber, have you tried their track plan data base? Not sure what you would find there to fit your space, but it is a place to look.
Relax a little, think about your druthers, come back here and list them and then folks can begin to help you sort things out.
Good luck,
Why are you restricted to the door? I would recommend an open grid 5’ x 9’ if you have the space for it. That way you can run 24" radius curves. Also, if you are going to want some topography for your creek, your going to need scenery below the track if you know what I mean. Hard to do that with a door in HO.
If you want continuous run on 36" x 80" hollow core doors, then you are in the domain of N scale layouts.
For your typical loop-on-a-table layout in H0 scale, you’d want a minimum 4 feet (48"), preferably 5 feet (60") deep table (which also requires access to the rear side in some form - as a minimum enough space to pull the table out so you can get behind it to work on the rear part of it).
I know that it sounds like an 18" radius turnback curves would fit on a 36" deep table, but it won’t. Not really.
If you want a generic loop layout on a 36" x 80" hollow core door, you have the space for it in N scale - a 3 x 6.67 foot N scale layout is roughly the equivalent of 5 x 12 foot H0 scale layout.
Also, if you just want to make a H0 scale continuous run loop layout on a hollow core door, I’d advise against using standard and unmodified diesel engines and biggish cars.
Then you should look into running short (or modified) engines and cars that can handle sharper curves - like an industrial locomotive and shortish cars, where you can go down to 15" radius or so.
The rule of the thumb is that curve radii should no
Ok so Im liking all your guys’ ideas. I could take out the continuous running thought. That isnt as important to me as wanting a nice realistic yard of some sort with some industries to deliver to. I have thought about cutting this door in half or placing a backdrop on half and having a small staging yard on the back half of the door so that I can focus on only the front part for scenery, Another thought is to make this a staging yard I think that’s what you call it when you have a circular engine house with a turntable. I have the turntable but not the engine house maybe I could go off the images available online and could scratch build the house myself.
I am calm in making my decision…But I am very excited to get started. I’m tired of looking at all of this material and not having one decent idea so I am gonna post some pics of some track I have laid down but not made permanent and Ideas or criticism is very welcome and needed. I am new to this and I think I have done a lot of research and a lot of gathering in my quest to make an awesome and ultra realistic setup.
You can make a nice switching layout, but continuous running will pretty well limit what else you can do.
You can only fit a 15-16 in radius curves and then that squeezes everything inside that loop which really limits your options for switching. You will only be able to run smaller engines and cars because the turns at the ends are so tight.
I would suggest:
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Building a switching layout on just the door.
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Building switching layout on the door and putting it on part of a 18" radius loop, then LATER add a 1 ft wide addition on the back to complete the loop. You can operate on the door most of the time and then on “special” occaisions add the extra foot and operate continuous.
I also suggest adding one or more layers of blue/pink foam on top of the door if you want a stream. If you dig into the hollow core door itself to create the stream you will weaken it significantly.
I am not happy with this I just laid it down to kind of get an idea or to spark an idea but well nothing happened.
And this is the whole door
Completely wrong sir. I know what I want to model. Warehouses and a staging yard of some sort im just looking for layout ideas. I will know what I want to model when I see it. I lay down track and sit on it for a few days and decide I don’t like it and rip it up and start over (as you can see from the glue marks on the door). I look at it and think.Will I enjoy this in a month, 3 months , a year.?. If I cant say yes then up it comes and I start a new design. I guess what I should do is get a good layout planned and just stick with it. All I was asking out of you good experienced modelers was some ideas to incorporate the things I mentioned a few warehouses a creek maybe a bridge just looking for some ideas here…
(((( changing your post to that is much more helpful…lol thanks)))))
- What do you mean by “warehouses”?
Do you mean wooden buildings in a small western town in the 1890s? Six story brick buildings creating an urban canyon around the railroad tracks in Brooklyn in the early 1950s? Modern metal buildings in an industrial park? California fruit packing houses? A Maine fish market? Something else entirely?
- What do you mean by a “staging yard”? You talk about turntables and roundhouses in connection with a staging yard. That makes no sense to me. Staging is the concept of having one or more tracks where you can keep trains after they have “departed” from your modeled layout, or before they “arrive” on your layout.
I am assuming you most likely just mean that you want a small yard - like a small interchange yard or an industry support yard or something like that - a few tracks where you can sort cars and temporarily store a few cars while picking up or setting out cars at your warehouses.
A creek and a bridge can be added to pretty much any layout. Likewise a siding and a couple of spurs for holding cars while you switch - not much problems adding that to any layout. That doesn’t define what you are trying to create very well.
You do need a basic vision of what you are trying to model first. “Some warehouses” isn’t specific enough. Try to describe the place you envision. When is this? Where is this? What kind of place is it? What would be transported by rail to these warehouses?
Have you seen any layouts that inspire you?
For a handful of random inspiration, you can e.g. look at the pictures from poster tomcat-13’s layout (use the search box in the right margin to look for the name). Or look at “Brooklyn 3am” (likewise - search for the name). Or look at Scot Osterweil’s Highland Park Terminal.
Or look
Any reason that you cant go to a 4x8? Looks like you have the room. Your options would be much better.
Hmm. Leaving it in our hands can be dangerous! WE cannot tell you what, when, how to model your layout.
I can tell you having a 40"x52" in HO layout myself- {all the space I can afford} that even with the extra 28" you have it won’t leave much for a lot of switching to go on in the center…A small yard with 3-4 spur tracks may work so would a small “Z” or “X” shaped access to industries may be possible. I can also tell you you will be restricted to 18" radius curves-which will actually hang over the edge of your 36" door. I would avoid AT ALL COSTS using 15"R curves- they are a royal pain in the patootie and will ONLY run the smaller equipment adequately. You will need at least 40" to install an 18R curve for your continuous running trains on an outside loop without track falling over the edge of the door.You may have to add a border around your door to stretch the width and length a little. That is what I did. You may also want to add a plexiglass border about 5" high all the way around as you WILL experience derails and “falling locos” to the floor with the track so tight to the edges!.
Also, you will be restricted to smaller steam or smaller diesel locos as many of the large
The harsh reality is, what you have on that door now will get old very quickly!
Ive seen some good switching layouts on that size bench. If theres one tip I’d give, keep the track running away from the edge of your bench. One thing i learnt from a layout of old before it was scrapped, model trains look so much better when they dont run paralell to the bench work edge.
Pluss, those curves will make hands-free, remote uncoulping (adding realism in the process) virtualy impossible. They will also seriously limit the stock you can run.
I would be considering some of the idea’s in the scematics above.
I am in agreement with many on here.
I started out in N scale with a nice 3x8 oval and that got old after awhile. I am now looking at building a shelf layout (in N scale or HO, I haven’t quite made up my mind yet) that I can work on and operate now but add onto later. In HO you can build a ton of different shelf layouts in a 2x8 space. By leaving a mainline run open on either end you can add additional layouts later and build corner curve sections to make a loop. I am suprised that I haven’t seen the Heart of Georgia layout mentioned yet but it is a great example of what I am talking about. The layout examples Stein has posted are also excellent examples of shelf layouts that can be added onto later.
One of the biggest mistakes most new model railroad planners get into is either making a layout that is too cramped to use or to big to construct and use in a reasonable amount of time (and money). It is an easy trap to fall into.
Do you have the HO trains yet, or just track?? Think On30 logging or mining. (cut every other tie out of your code 83) Some of those trains can run on a 9" radius with steep grades. (just a thought)
Looks to me like the OP went the whole nine yards. This is what he wrote in his first post in this thread:
Basically it sounds like a case of getting caught up in a buying frenzy, and only then starting to think about what to use it for.
By all means - let the ones among us that never have done that throw the first boxcar - I suspect most of us has fallen prey to that impulse from time to time. I still have no clue about what to use most of that Valley Cement kit I got tempted into buying on my Minneapolis Warehouse District 1957 scene. Oh well - at least I have managed (so far) to stay away from mine tipples and flood loaders … 
Still - this would be a good time for the OP to figure out, a little more about what he wants to model - at least a rough idea about era, type of place, type of traffic.
Modern warehouses in Miami?
Bush Terminal in Brooklyn in 1943?
Niagara Food Terminal in 1930 (see prototype forum - I just posted a find there)?
Minneapolis warehouses in 1900?
Lots of cool things that can be modeled, but it will make it easier to figure out something that will fit on a 3 x 6.7 foot hollow core door if he has an idea about era and type of place.
Smile,
Stein
Actually you are very correct I did (against my better judgement) go into a buying frenzy. I just couldnt help it. I really only bought universal items like paint and weathering and track. I bought one or two good looking locomotives that I absolutely wanted. I bought alot and I mean alot of code 83 track so I have enough to do pretty much whatever I want as far as a layout.
I have been looking at a Miami layout here http://www.the-gauge.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=46&t=169&start=105 and I will be completely honest it was this layout that got me into this world of model railroad, I fell in love with this layout at the amount of detail he actually went into. He went so far as to shrink an actual copy of a newspaper to use as trash on the street. I mean how awesome is that? My plan was to do a layout very close to this one. And Im actually laying the track for it now I am going to add my own twist to it though with a few more turnouts so that I can have more industry and loading docks for trains and big trucks. I was really looking for ideas and maybe some tips into commiting to an actual layout. I find myself laying track then pulling it up but I think this time I am commited to it. I will post pics when they become available
Kurt is a very talented modeler.
As is Lance Mindheim, which designed the layout that inspired Kurt in the first place.
Lance has a pretty good book out on designing shelf switching layouts - not a huge book, but it discusses cleanly and clearly the principles involved in getting a reasonably balanced switching layout. Here is a link to his book How To Design A Small Switching Layout on Amazon.
He also has a with track plans for various switching layouts, called “8 realistic track plans for small switching layouts”, which I also think is a pretty nice collection of track plans for your use.
Smile,
Stein