OK, since the unanimous and overwhelming view of my previous idea for a track plan was "that's just a horrible idea", I've decided to move to a more traditional style. If you missed my last one you didn't miss much.
So, let's see if this one has any merit whatsoever.
View of the total room: http://www.flickr.com/photos/10910181@N05/1419505452/
View of the track plan section only: http://www.flickr.com/photos/10910181@N05/1419508768/
The first thing I notice is that I put the lumber yard on the wrong side of the tracks--literally. But let's move right along.
A few notes:
1. I heard suggestions of doodling instead of using xtrakcad. I royally stink at doodling. Therefore I used xtrackcad again but made NO ATTEMPT to attach tracks, use predefined turnouts, etc. I just "doodled" them using rough drawings. I'll meet you halfway.
2. If you care to read the givens / druthers, they're back here: http://www.trains.com/trccs/forums/1219145/ShowPost.aspx
3. Green = layout edge.
4. Blue = river
5. Pink = buildings, mostly undefined but represents a small town city center.
6. Thick black and dark brown = roads
7. Brown circles = grain elevators
Here's hoping I can get the pictures to appear instead of just hyperlinks this time.
**Apparently no such luck.
Here, I'll help out
For future reference, I linked directly to the images themselves, not the pages that they're posted on.
Half tempted to move those couches and TV stuff "Down" and then expand as necessary into that space.
I like the new presentation but fear that having that railroad shoved into a corner is not exactly helping.
This plan is an improvement. If it makes you feel better, I went through 19 drafts on my plan before I got a really good one. And to put that in perspective, I only changed numbers on major changes and where I stopped was trackplan19f.xtc The thing is that if there is something you don't like, this is the time to fix it. Work on it, get help, work some more, get some more help, etc. etc.
Now if this were my layout, I'd punch a couple tunnel sized holes in your wall into the storage room in the lower left and lower right sides of your drawing. I would add 4-5 staging tracks on both sides so that your layout can now represent a section of a much larger layout. With your loop you can still railfan and just run trains if you like, but now you will have the option of running ops sessions that can last a few hours with several people.
I've heard many people say "that will never happen", but the fact of the matter is that people grow in the hobby. If you can, you want to plan for that growth as opposed to outgrowing your layout before the scenery is finished.
There are several things we could talk about such as the runarounds in the industries and the yard configuration, but I'll leave this post on the conceptual level and let the others be more pragmatic.
Chip
Building the Rock Ridge Railroad with the slowest construction crew west of the Pecos.
I just noticed we have very similar space. Just for giggles, here's my plan. It is set in the 1885 California Sierra Foothills.
Gazoo wrote: 1. I heard suggestions of doodling instead of using xtrakcad.
1. I heard suggestions of doodling instead of using xtrakcad.
You missed half of my suggestion, or I didn't make it clearly. I also said to take a step back, spend a little time learning about layout design, then come up with a plan (how ever you decide to draw it).
The current plan places nearly the widest part of the layout at the point you'll need to crawl under a million times during construction.
It's a little better than the Prairie Dog Village, but I'm afraid it will still be a real pain. (Literally)
It would seem to me that either of these two approaches would be a little better.
The first moves one of the loops into the open part of the room, easing access and improving viewing.
The second moves a loop into staging. You can still have a relatively deep scene, but it allows you to move around the layout comfortably. Believe me, you'll want that.
Again, I think your best bet is to stop designing for a while and study a bit, but that's just my opinion.
ByronModel RR Blog
Layout Design GalleryLayout Design Special Interest Group
(I'm not exactly sure what the black lines represent, so my idea may be totally off-base - but here goes.)
In your lower-right (southeast) corner, it looks like you have a single track with a bridge connecting the two loops. If you're willing to eliminate that, you could have an open access aisle to get to your 'observation post' area without the need for ducking or crawling under - a major thing to consider if you want to entertain guest operators with bad backs, etc.
-Ken in Maryland (B&O modeler, former CSX modeler)
cuyama wrote: Gazoo wrote: 1. I heard suggestions of doodling instead of using xtrakcad. You missed half of my suggestion, or I didn't make it clearly. I also said to take a step back, spend a little time learning about layout design, then come up with a plan (how ever you decide to draw it).The current plan places nearly the widest part of the layout at the point you'll need to crawl under a million times during construction. It's a little better than the Prairie Dog Village, but I'm afraid it will still be a real pain. (Literally)It would seem to me that either of these two approaches would be a little better.The first moves one of the loops into the open part of the room, easing access and improving viewing.The second moves a loop into staging. You can still have a relatively deep scene, but it allows you to move around the layout comfortably. Believe me, you'll want that.Again, I think your best bet is to stop designing for a while and study a bit, but that's just my opinion.ByronModel RR Blog
Now THIS is an improvement.
No, I got the second part as well as the first part, and I thank you for both. I've read some and I have reached a point where, knowing my personality, I'm saturated with information. I will learn very little else until I start driving nails and making mistakes. It's just me.
And I REALLY, REALLY thank you for the effort to assist by re-drawing the plans. However, here's what's not included in the drawing: the part of the storage room you covered with track in idea #1 (western wall) has built-in home theater components. It's not impossible to move, but it's not moving any time soon. So why not just move the TV now? Because on the southern-most wall of the total room is a painted-on chalk board on the wall. I have a 3.5 year old and a 13-month old. Mommy would not approve of disposing of that after she was so proud of adding it to the basement. In 8-10 years, though, it's gone and the TV is in its place.
Now, inside the storage room are built-in shelves. 1" plywood, solid as a rock, wall-to-wall. Again, not impossible to move, but I think I would much rather duck under the river than attempt to move them.
I honestly don't think I'll mind ducking under the river, and then operating from inside the loop. But, that should not stop you all from giving me your honest and straightforward opinions. I'm listening!!
It's too bad you can't find a way to make Byron's first plan work because it's really nice and would look good while being easy to work on.
If you must stick with the island plan (which, BTW, is still a big improvement on your first plan), listen to what Chip and the rest of us middle aged to older guys tell you. You will absolutely hate having to crawl under the layout every time you want to make any little change. If you plan on adding lighting, you're going to hate the underside of your layout enough without seeing any more than you have to. Try reworking the plan with some scenic feature like the river made wider as part of a canyon that you can lift out and put aside until you're done with construction and then making the constant and never-ending adding and rearranging of details that will continue for the life of your layout.
Gazoo wrote: cuyama wrote: It would seem to me that either of these two approaches would be a little better.The first moves one of the loops into the open part of the room, easing access and improving viewing.The second moves a loop into staging. You can still have a relatively deep scene, but it allows you to move around the layout comfortably. Believe me, you'll want that.And I REALLY, REALLY thank you for the effort to assist by re-drawing the plans. However, here's what's not included in the drawing: the part of the storage room you covered with track in idea #1 (western wall) has built-in home theater components. It's not impossible to move, but it's not moving any time soon. So why not just move the TV now? Because on the southern-most wall of the total room is a painted-on chalk board on the wall. I have a 3.5 year old and a 13-month old. Mommy would not approve of disposing of that after she was so proud of adding it to the basement. In 8-10 years, though, it's gone and the TV is in its place. Now, inside the storage room are built-in shelves. 1" plywood, solid as a rock, wall-to-wall. Again, not impossible to move, but I think I would much rather duck under the river than attempt to move them.I honestly don't think I'll mind ducking under the river, and then operating from inside the loop. But, that should not stop you all from giving me your honest and straightforward opinions. I'm listening!!
cuyama wrote: It would seem to me that either of these two approaches would be a little better.The first moves one of the loops into the open part of the room, easing access and improving viewing.The second moves a loop into staging. You can still have a relatively deep scene, but it allows you to move around the layout comfortably. Believe me, you'll want that.
How about taking Byron's second idea and do the return loop in the corner instead of inside the storage room - ie do a plain dogbone ? Here I just sketched in 60 cm (23.5") radius return curves, and indicated a few of places where you could have spurs branching off:
There are a lot of other options you can do - you could e.g. do a fairly thin shelf layout twice around the space - here is a layout design I have (thanks to a lot of help from helpful people in this forum!) for a room that is 11 1/2 feet wide by 6 1/2 feet deep :
Here is a link to the Model Railroader track plan database:
http://www.trains.com/mrr/default.aspx?c=tp&id=93
Have a look e.g. at Jerry Boudreaux's Red Rock Northern - which is a pretty hefty twice around 9x11 foot layout which also has great engine operational opertunities, from the June 2007 Model Railroader :http://www.trains.com/mrr/default.aspx?c=a&id=1235
Or the Metro Belt and Terminal from the April 2001 layout:http://www.trains.com/mrr/default.aspx?c=a&id=1445
Richard Mallery's Boggs Landing & Trotwater RR from June 2001:http://www.trains.com/mrr/default.aspx?c=a&id=1449
How about Paul Hanson's "Layout design for guest bedroom" posted here - read the entire thread and see how high he is planning to put his mostly freestanding layout: http://www.trains.com/trccs/forums/1182716/ShowPost.aspx
There is a lots of ways of doing this.
Btw - one of the factors which seem to drive your designs so far may be an unstated given or druthers - it seems to me that both of your proposals contains multiple alternative continuous run routes through your layout. Maybe you subconsciously are afraid that it will be boring to just have one route through the landscape for continuous run/display running.
But I suggest you decide whether alterative routes for continuous run is something you must have, or just something that slipped in without a conscious decision.
Smile,Stein
Gazoo wrote: cuyama wrote:You missed half of my suggestion, or I didn't make it clearly. I also said to take a step back, spend a little time learning about layout design, then come up with a plan (how ever you decide to draw it).The current plan places nearly the widest part of the layout at the point you'll need to crawl under a million times during construction. It's a little better than the Prairie Dog Village, but I'm afraid it will still be a real pain. (Literally)It would seem to me that either of these two approaches would be a little better.The first moves one of the loops into the open part of the room, easing access and improving viewing.The second moves a loop into staging. You can still have a relatively deep scene, but it allows you to move around the layout comfortably. Believe me, you'll want that.Again, I think your best bet is to stop designing for a while and study a bit, but that's just my opinion.ByronModel RR BlogNo, I got the second part as well as the first part, and I thank you for both. I've read some and I have reached a point where, knowing my personality, I'm saturated with information. I will learn very little else until I start driving nails and making mistakes. It's just me.And I REALLY, REALLY thank you for the effort to assist by re-drawing the plans. However, here's what's not included in the drawing: the part of the storage room you covered with track in idea #1 (western wall) has built-in home theater components. It's not impossible to move, but it's not moving any time soon. So why not just move the TV now? Because on the southern-most wall of the total room is a painted-on chalk board on the wall. I have a 3.5 year old and a 13-month old. Mommy would not approve of disposing of that after she was so proud of adding it to the basement. In 8-10 years, though, it's gone and the TV is in its place. Now, inside the storage room are built-in shelves. 1" plywood, solid as a rock, wall-to-wall. Again, not impossible to move, but I think I would much rather duck under the river than attempt to move them.I honestly don't think I'll mind ducking under the river, and then operating from inside the loop. But, that should not stop you all from giving me your honest and straightforward opinions. I'm listening!!
cuyama wrote:You missed half of my suggestion, or I didn't make it clearly. I also said to take a step back, spend a little time learning about layout design, then come up with a plan (how ever you decide to draw it).The current plan places nearly the widest part of the layout at the point you'll need to crawl under a million times during construction. It's a little better than the Prairie Dog Village, but I'm afraid it will still be a real pain. (Literally)It would seem to me that either of these two approaches would be a little better.The first moves one of the loops into the open part of the room, easing access and improving viewing.The second moves a loop into staging. You can still have a relatively deep scene, but it allows you to move around the layout comfortably. Believe me, you'll want that.Again, I think your best bet is to stop designing for a while and study a bit, but that's just my opinion.ByronModel RR Blog
Is there any reason you couldn't build on plan 2, but wait on the staging a couple years (as needed)? It looks like a fairly good plan to start with, personalized for your taste, of course. Build it now with access and tracks leading off to staging, and when you're ready, and have a need for it, go into the storage room and build the staging. Nobody says you have to build it now.
Also, it would be helpful to the rest of us in the forum if you would add the rest of your room's features, furnishings, shelves, and anything else to your drawing. You don't necessarily need to "draw" *everything*, but at least label it (like the painted-on chalkboard) where it is.
Oh, and I almost forgot, I built a layout with duckunders (more like crawlunders), and I thought I could deal with it. The room was carpeted, and it wasn't too bad crawling under, but, quite honestly, it did get old fairly quick, and I've since sworn I'd never have another duckunder again. This was about 10 years ago, and I'm 36 now. I would, however, consider a lift out, tilt up, or swing out section of some kind.
If you absolutely insist on a "open pit" layout, I would strongly suggest using a drop section or something so that it's not a "duckunder". You could use a piano hinge to make a 24" wide drop section, and use door hinges or barrel bolts (or something) to hold up the other end for operating. **IMPORTANT** If using this arrangement, be sure to install safety switches so trains do not take a dive over an open drop section. There are too many of us here on the forum that have had this happen, usually to our best, most expensive engines. (No, it has not happened to me .... yet, and I plan (hope) to keep it that way.)
Brad
EMD - Every Model Different
ALCO - Always Leaking Coolant and Oil
CSX - Coal Spilling eXperts
--The whole reason I didn't build it with an opening between the loops in the first place is that I couldn't figure out how to make the return loops a reasonable radius. It's 26 inches right now, I'd hate to make it any tighter.
--I guess I assumed it was not feasible to build a lift-out section of curved track--could I lift out part of a section of curved track (taking part of a loop and lifting it out)?? I guess it's no different than straight track: if it's lined up right it will work fine, if not it won't. Anybody ever try this?
--The river was actually a throw-in when I figured I couldn't leave enough space to walk between the loops. At most I have about 10" under the current setup if I get rid of the river. What's the minimum? I'm a size 32 pant but 10" isn't much.
--I could move the return loop to the southwest corner, as suggested by steinjr, and then make the south central and southeast parts just be dead end tracks. It seems like a waste of real estate, though, for continuous running.
--How about this as an alternative: I can move the southern loop further east, out into the room. Then take the northern loop and move it as far to the northwest as possible. (Basically steinjr's suggestion in reverse.) A quick test of that shows me I can create a walkway between the two loops. The upside of doing the reverse of steinjr's suggestion is twofold, I think: I plan to expand along the north wall anyway, and I think it gives me a slightly longer mainline.
steinjr: I will check out the track plans you linked for ideas. Thank you for you help and efforts. I have a couple books of track plans that I've been referencing but there are always better ideas out there.
steinjr wrote: Btw - one of the factors which seem to drive your designs so far may be an unstated given or druthers - it seems to me that both of your proposals contains multiple alternative continuous run routes through your layout. Maybe you subconsciously are afraid that it will be boring to just have one route through the landscape for continuous run/display running.
A fair and observant point. I don't plan to have other people over for extensive operating sessions, but I intend to play with it myself!!
twcenterprises wrote: Also, it would be helpful to the rest of us in the forum if you would add the rest of your room's features, furnishings, shelves, and anything else to your drawing. You don't necessarily need to "draw" *everything*, but at least label it (like the painted-on chalkboard) where it is.
There is very little else in the room we haven't discussed yet that is not moveable. There is a pillar I forgot to draw that is 3' off the wall of the storage room, which might get interesting if I expand that direction, but other than that there is nothing of interest that can't be moved.
Hi,
I like the idea of a loop in the storage room. This could then be easily modified for a second level to be added in the future.
Frank
"If you need a helping hand, you'll find one at the end of your arm."
Gazoo wrote: --The whole reason I didn't build it with an opening between the loops in the first place is that I couldn't figure out how to make the return loops a reasonable radius. It's 26 inches right now, I'd hate to make it any tighter.
H0 scale, right ? You were not planning to run passenger trains ? What kinds of engines and cars are you thinking ?
FYI, John Armstrong classifies curves in three groups - with sharp curves being 18" radius, conventional curves being 24" radius and broad curves being 30" radius. Give or take a little.
24" curves is not extremely tight. But it all comes down to what kind of engines and cars you expect to run.
Gazoo wrote: --I guess I assumed it was not feasible to build a lift-out section of curved track--could I lift out part of a section of curved track (taking part of a loop and lifting it out)?? I guess it's no different than straight track: if it's lined up right it will work fine, if not it won't. Anybody ever try this?
It has been done. It has even been done with curved track on elevators taking stopped trains from one level to the next.
Gazoo wrote: --The river was actually a throw-in when I figured I couldn't leave enough space to walk between the loops. At most I have about 10" under the current setup if I get rid of the river. What's the minimum? I'm a size 32 pant but 10" isn't much.
For a human being of normal proportions - with the shape most of us take on a few years down the line ?
You should probably allow about 24" (ie 2') at the narrowest.
Gazoo wrote: --I could move the return loop to the southwest corner, as suggested by steinjr, and then make the south central and southeast parts just be dead end tracks. It seems like a waste of real estate, though, for continuous running.
Think of it more as "available for later expansion" than as "wasted space"
You can always later add a loop down alongside the storage room wall on the left side of the main room, or let tracks go through the wall into the storage room But seriously - it really depends on what effect you are going for.
Gazoo wrote: --How about this as an alternative: I can move the southern loop further east, out into the room. Then take the northern loop and move it as far to the northwest as possible. (Basically steinjr's suggestion in reverse.) A quick test of that shows me I can create a walkway between the two loops. The upside of doing the reverse of steinjr's suggestion is twofold, I think: I plan to expand along the north wall anyway, and I think it gives me a slightly longer mainline.
Sketch it out. Do some test running. Change it again, and repeat until happy. I have 86 different sketches in my layout directory before I finally was happy with my plan.
Gazoo wrote: steinjr: I will check out the track plans you linked for ideas. Thank you for you help and efforts. I have a couple books of track plans that I've been referencing but there are always better ideas out there.
If you don't have John Armstrong's "Track Planning for Realistic Operations", then I also warmly recommend getting it. You don't have to actually want to run operations to get good use out of that book - it gives a lot of practical advice about how real railroads do things, how you can model things, hint and tips etc.
Good luck with your planning!
Smile, Stein