Things you will never see on my ho layout

[the old train man]

1 spider webs on the mainline

2 o scale automobiles

3 1 inch trees in the foreground & 6 inch trees in the background

4 real water in the lakes and streams and especially in the ocean scenes.

5 traction tires on a caboose

6 engines pulling more than 200 cars around the layout

7 a wye in a tunnel

8 a spur track in a tunnel

9 a turntable in a tunnel

10 a cab forward pulling an ac6000 around the layout

11 a night scene with no lights

12 footprints

13 real weeds growing between the ties of the track

14 purple houses

15 elephants grazing along with cows in a pasture

16 brass rail

17 a mortuary scene

18 telephone poles with scale working wires

19 an airport with 7 fullsize passenger planes on the runway

20 engines that go over 150 scale mph

21 x rated scenes

22 curves sharper than 14 inches

23 manual switches on the back of the layout,further than 4 feet from the edge of the layout

24 a sign saying, Im finally thru with my layout

 

 

 

 

[RR_Mel]

You nailed pretty much everything on your original post.  I do have two on your list; first I have a hidden spur track in my mountain (behind a tunnel) for storage.  The other thing that is very hard to get rid of is spider-mite webs.  That reminds me, it’s Bug Bomb time again.

 

 

 

 

Mel

 

Modeling the early to mid 1950s SP in HO scale since 1951

 

My Model Railroad   

http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/

 

Bakersfield, California

 

I'm beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.

[tstage]

Most of those that you've listed plus graffiti and smoke.  Tag...you're it.

Tom

[the old train man]

Mel,friend of mine modeled a weed killer car & put insecticide instead of weed killer in the car.Worked pretty good til a roach died on the tracks & derailed his new 2- 8- 8 -2....................Just kidding.

[the old train man]

Tom,I forgot to mention real rain water to match my rolling thunder,your it.

[BRAKIE]

About that purple house..Sorry to disappoint there is or was  at one time a purple house on RT.4 outside of Attica (Oh) several years ago.

I will add freight cars that does not fit the era I'm modeling.

[JOHN C TARANTO]

Here's a few more:

1. Dinosaurs

2. Hot Wheels vehicles

3. Round "tennis ball" like trees packed into the background

4. Political signs referring to actual campaigns in progress or hot-button issues

5. Small cards or thumb tacks attached to the roofs of my rolling stock

6. Fake grass mat

7. Un-realistic smoke from my locomotives

 

[the old train man]

Remember guys,I said you wont find them on MY layout.If you want to include any of the above mentioned,be my guest,just so your having fun. I do have a ho scale world war two tank im thinking about putting on the layout with a crushed auto behind it.

[Anonymous]

All of the op's list except 18, 21 and 24 (the layout wont be more than a 30" reach to any point).   Also add no battery powered locomotives, just capacitors.  You cant have current detected signaling if you dont clean the rails.

[steemtrayn]

A single track main that goes double just as it enters a tunnel.

[BATMAN]

Everything must be to scale, no ifs, ands or buts!

 

 

[chutton01]

the old train man

I do have a ho scale world war two tank im thinking about putting on the layout with a crushed auto behind it.

If you're trying to avoid 'whimsey' (are you?), why not put the tank (some version of the Sherman M4 I guess, those are pretty common models in HO) on a plinth (well, a square representing a concrete pad) as a stuffed and mounted model. Hey, if it worked for old steam locomotives...

Now, as to the other items on your list...
12 footprints  -- No muddy areas or swampy land on your layout? Footprints (assuming human...actually, what about deer or horse tracks?). Tire tracks?

13 real weeds growing between the ties of the track -- Real weeds? OK, what kind of micro-bonsai bio-technology are your refusing to use here anyway? OTOH, little used spurs and branches are vegetation magnets, and there is quite an availability of model foliage and grasses nowadays

14 purple houses  -- There was one not far from my house, next to the LIRR Montauk line.  That said, such colorations for houses (such as pink, purple, turquoise, etc) can be pretty rare if they are not used as retail outlets or art/antique shops...

18 telephone poles with scale working wires -- I presume you mean EZ Line thread here, and while there is definitely a tangle hazzard using it, the results do look nice (and it does snap back under mild deformation).

21 x rated scenes - You're no fun anymore...

For me, it's

No cutsey/overused scenes like cops hiding behind billboards or dogs wizzing on hydrants or firemen rescuing a treed cat (COUGH!_{woodland scenics mini-scenes}COUGH!)
In conjunction, keep company/business names reasonably realistic (No W.E. Snatchem's here).

No industries with building smaller than the freight cars they recieved will be modeled.  Instead, either they will be modeled as flats, with extensions off into the backdrop, or implies via a sizable transload operation I plan to create (with warehousing and unloading equipment - maybe not as cool as branch lines snaking thru canyons between industrial buildings from the pre-Conrail era, but even by the 1980s such old indutrial buildings were being repurposed as offices, public storage, and condos when they weren't being torn down all together.

Oh yes, everything gets a light weathering, but not to George Sellios hyper-depression-era-apocalypse levels.

[Anonymous]

chutton01

18 telephone poles with scale working wires -- I presume you mean EZ Line thread here, and while there is definitely a tangle hazzard using it, the results do look nice (and it does snap back under mild deformation).

I actually want to string code line for my signals and actually transmit over it.  Thinking of using magnet wire.

[Jimmy_Braum]

for my protolanced wheeling-

NO CSX smaller than a six axle. 

No modeled derailments 

no equipment older than 1990  

 

 

[NYBW-John]

A flatcar with a missile launcher.

[NYBW-John]

Handlaid track.

[cowman]

WW II tank can be a static display in a memorial park.  I have a 105 mm howitzer, if I ever get the layout going to put a park on.

Have fun,

Richard 

[riogrande5761]

What the saying?  Its your layout and you can put or not put whatever you want on your layout.

[ATLANTIC CENTRAL]

cowman

WW II tank can be a static display in a memorial park.  I have a 105 mm howitzer, if I ever get the layout going to put a park on.

Have fun,

Richard 

 

I model 1954, both M4 Shermans and 105 howitzers were still active duty........

Sheldon

[mbinsewi]

the old train man

spider webs on the mainline

My layout sits dormant all summer, and I have a lot of hidden mainline track.  You should see what the loco looks like, when I run the first train, in the fall.  The front handrails are draped with cob webs. 

Mike.

[ATLANTIC CENTRAL]

Things you will never see (or hear) on my layout:

crime

graf.....

passenger cars with gaps between the diaphragms

semi scale wheels or couplers

any prototype built after 1954 (well nothing real obvious anyway)

locos with onboard sound

locos with smoke

 

Sheldon

[hon30critter]

Now there's a topic which will cause many of us to politely disagree!

I'm with Sheldon on the locos with smoke, but I have to politely disagree with him when it comes to sound.

Spider webs will be hard to avoid given that my layout will be in a garage that is already quite well populated with the crawly little beasts. I don't believe that insecticide bombs are available in Canada, but 20 seconds with a regular insect killer spray will do the same thing. I think I can still hold my breath for 20 seconds. I also plan on running a car with a tunnel clearance gauge to remove as many of the webs as possible.

Any material that will attract mice. No papier mache, no real twigs for tree trunks....

No Hot Wheels automobiles!!

No cops and robbers, in fact no cops period. I'm not anti cop, but I prefer to not see them.

No bottle brush trees (unless they are really convincing).

No hobos.

No couples engaged in, uh, umm, you know... 'two spoons in a drawer' or variations thereof.

No nudes in a window. Nudists would be OK although I don't know where I would put them, but peeping Tom scenes are out! I don't like people who disrespect others' privacy.

No peeing dogs.

No CN noodle script. My era is too early for it anyhow, but I just don't care for the logo. Same with CP's Pac Man crap!

There are likely more things that will not see the light of day on my layout but I can't think of them right now.

Entertaining thread!

Dave

[Anonymous]

You won´t see just about anything you´ll find on your layout on my layout!

My layout is based on themes of the famous Glacier Express narrow gauge train in Switzerland - tha´ts why!

You won´t find spider webs as well - the layout is in our Office/guest/laundry room and my wife is not at all fond of these creepy crawlies!

["JaBear"]

ATLANTIC CENTRAL

any prototype built after 1954 (well nothing real obvious anyway)

Would a 58 Chevy Bel Air be too obvious?

 

Cheers, a wondering Bear.

[joe323]

Actually I got rid of the Hot Wheels vehicles as I could afford more scale vehicles.  Still have the Matchbox and Hess mini trucks in the background though.

[ATLANTIC CENTRAL]

 

 

ATLANTIC CENTRAL

any prototype built after 1954 (well nothing real obvious anyway)

 

 

Would a 58 Chevy Bel Air be too obvious?

 

Cheers, a wondering Bear.

 

Well, you might find one or two of them, since it is one of my most favorite old cars.......

Sheldon

[oldline1]

Well, cobwebs suck but in NW Arkansas on a farm way out in the country that's just a daily fight.

Otherwise there will be NO:

NYC or UP

lunar landing sites

circus trains or tents

anything more recent than 1955

multiple track scenes stacked to gain mileage ala G&D

working signals

Roger Huber

Deer Creek Locomotive Works

[Lone Wolf and Santa Fe]

Rule number one: On my layout you will never see tools, paint brushes, pens, drinks, or any other man made object that is not part of the model. Anything else is ok as long as it’s a part of the model.

On my layout you will never see an empty building’s interior unless it is meant to be a vacant building. All buildings have detailed interiors or they have window treatments which you can not see through. These structures have detailed scenes on the outside instead.

On my layout you will never see dinosaurs or UFOs but you will see a giant insect on the set of a science fiction movie being filmed, a dragon at the Renaissance Faire, and rumor is that Bigfoot was sighted in the mountains along with one or two abominable snowmen.

I’m with others who have no crime. I used to have cops and robbers having shoot outs, and gang bangers rioting but I cleaned up my cities. The highway patrol no longer even pulls people over for traffic tickets. However the vehicle code is strictly enforced on the rules below.

You will never see a vehicle in a traffic lane without a driver. A rearview mirror is also required.

On my layout you will see HO scale Hot Wheels. They might not be for everyone but they work for my car show scene. These are not your old, Redline, S scale, toy cars from your childhood. They are proper HO scale hot rods.

Never say never: I am planning on building two other additional layouts. One is going to be a Virginia and Truckee, wild west layout, which I just started collecting items for. On this layout there will be train robbers and shootouts. Maybe even some guy hung from a tree.
The other layout’s location is on Mars (based on the movie, the Ghosts of Mars, also Total Recall) so there is a possibility there might be a UFO…TBD

[hardcoalcase]

Diesels

[tomikawaTT]

Most of the above apply with equal validity to my !:80 scale HOj layout, with exceptions and additions:

From the original post:

       #7  Wye in a tunnel.  When the schematic of the Netherworld is straightened out the connection between the Up main and the Down main in Nonomura proves to be one leg of a wye that actually closes at the other end of the room, in Minamijima.  It is traversed by every locomotive hauled train that reenters the visible world at the same place from which it left.  Trains from Nonomura staging actually back through that connection before proceeding Down to Tomikawa.

       #8  Spurs in tunnel.  Nonomura staging is all spurs - arriving trains back into storage.

       #9  I don't have a turntable in a tunnel, locomotives turn on the wye.

       #12  Footprints.  My 1:80 scale people are walking on dirt, or trying to get a three wheel minitruck out of a mudhole.

       #16  Brass rail.  I make judicious use of this asset, not for track where locomotives roll, but as strategically placed scenery.  Some of my guard rails are brass, but the running rails are all nickel-silver.

       #23  Manual points a long haul from the front of the layout.  ALL of my finger-throw points are controlled at the fascia (no mitts in the scenery) and connected to the actual points by cable under tension.

Additions specific to my choice of prototype:

        Standard gauge rolling stock.  Whether US prototype or Shinkansen, it wouldn't have been found in the Upper Kiso Valley in September, 1964.  Extend that to include Japanese prototypes that first appeared at a later date.

        Godzilla.

 

As for the X-rated, the window shutters of the gentlemens' club private rooms remain discreetiy closed...

Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)