Hi Archie,
Since you're not too far away, try and make the trip to York, Pa at the end of March for the East Coast Large Scale Train Show (ECLSTS). Its the biggest large scale show in the country and you'll get to meet many characters like me and Cap'n Bob! Plus you can see what's available and purchase track without shipping charges should you be ready to do so. Yogi Wallace from the Wheeling area gives great demos on his scratch building techniques - http://users.stratuswave.net/~wd8jik/
I have used some of his and some of my own for many of my buildings which you can see here - http://www.grblogs.com/index.php/structures/?blog=25
More on ECLSTS can be found here - http://www.largescaletrainshows.com/cat_index_19.html and http://www.aristocraft.com/vbulletinforums/forumdisplay.php?f=24
-Brian
Rob,
Thank you and all whom have responded to my question,It is wonderful to get responses from all over this great planet,each of you have made me feel very welcome, I commend each and everyone of you for your sacrifice of advise. I will always try my best to hold a high standard as each of the you have shown to me.
Archie
Al,
Thank you for responding and I am sorry I have been away,work takes alot of my time, I do not have track plans as of yet, I feel I am really open to suggeston. I will post some photgraphs of the area I wish to develope in to the community to be known as mountineer divide over the upcoming weekend.
Thank you
Archie welcome, you've gotten some very good world wide input. My railroad is a 425' loop built along a hillside; I live in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. My practices are pretty much as those above. I use the widest curves paractical, 20' dia down to 10' dia. min, Aristo X-switches and 2.5% max grades on the mainline. Hauling rolling stock to and from the railroad got to be a real drag. My mainline also loops through the crawl space under our house, branching into three through sidings, six spur tracks where I stage trains and store rolling stock. I use Aristo and USA track, they are compatable, I like the way they screw together. I use some grease to hold the screw on the allen wrench. I've noticed the newer track comes with deeper screwheads.
Good luck and have fun, Rob
The following web page shows the track plan of my first layout. The top right hand double curve is 60cm below ground level. We called it "Strawberry Cutting" as they were used to stabilize the soil. The curve at the bottom left hand corner is 95cm in the air. The site was roughly 11 metres square. Curves were 2 feet 6 inches, 3 feet 6 inches and 4 feet radius respectively. I think I used about 70 metres of track to build it with(?) Most of my locomotives are articulated hence I have tight curves -or possibly the other way around(!)
http://www.cabbagepatchrailway.co.uk/semaphore.htm
I can e-mail you more shots if you like...
regards
ralph
The Home of Articulated Ugliness
OK there Arch, I've got some for you.
1. I would think about a raised layout, we ain't getting younger and getting up and down on the ground can be a chore!
2. Go with as big a curve (radius or diameter) as you can fit into the available space, even if it means a few less features. Why? you can then run most anything made, and even small switchers will look more realistic on wide curves. My mainline uses a 20' diameter curve, while the minimum is 10' anywhere on the layout!
3. Give serious consideration to paying the approx 20% premium to get Stainless Steel track. This can be a touchy statement, and it is much debated; however, after watching how much track cleaning has to be done here at the seashore on brass track I'm glad I went stainless.
4. Bite the bullet and get plenty of capacity in your power supply. The starter set power units are morbidly undersized. If you were to buy some of the big newer locomotives with multiple motors inside you wouldn't have enough juice to run them.
And on to my usual comment to new folk around here. Although in your original post you stated that you live in WV, as time goes on it proves helpful to answering questions to be able to look up and see where one is located; that's because what works in the desert Southwest may not work in the mountains of WV! Likewise, what works in the dampness of the seashore may work differently in a less humid area. Long term, it would be good to go back to the sign up page and insert a general location which will show up under your name each time you post. DON'T be too specific, as in giving a street address; but someting general like you did with town and state.
ABOVE ALL have fun with it; this can be a family sport if Momma likes to play with posies, build model houses, or some other aspect. You can turn the gardening aspect over to her! That twigs her interest, and then she may think about buying you some train stuff next Christmas!
FINALLY, I have found that if I have spent too much on my trains, a DIAMOND causes all the flak to go away!
Posting some photos of the proposed area would greatly help. Take them from varying angles so we can get a feel for the lay of the land.
Do you have a particular track plan / layout already designed? Posting that will also generate feedback...
Al
Ralph,
Thank you for your response and I will keep your instruction in mind, I have an area which I believe will use aprox 225 feet of track, it will incircle a 15 X 20 feet water garden and will include 2 small 2X3 feet ponds on the open farm land scene, I live in a small country style community and will be incorporating the theme as such, of course this planning stage will last aprox 6 to 7 months before actual site preperation begins ground braking.
Two Tone,
Thank you for the response most of my area will fall in the 2% or under area, as for track well I am using the USA Trains track as this is my starter set and it appears to be of good quality, the local train shopI urchased my set thru has been very helpful and i am sure he will receive lots more of my money as time goes on,i will keep in mind your response and thank you agian for responding, I am sure we wil speak in the future again.
Hi Archie Welcome to the forum, Cabbage has given you some good information, if you find that the slope is too steep why not put a cutting in? Always try to keep the track as level as you can, may I also surjest you curves are Radius 3 the same with your turnouts. its better to have curves that will take big locos also your rolling stock will over hang track on small curves. I use LGB track find it very good there are lots for sale on ebay but the choice of track is down to you . Hope this helps
Age is only a state of mind, keep the mind active and enjoy life
Well -it really depends on how steep your slope is.... At my last house we built the layout on a 1 in 7 down slope with a 1 in 5 cross slope rising to a 1 in 3 up slope. This was selected as it was the flattest part of the garden. As long as your railway track does not present a gradient greater than 1 in 25 (4%) then you should be alright. Try to keep the slope as low as possible preferably 1 in 50 (2%).
I build it all on the "plank on post" method thus all the track was level.
viz:
The Station
At my current (and probably final ) home I am going to use this system again.
regardsralph
Hello to everyone, I am so excited just bought my first train set tonight,at 53 what a rush, I live in Ravenswood,WV and Iam so anxious to learn, I have never in my life had a train set before, Now to give you my details, I purchased a G Scale New York Cental starter set made by USA Trains, I have a water garden built in my back yard with incline to my yard, i want to incorperate the water garden and the slope please any info would help with a direction, I of course am concerned and realize I must prepare my site and thus begins my journey for help.I want to hopefully scratch build most of my buildings and tresses as well.
Thanks in advance for all who respond.
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