Also New to the Hobby....

[Anonymous]

Hello all.

Yes, I agree that you all look to be very knowledgeable about the ins and outs with model railroading....

A bit about myself.....

I am a 31 year old soon to be married man, living in an old victorian house with a creepy basement that my bride to be hates so much, that I can do whatever I want with it. Therefor, I have chosen my long desired hobby of model railroading to take one room in said basement...

The room I expect to do this in is about 12' X 15', with 2 doorways on one of the 15' sides, and one end on a 12' side open to an area that holds an old massive, and newer and more efficeint boiler.

Once I finish up some plumming and electrical in the basement, I am going to replace the dirt floor in that room with concrete and then rug to make it easier on the feet.

Growing up, my brother had a fairly large HO layout (10X10 maybe?) that never advanced beyond rolling stock and a coat of green paint on particalboard.

I am leaning towards an N Scale layout in my room, since I don't have quite as much space as I might like to do an HO layout.

Any hints other then "read" and "have fun"? I am trying to do both of those, and I am trying to find a good store here in South Central Wisconsin to do my shopping....

Thanks again for all your help to come!

[AntonioFP45]

Welcome aboard!

Exactly how much space do you have. If you wi***o model in N scale go for it but if your heart is in H.O then really think about it........

You can design an "around the wall" type layout instead of the traditional board. Go to www.atlasrr.com

On the top bar, you will see a tab called "LAYOUTS". Click on that. A box with 9 squares will then open up. Click on H.O and then on N. You will see various track plans that will help you with some ideas.

Also, think of your theme: Modern, 1960s, 1980s, small town, big city, industrial, rural, mountainous, desert, etc. Do you want a locomotive servicing facility? What type of customers will your railroad serve? Planning on passenger service?

Since I prefer longer running for trains, I will be going with an around the wall type HO layout featuring a small, southeast US city. Industries will be: a Lumber yard, A frozen food plant, a cement plant, and a warehouse. This allows me tol be able to use my large fleet of Boxcars, Flats, Reefers, and Covered Hoppers for the local switching service. I will also have passenger service and a small diesel locomotive servicing faility.

Hope this helps! Keep the questions coming![:D][8D][:)][tup][swg]

[Anonymous]

Vist www.nmra.org and click on beginner's page.

Also on that home page click on the logo"Worlds Greaest Hobby.

Welcome aboard and THANKS! for selecting trains.com to get you to
your destination.

[Anonymous]

thank you guys!

Both those sites look to be full of good things.

To answer the questions from AntonioFP45, here goes..

How much space do I have? That 12X15 room is what I am going to start with. I might be able to have the layout spread into another section of basement later, but that is years and alot of commitment way from here today.

N vs. HO = I did grow up with HO, but I realize the virtues of N. I don't have a huge room, so N may be a better choice for me to start with....

Theme? I have always prefered steam over diesel, but I don't mind a bit of a mix, so I am guessing mid 40's to early 50's at the latest. I live in what is an old tobacco town between Milwaukee, Madison WI, and Chicago, so I was thinking I would model something along that corridor. Typcial industries might be standard agriculture, wood and paper products, chewing tobacco, and automotive out of Milwaukee. When I think of a model railroad, I think more about industry and materials then I do passenger service, so I think the passenger terminals may be little more then decoration 8)

One question that I do have that I have seen contradictory responses to, is should I look at building a layout that is destined to be replaced later once I have learned the lessons that are infront of me, or should I build something that has an eye to 2005, 2006, and 2010 when laying out what is in essance my first layout....?

I hope that question makes sense 8)

Thanks!

-M

[Anonymous]

I would build with an eye to the future - one that allows you to expand your layout without having to painfully start all over again.

I like HO, but if you want to have broad sweeping curves in a tight layout, N is probably more in proportion. Nothing wrong with building an around the wall layout, you want to make sure that you can reach your trains no matter where they are on the tracks. If you have enough room, you can make a two-level layout (or more) that lets you run trains in a 3-dimensional arrangement.

The biggest suggestion I can give is that it's your railroad. You are the President, Chief Engineer, Head Conductor, Operations Manager, and Chief Dispatcher. You run it to suit you.

I recommend that you also pick up a copy on wiring your layout. If you decide to go DCC later on, it's not a big change of wiring from DC.

Welcome to the hobby! May your trains always run on time and your operating costs remain low.

[Anonymous]

Welcome!

There are contradictory responses to almost every question in model railroading, simply because there are so many ways to do the same thing...!

Your 12x15 room is quite large compared with some of the space people have available. One spectacular railroad in HO in a room about that size is Mike Hamer's Boston & Maine (see Great Model Railroads 2004 - it's on the cover). It operates like a much bigger layout and can handle 30 car trains without seeming small.

Boy do you have your work cut out with that basement! [;)] I have a similar house, with a stone foundation. That pretty much eliminates attaching anything to the wall, so I have decided to go modular. My other problem is that I am 5'10", and bottom of the floor joists (exposed) are about 5'2" off the floor...! I do most of my working and running trains sitting down. [:)]

It looks like you have all the newbie advice under control, and are really further ahead than most. As for the "plan to expand" I would suggest (only a suggestion...) that you work on the layout a bit at a time. You can also plan for scenes or dioramas to be incorporated as part of the layout as you go. Starting a layout (even a small one) that you know you will rip out within a year or two seems to be normal for some people, but I find it somewhat discouraging. That is just my 2 cents.

Good luck, and don't be afraid to ask questions!

Andrew

[Anonymous]

I expanded my small HO layout three times and would like to add more but no more
room.

Allowing for subsequent expansion is good foresight.

[AntonioFP45]

Mrbornac

Glad to see that fellow modelers are giving great input! If I may just one more suggestion. When you have about 30 minutes of spare time, try this website:

www.allenkeller.com

[tup]These are excellent and very enjoyable model railraod videos. You can purchase them through your local model railroad shop, but the website shows the entire selection. There is a brief description on the featured layout(s) as well as the owner's background. Several of the videos may fit into your category as far as industry. Volume 10 and Volume 30 feature well built, N scale layouts.. I'm planning on buying Volume 21 and 23.

Hope this helps![:)][:D][8D][;)][^][swg][swg]

[Anonymous]

[#welcome][#welcome][#welcome] Hi!!!!!!!! Welocome to the forum. If you're looking to buy stuff on the internet, here are some good sites:

www.internettrains.com

www.internethobbies.com

www.walthers.com

www.ehobbies.com

Good luck and have fun!!!!!!![:)][:)][:)][:D][;)][8D]

[CP5415]

Welcome to the hobby !!!!!
You can do a lot in HO with the space you have. I'm working with a 9X12 layout myself in HO scale. While I won't be able to have long trains, I will be able to have considerable switching opportunities with the track plan I'm working on.
Most of the ideas I'm using came from Model Railroad magazine & Kalmbachs 101 track plans.

Gordon

[Budliner]

put up a suspended ceiling
the dust will kill it

[Anonymous]

The dust is somthing I have not considered.

The room I plan on doing this in is next to a crawl space, repleat with dirt and dust.

I will have to look at "closing off" the crawlspace to cut down on the majority of the dust...

[CBQ_Guy]

QUOTE: Originally posted by mrbornac

The dust is somthing I have not considered.

The room I plan on doing this in is next to a crawl space, repleat with dirt and dust.

I will have to look at "closing off" the crawlspace to cut down on the majority of the dust...

Hi,

If you don't/can't go the suspended ceiling route (and if you do use the fiberglass panels faced with vinyl rather than the other type which "snow" dust themselves down on the layout), a cheaper alternative is to get some Visqueen vapor barrier type plastic and just staple it to the bottom of your ceiling joists. Crude, but it does the job. I did this in the basement of the old house and it worked great. A friend liked the idea so much that he did it , too. No one really seems to notice as he is a very good modeler so visitor's attention is always focused on his layout. Model Railroading magazine didn't seem to hold it against him, either, as they featured his layout with a cover shot and article a few years back:

"Bruce Brantner's Coyote Division of the Santa Fe"

Anyway, welcome and have a great time with the hobby!

[Anonymous]

just remember one thing! IT is a labor of love also, use your imagination too.do you notice trains when you travel? and how beautiful it looked coming out of the tunnel right at you. the pristine forest surrounds you. and the whistle is the only you hear.
enjoy the hobby.

[Anonymous]

OK, so when I was young, and to this point for me, the thoughts I have around modeling a railroad are based on hauling goods from one spot to another, with a loop that allows the train to run for an extended period of time.

How does the "switching" that many of you do replace the "unending loop" that others use to entertain themselves as the trains roll by...

What is the concept, and where is the challenge/fun in it?

Just trying to figure out what I want to build [:D]

[Anonymous]

[#welcome]

[fiatfan]

As others have said, Welcome!

As to your last question, switching refers to making and breaking trains and then moving those cars to and from industries along the right of way. It's basically the starting and ending point of all movements on your railroad. You want to create industries that move freight from one factory to another. It's also convenient to have an interchange track that allows you to ship cars to locations off your layout. If you design your layout carefully, you can increase the mileage between towns with some very simple tricks. For example, if you were to build three separate towns, one directly in front of you, one to your left, and one to your right, it would be easy enough to design the layout so that to get to the town on your right, you would leave the town via the tracks going to the left. That way, the train would travel almost all the way around the room to get t o the next town. Another design element would be to build in switching puzzles for yourself. In my case, I have a small yard directly to the left of the main control panel. To spot a car from the yard at the industry to my immediate right, that car has to travel almost forty feet because of the way I designed the layout.. Having to do this helps keep me and my equipment busy! However, I have also designed the layout so that on those lazy nights, I can just sit and watch a train run around the room.

A book you may want to purchase is John Armstrong's "Track Planning for Realistic Operation."

Good luck!

Tom

[Anonymous]

Not exactly a "train" comment but you might want to invest in a small dehumidifier. The new concrete on the floor will likely keep the room damp for quite a while after it's installed and could cause some minor problems

[Anonymous]

Thank you Bob, good idea.

[Anonymous]

Greeting Matthew
I hope your fiance doesn't mind you being a "Basement Dweller". It doesn't sound like she'll take up an intrest in hanging out in the "creepy" basement with you. Where do you folks do your laundry? If it's the basement, then offer to do the laundry while you're down there. Just don't mix white with the color stuff.

How long do you plan on living there? Where do you do your wood butchering? You said the planned room is next to a crawl space, is it exposed to the outside? Does it get cold down there?

If you decide to go N scale, think about modular. You can take it with you if you move or, in the mean time, look around for an NTrak modular club in your area to join.

Yes, I know you're not asking for more stuff to read, but there's an article on this web site that explains N scale and modules.

Happy Dwelling!

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by gsetter

Greeting Matthew
I hope your fiance doesn't mind you being a "Basement Dweller". It doesn't sound like she'll take up an intrest in hanging out in the "creepy" basement with you. Where do you folks do your laundry? If it's the basement, then offer to do the laundry while you're down there. Just don't mix white with the color stuff.

How long do you plan on living there? Where do you do your wood butchering? You said the planned room is next to a crawl space, is it exposed to the outside? Does it get cold down there?

If you decide to go N scale, think about modular. You can take it with you if you move or, in the mean time, look around for an N-Trak modular club in your area to join.

Let me hit these one by one.

1 - We have our laundry on the main floor of the house. I do all of it already in exchange for her doing the cat boxes (we have 3 of those guys). She won't mind the basement dwelling too much from the sound of it. I approached her with my intent to do this recently, and instead of getting the expected "Dork" comment from her that I often get, she replied with "Oh, that is cool, would you let me make some of those models?".

hehe, the answer to that is a resounding YES [:D]

2 - Our current plan is 10 years on this house. It is our first, and we have desires to put in a large amount of improvements over that time to increase the value of house. It is about 20 minutes from Madison, WI, and with the real estate prices going up like they are in the "big city", I hope that my home value will be enough higher in 10 years that I can make a nice little profit on the place if we should choose to go [:)]

I am putting together a small woodworking area down there now, and I have decided to move my layout room to the half of the basement that already has a concrete floor. The ceiling is a bit low (the pipes for our boiler hurt when I hit my head on them hehe), but that room is that much farther away from the crawlspace and that grime. The basement is pretty well sealed off, we don't have any holes in the foundation that expose the basement to the outside... It does get cold down there, but I don't mind wearing sweatshirts while I work [:)]

My current plan is to do modular setup of some sort, using the NTrak standards as a guide to get started....

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: ....(cats) we have 3 of those guys

You're a smart man putting in doors to keep the cats out of the layout room. I have four cats myself (I volunteer at my local animal shelter) and I love them very much, but I had trouble keeping them off my first layout. This time I'm raising the layout higher (they're too old to jump more than two feet).

QUOTE: instead of getting the expected "Dork" comment from her that I often get, she replied with "Oh, that is cool, would you let me make some of those models?".

That's cool too. I posted a question asking about women in model railroading. I like the responses.

[Anonymous]

Because of the previously mentioned crawl space and other nasty bugs that live in the basement, the cats we have are not allowed down in the basement.

They sure are curious when I come up stairs though....

[CBQ_Guy]

QUOTE: Originally posted by mrbornac

OK, so when I was young, and to this point for me, the thoughts I have around modeling a railroad are based on hauling goods from one spot to another, with a loop that allows the train to run for an extended period of time.

How does the "switching" that many of you do replace the "unending loop" that others use to entertain themselves as the trains roll by...

What is the concept, and where is the challenge/fun in it?

Just trying to figure out what I want to build [:D]

Hi,

Two sites which may of interest and help answer your question on operation.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ry-ops-industrialSIG/?yguid=154581698

The above is a yahoo discussion email group hosted by the Operations SIG. In case you can't get to it from the link above, just go to yahoogroups.com, and in the search box enter

"Ry-ops-industrialSIG"

exactly, but without the quotes.


Another site is the Operation SIG's web page at:

http://www.opsig.org/

Enjoy!

[CBQ_Guy]

QUOTE:
"Oh, that is cool, would you let me make some of those models?".

Your cause might better be served if you got her to make your trees! [:I]

[Anonymous]

So further investigation into the space I am going to use over the weekend gave me an idea...

I have about a 1 foot wide concrete ledge that runs along the room at about 4 to 5 feet off the ground, where the concrete floor/wall meet the old stone foundation.

Looks like a good slot for staging later on...

It's not very flat/level, but I can work with that....

[Anonymous]

Keep in mind that most rigid foam insulation is very flammable as well as any sheet plastics. Always encapsulate them with fire-rated drywall. Constant humidity and temperature levels will make it far more comfortable for you and guests, as well as keep your layout from growing mold, rusting and expanding and contracting and slowly pulling itself apart. Consider tapping into your forced air HVAC system with but one duct; consult with an HVAC pro for you may have to re-balance air flow upstairs with a simple damper. A good dehumidifier will help-make sure it has provision for hooking up a drain hose and plan where you'll drain water off to. . .Don't spray lacquer if you have pilot lights on H2O htr or gas furnace. Airborne construction dust is cause for concern too- breathing and fire hazard. Door(s) are a must-keeps out critters, unsupervised kids, and dust. If concrete floors are new they'll 'shed' off concrete dust for about a year-seal with appropriate sealers; some are more suited to new construction. Seal any cracks in walls and floor including expansion joint at o/s wall and floor juncture-suggest construction adhesive that works on masonary-it remains flexible and absorbs concrete dust quickly duplicating color of surrounding concrete. Consult with your local building dept. as to recommended or mandated codes for moisture proofing walls and floor. Consider a wood or vinyl floor in at least aisle ways. Concrete is hard on feet and legs after standing on it for considerable periods. There are several ways to finish o/s walls whether they are block, poured concrete or stone. You can attach shimmed furring strips or if wall is very uneven construct a free standing wall afixed to floor and ceiling joists-air between wall and foundation will add R value besides. If RADON is an issue in your area get a test kit or have an inspector test for it. There are right and wrong ways to do this test so read up on it first. I recommend a dropped ceiling with recessed ceiling lights for dust control, finished appearance and overall better lighting and noise insulation. I'd also install a separate elec. breaker at your electrical panel-have pro do it-so you can shut down entire electrical feed to layout incl. recessed lighting (since fluorescent lighting has a less friendly history of catching fire, especially if there is a problem with dust buildup) A true legend in our hobby-the late John Allen- had THE layout in the early 70s and it was left unattended for a couple of weeks after he passed away and one night it caught fire-in his basement- and burned the house essentially to the ground. There are several good books on refinishing basements and suggest you look into them, before you start. Lastly, install a john if your plumbing allows-at least a urinal if it's a guy only thing-you'll be spending a lot of time down there and both the bladder and the stairs are less forgiving as you age! Do this room correctly now and you'll add considerable value and marketability to it when you decide to sell it. It could always be reused as a rec room, etc by next owner.