At last count, I had something like $13,000 invested in my model railroad. Nearly 2/3s of that figure, however, is the rolling stock that I've collected during the past quarter century. I tend to build at a glacial pace, so the remaining 1/3 of the funds are spend out over the last seven years.
Compared to, my other passion is baseball, model railroading is downright cheap. Season tickets at 40 bucks a ticket add up fast! But I do love going to the games.
Nick
Take a Ride on the Reading with the: Reading Company Technical & Historical Society http://www.readingrailroad.org/
Currently, I am pondering to build a small "scenic" shelf switching layout. This thread made me think about the cost involved for this roughly 9´ by 2´ sized layout. Here is my estimate:
Total is 1,830 $ or a little over 100 $ per sqr. foot! If I start to add the cost for locos and rolling stock, I´d probably give up the plan to build a layout and return to armchairing, just enjoying to read my monthly copy of MR.
Construction time will about two years, so that is a little over 76 $ per month - theoretically. If I were a smoker, smoking a pack of cigarettes a day, I would spend over 200 $ for cigarettes in a month. Being a model railroader actually saves money!
If this is your third layout, you probably have a pretty good idea of what local and time frame you desire for it. 8ft.x10ft. is adequate for an around the room HO layout, or perhaps, a modified C or E Shape. Are you considering DCC ? I had a good idea of what I wanted when I planned my 24'x24' garage loft layout , with an inside stairway. I completed the benchwork and track layout in four pre-planned steps, with dead switches installed for the future planned expansion. Access holes were installed, as I progressed. I had most of the factories, houses, etc from previous layouts, and got footprints of desired buildings (from Walthers) I blocked off the required spaces for each structure, so that the ballasted tracks did not have to be moved. At present, I have "cleared the decks for action". With 110 turnouts, six reverse loops and three wyes, the wiring gets a little tricky. You should be able to plan the wiring of your entire layout, in advance. Strangely, I have nearly completed the scenery, and DCC wiring, but have never run a train around the many routes around my entire present layout .As MR states: "Dream-Plan-Build" Bob Hahn
tomikawaTT For that matter, how much does an avid sports fan spend on a season ticket? And he can't go to the stadium in pajamas and slippers - my usual attire in my layout space. Also, I rather doubt that he has as much fun for his money as I have for mine. All he has to show for his expenditure is a collection of marked-up scorecards - I have an empire Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
For that matter, how much does an avid sports fan spend on a season ticket? And he can't go to the stadium in pajamas and slippers - my usual attire in my layout space. Also, I rather doubt that he has as much fun for his money as I have for mine. All he has to show for his expenditure is a collection of marked-up scorecards - I have an empire
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Uuuum, I wan't to argue that but then realized I honestly couldn't. I've only been to two Badger football games, two Brewery games, and one Packer game in my near 26 year life so far, although the Packer game I wouldn't trade anything for. It was the infamous game during December, when it was hovering around a 0 degree windchill I do believe, I know it was only around 15 degrees, oh yea, and we beat the Lions which gave them the perfect losing season, 0-16. I plan to get a picture of a frozen Lambeau field in a real nice frame with the ticket stub to hang on the wall. Freak chance that I got to go to the game in the first place. Now I could take pictures of my finished models (when finished) but unless they really into trains they probably wouldn't be able to tell that the picture of me holding my MILW version H10-44 was the first H10-44 ever produced and first owned by MILW. Or that the "Jupitor" 4-4-0 is an exact HO model of one of the trains that was present during the driving of the golden spike (if they would even know what that was in the first place). But they see that picture of Lambeau and they will know, and chances are they would recognize the ticket stub as one from "that game". But please don't miss understand me I won't have these models, the most I will have is an S-3 modeled after the GB&W S-6 that the National Train Museum uses for their train rides. I rode in the cab for my ride and it was well worth the extra measely $10 and it left a lasting impression that will never leave my mind. At least untill I'm in my early 70's when teh appearny family heirloom of alzteimers hits. I can say the same for the early style H15-44 with the round cab windows. It eludes me where I saw it, or for that matter when I saw it (know I was little) but I won't forget seeing, and touching that loco. There's one more steamer that left a lasting impression, same situtation with the H15 can't remember it, but it was a pulling, or pushing rather, a short train ride a few miles long that was part of a train museum. I'm sure if I talked to my dad he would remember which summer vacation that was and I could probably track it down with some research. It was pretty cool to be an 7-9 year old, sitting in the coupala of a caboose, wilst a steam driven train pushed BACKWARDS to the main museum. I want to say it was in Montana. I remember it was a red center coupala caboose (of course) and a yellow color for the passenger car (cars?), but that's about it.
I agree with those who say that paying $150 per square foot is paying craftsman rates for a layout.
I built a small 2x4 diorama for "Take a Model Train to Work" day in 2007 and kept careful track of how much it cost. There was no benchwork, and no power, but the extruded foam base, scenery, hills, roadbed, track, ballast, rock castings, a bridge, creek, and partial river cost under $12 per square foot. Open frame benchwork isn't that expensive to build yourself (assuming you have some basic woodworking tools, so that MIGHT bring it up to $15, or about a tenth what that guy is quoting.
Structures, power supplies (and maybe decoders) and trains cost a bit more, obviously, but you don't need to buy them all at once (I use templates cut from cereal boxes to reserve space for structures when I'm doing basic terrain.
To each his own, obviously, but for my money, I'd rather have the fun of building the layout myself rather than simply paying someone to do it.
Connecticut Valley Railroad A Branch of the New York, New Haven, and Hartford
"If you think you can do a thing or think you can't do a thing, you're right." -- Henry Ford
Hi!
I'm currently building an 11x15 two level HO railroad that essentially replaces a 14 year old layout. While I have salvaged the 2x2 legs, and a good portion of the track & turnouts, I am buying "new stuff" for everything else.
As a newly retired business analyst, I confess I am a nut on keeping track of monies spent (which is NOT to say I am frugal or cheap). Soooo, let me pass along a break-down of what my new layout will end up costing me - excluding rolling stock, locos, structures, & scenery. For the sake of this posting, it is assumed that nothing was salvaged. And, I'm using actual internet prices paid, and I have all necessary tools.
- Lumber & fasteners, including plywood & legs, etc - $ 380.
- Cork roadbed & Atlas code 100 flextrack - $400.
- Atlas # 8 & # 6 turnouts - $430.
- Atlas switch machines & Caboose Hobbies throws - $230.
- Digitrax DCC system (2 dt400s, power packs & DCC specialties circuit breakers), excluding decoders - $1050.
- Wiring & fasteners - $170.
- All other (including supplies such as backdrop paints, caulk, solder, etc., etc.) - $240.
Soooo, to get a "plywood central" layout built, my cost is $2,900. Of course I have all the locos, rolling stock, structures, and scenery supplies I need - but what would it cost if I did not???
I have just over 50 locos, mostly Stewarts, Atlas, Spectrum, & BLI. But if I were to build a new roster, I would probably end up with about 30 (including B units), and spend about $4,000. Ooops, I want decoders in those 30 locos (x sound) and that is another $600 (installed by me).
I would want two sets of passenger cars (heavy & lightweight), and that would be about $1,000. And I would want about 150 freight cars (I have over 400), and for kits, that would be about $2,500. Structures for a loco terminal, stations, several small industries, farm, etc. would easily be another $700 (20 x $35) for mainly Cornerstone kits. And scenery supplies (ballast, groundcover, tree materials, plaster, paints, etc.) cound easily total $300.
Sooo, added to the layout cost of $2,900, the total "finished" layout runs $12,000!! I did not fudge the numbers to come out to the $12k, it is just a coincidence.
Of course most of us have a lot of the needed RR stuff already on hand, and we surely won't go out and buy 30 locos or 150 cars at one time, and my DCC system is probably twice the size that you would really need to start with. And, in my case, building the layout to the point of a "plywood central" could and will easily take 8-12 months (from design to final testing).
Hey, for what its worth......
Mobilman44
ENJOY !
Living in southeast Texas, formerly modeling the "postwar" Santa Fe and Illinois Central
With my new Diamond Valley I've spent about $80 per square foot.And I wrote up every piece I bought.
Wolfgang
Pueblo & Salt Lake RR
Come to us http://www.westportterminal.de my videos my blog
willy6 . As I'm approaching the ripe old age of 55, that's some scary thoughts where I'll be 68 years old at a minimum cost of $12,000 building my 8 X 10 HO layout.
. As I'm approaching the ripe old age of 55, that's some scary thoughts where I'll be 68 years old at a minimum cost of $12,000 building my 8 X 10 HO layout.
Gee. Depending on the many variables, I'd expect you should complete such a layout within 1 to 5 years if you spend 50 to 100 days a year (one or two days a week) working on it. Seems to me you should have time to complete at least five such layouts.
Mark
Since my presently under construction layout [16x20, HOj(1:80) scale] will probably be my last, I'm in no great hurry to 'finish.' Getting operations started took about six weeks, compared to Matt's two years. At my present rate of (non) progress, I may get all the trackwork down and the wiring completed in less than ten years from beginning, and I'm firmly convinced that I'll be finished before the railroad is! For the record, my rapidly-approaching birthday will be my 72nd, and I figure I'm good for another 28 years.
I rather suspect that the custom builder you quoted was naming HIS price, building with top-of-the-line commercial products. That puts several jokers in the deck:
Using your own figures, I figure that your $12,000 cost will average out to less than $20 per week. Of course, layout expenses aren't a simple horizontal line, but the humps aren't all that high (unless you purchase pre-fabricated benchwork or commercial double slip switches) and there will be periods when the actual expenditure curve will reach zero.
For that matter, how much does an avid sports fan spend on a season ticket? And he can't go to the stadium in pajamas and slippers - my usual attire in my layout space. Also, I rather doubt that he has as much fun for his money as I have for mine. All he has to show for his expenditure is a collection of marked-up scorecards - I have an empire!
(Of course, I also have a nice collection of scorecards and ticket stubs from gumnastic events I've attended...)
As I commenced building my 3rd layout, I sat back and reviewed past issues of "Model Railroad Planning"(MRP) to avoid mistakes I have made in the past. I will make mistakes again on this layout because i'm human but intend to make less of them.I was reading the 2004 issue MRP and on page 36 there was an article of a person named Mat building an 18' x 21' layout, scale not metioned... the article states that "Mat estimated that it would take two years to get the railroad running, four years to complete all track and wiring, and 13 years to finish the layout". On page 37 a custom builder stated it cost $150 per square foot for benchwork,track,scenery and a control system. As I'm approaching the ripe old age of 55, that's some scary thoughts where I'll be 68 years old at a minimum cost of $12,000 building my 8 X 10 HO layout.