I seem to recall an article in MR (or maybe some other magazine) many years ago that suggested operations on our layouts could be improved by limiting the number of cars we have in service. IIRC, the article suggested that we should limit the number of cars on our railroads by type according to the capacity of the places each type could logically be stopped. I think it suggested some ratio of cars to total capacity but I'm not sure what that ratio was.
I've searched the MR archive unsuccessfully for that article. Can anyone point me to it or does anyone have a better memory of it than I have?
Any experience or thoughts along these lines would also be appreciated.
ChuckAllen, TX
I kind of remember what you're referring to. Can't remember what issue that was in though. I do know that a while back I got more of the A-Line/Proto Power West storage trays for offline storage of my rolling stock after realizing that my staging yards were getting too full, and it was spilling out onto the rest of the layout, which made it difficult to get trains in and out of the yards as well as sort cars in the yards.
Kevin
http://chatanuga.org/RailPage.html
http://chatanuga.org/WLMR.html
I enjoy building rolling stock models, from scratch, from kits, kitbashed, any old way. Result, after many years of model building I have far more cars than will fit on my layout. The extra cars live in the boxes they came in, on shelves in my shop. Every so often I take some cars out of the shop and put them on the layout, and I have to take some cars off the layout and put them in their boxes on the shelves. It's a hobby, I do the part I enjoy. If that gives me more cars than I need (a lot more cars than I need) so be it.
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
dstarr I'm pretty much in the same boat as you but probably on a smaller scale. I've got nearly 100 freight cars and about 20 passenger cars but no home layout; I operate on a club layout.
That club layout is unfortunately jammed with what I think is too many cars for less stressful operations. What I'm looking for here is others' estimations of how many cars are too many for realistic operations.
That depends a lot on layout size, and operation style.
A 18" wide 8' long shelf layout designed for industry switching can fit way fewer cars than a large 20x20 club layout designed for mainline ops.
Generally, if a operations style layout, no more cars than needed for a full ops session, smooth switching and ops is the goal, so less cars is better. Goal is operations without bottlenecks. If bottlenecks occur, even occasionally, it is a major issue.
If it's built to display your trains or railfan, more cars can fit. Now the goal is to see more trains, even if operations is impacted by that. Bottlenecks can and do occur, but are not a big deal.
I seem to recall that you should count all car spots, all available in both industry and yard, then subtract 10-15% if switching ops style, then adjust the number up or down from there for smooth operations. But if it's designed for mainline running and more "railfan" style ops, then you could go right up to the spot limit, or even slightly passed said number of spots, without problems.
So the answer? It depends.....
Ricky W.
HO scale Proto-freelancer.
My Railroad rules:
1: It's my railroad, my rules.
2: It's for having fun and enjoyment.
3: Any objections, consult above rules.
At some point, I read that some high percentage of rolling stock should be "home road." I have been slipping into the habit of getting more Milwaukee box cars, which Accurail regularly supplies. So, I now probably have more rolling stock than I need, but it looks pretty good between the Milwaukee power and the Milwaukee caboose.
At a train show, I found a Milwaukee ice service reefer. It's a great reefer for my fleet. Of all the rolling stock I've added in the last few years, it's one of my favorites.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
cefinkjrI seem to recall an article in MR (or maybe some other magazine) many years ago that suggested operations on our layouts could be improved by limiting the number of cars we have in service. IIRC, the article suggested that we should limit the number of cars on our railroads by type according to the capacity of the places each type could logically be stopped.
Probably a good suggestion, but that shouldn't necessarily mean you'd have to limit how many cars you own, but only how many cars are in use at any time.I have around 400 freight cars, 40 or 50 pieces of passenger equipment and a couple dozen MoW cars, along with perhaps 30 steam locos.In most cases, about 1/5 of each the aforementioned items would be on-layout at any given time.Many will end-up at various on-layout industries, either for loading or unloading, while others may be simply travelling from one staging area to another, or back to the box in which they're usually stored.
About one third of my freight cars are lettered for my "home-roads", but I also have cars from all over North America, and I generally use them wherever I want - not necessarily prototypical for some of them, but this is a model railroad, not a real one.
Wayne
Evening
I don't think there's any such thing as having too many cars but if there is I'm definitely guilty.
If I ever get any of them on the layout someday that would be nice.
I guess I won't have to worry about that right now as I made a rule for myself that I won't be laying any track until everything that's time-consuming is completed.
My other layouts when I was young never got anything done because I was too busy playing Choo Choo all day...
This too many cars in service at one time for realistic operations makes complete sense to me though. As I have no idea what business the Double Stacks will ever be doing on my layout someday. I just bought a couple sets because I thought they looked neat
TF
I just reviewed my Excel inventory spreadsheet. Here's the breakdown of my rolling stock numbers...
That's a total of 237 pieces of rolling stock. At least 75% of those were built from kits over the past 17 years. 40% are my home road (and affiliate roads); 60% other roads - mostly roads east of the Mississippi but a decent number of western heralds. I also enjoy finding obscure roads that might find their way onto an NYC train.
Tom
https://tstage9.wixsite.com/nyc-modeling
Time...It marches on...without ever turning around to see if anyone is even keeping in step.
MisterBeasleyAt some point, I read that some high percentage of rolling stock should be "home road."
This has been one of my biggest complaints about most freelanced railroads. There are just way too few home road cars on most of them.
-Photograph by Kevin Parson
The STRATTON AND GILLETTE has plenty of home road freight cars. I think it is at 30% to 35%, with the DAWDLE AND DELAY at about 10% to 15% of the fleet. That is 40% to 50% of the fleet being one of the two home roads.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
I solved a lot of my too many cars by upgrading my standards.
I discovered I had too many cars when I began full blown operations. All the while I was building my layout, I was accumulating freight cars. I thought my layout was big enough that the thought never hit me that I had too many. I could fit them all on my layout but it clogged everything up. There wasn't enough free space to move trains to. I realized I had to remove some of the freight cars from the layout. I still had about 3 dozen unbuilt cars, mostly Accurail. I now have storage drawers at one of my staging yards and I will fiddle the cars on and off the layout as I see fit. I've also made the decision to go with shorter train lengths, both for freight and passenger trains. It has definitely improved operations.
John Teichmoller suggested that the average modeler has too many PRR hoppers (Hopper trafiic tended to be from on-line mine to consumer or maybe an adjoining railroad) and too few Pennsy boxcars.
Too many cars? I suppose it depends how to look at things.
Let's take a factory for instance. Any factory prodiucing anything.
A car to deliver the raw matrial to the factory. A car to take the finished product away. Fuel to heat the factory be it coal or oil. Staff need feeding. Other incidentals such as packaging, stationery to be delivered.
Over a week that could be three maybe four cars daily minimum
Leeds Sovereign Street has six factories. At least eighteen cars daily.
Then there are through traffic for factories along the line (though not modelled).
I have 68 cars, technically I do not have enough.
David
To the world you are someone. To someone you are the world
I cannot afford the luxury of a negative thought
Back to the original question.
There are two aspects here, mix (which most of the answers have be about) and inventory (total car capacity of the layout.
Basically, about half full is a fluid size for a car inventory. Add up the car capacity of the yards and all the indusry tracks. Divide that by two and that is a good rough start for layout inventory.
I have 280 cars of space in yards, staging and interchanges, and 121 cars of room in industry tracks, for a total of 401 cars of room. I have about 220 cars on the layout, so about half full. I can add another 10-20 cars to the layout, but if I add 50 more cars it will start getting full and adding 100 more cars the layout will seem congested.
I model the P&R (Reading railroad) and have interchanges with the PRR and B&O. My goal of car mix was that every train (10-15 cars) should have at least one, preferrably two, P&R cars and one PRR or B&O car in it.
I have then tried to balance car mix by industry demand. I have lots of iron and steel industry so I am very heavy on gons and hoppers. I model an east coast railroad so I try to have more east coast cars. I have a large textile mill so I do have a selection of southern road cars to bring in cotton.
Detailed breakdowns of my car fleet are in the Rolling Stock section of my website:
Rolling Stock Roster – Wilmington & Northern Branch (wnbranch.com)
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
Defining "too many" cars is near-impossible. I don't keep my 100 freight cars on the layout. Instead, I keep all on a shelf until I need to stage operations. Operations are fun, depending on the siding, I put 6-12 cars in each. This might appear low, but they are longer since I model the 1980s. When I combine cars from 2+ industries, I can get a suitable number of cars without looking unwieldy. I defer to my engineer friends who can discuss force, acceleration, etc.
Bottom line: there really isn't an easy answer.
I have acquired too many freight cars for me and our layout. The cash value of all the highly detailed cars is higher than I want it to be with one son in college, and one approaching college. To add to that, my younger son likes UP stuff and anything "more modern", while I am trying to focus on ATSF 1969 through 1972, so we have essentially two separate fleets.
For what I like, since I basically railfan my own trains, it looks like I will focus on just the boxcar and reefer traffic, and I just bought some decent storage boxes for freight cars.
A bunch of other freight cars and engines are being sold.
ricktrains4824 & dehusman
Your replies were the kind of information I was looking for although your recommended ratios of 90% and 50% of track capacity varied a good bit. My memory was of a ratio of 70%.
The railroad in question is the Texas Northern Model Railroad Club's 3,000 sq ft layout and its 246' double tracked main, an 11-track classification yard, a 7-track staging yard and, depending on how you count them, 8 or 10 industrial areas. The last time I asked how many cars were on the layout, the answer was "about 400"; I have no reason to doubt that this is pretty accurate.
I have always felt that yard or industrial switching was made more difficult (and frustrating) than it should be because we have too many cars to handle. Your answers give me a starting point (other than my somewhat unreliable memory) for suggesting change.
Thanks for your replies.
Experience is the only way to determine the right amount of cars. Start with what you think is right and simply add or subtract until arrive at the correct number. I don't think there is any formula that will give you the answer.
This has been discussed in several magazine articles, books, forums, etc. over the years.
The one I like the best is start with all your yards empty, all your staging tracks full, and industry tracks 50% full.
Personally, I just start with a few cars - 5 or 6. Swtich those a few times then add more if it seems there is room for them. I am doing this now as I build my current railroad with each addition of track allowing more cars.
Paul
Since the original question deals with a large club layout, I was going off that info, most clubs run through trains, and have staging.
Taking 50% of cars from spots out would leave such a layout very sparse looking.
IIRC, through trains, and staging, had cars from said available spots in them, hence removing only the 10-15%.
If industry and yard spots do not receive through freights, which being a "through freight" they simply travel through the scenery, through freights are "free" cars.
Most club layouts are a type of "hybrid" cross between switching operations and railfanning style ops. (Railfanning style ops are mainline freights, little to no switching moves for them.)
This affected the percentage removed. Railfanning style ops need much less car spots freed up for smooth operations.
Purely switching layouts did have a higher percentage of "free spots" needed for smooth operations. But I don't recall it being as high as 50%.
But, I could be flat out wrong on what I remember reading.
As far as that size layout with ~400 cars on it, I have zero idea on if that would be a reasonable number or not. I have zero idea how many feet of track are purely mainline, no any idea how many of those ~400 cars are in mainline "railfanning" style operations.
One other caveat here - How do the other club members like to operate? Do they feel that it is too many cars? Or do they feel it's about right? It's even possible that they feel that more cars are needed on the layout... So us "non-members" can suggest anything with zero real consequence - We can't change what the club is doing as we are not part of said club.
While I do remember an article, I have zero idea where or when. But there was indeed an article that gave a formula to remove "x" percent of cars versus number of available car spots, depending on size and operating style.
MisterBeasley At some point, I read that some high percentage of rolling stock should be "home road."
At some point, I read that some high percentage of rolling stock should be "home road."
It depends. D&RGW being a bridge route probably breaks that convention, except coal trains.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
My freelanced railroad is primarily a bridge route and a majority of my rolling stock are foreign roads, mostly roads that interchange with my fictional road. I've only recently gotten good enough at making my own decals to letter a good amount of home road rolling stock. There's more to be done in that regard but for every home road car I add, something else will have to come off the layout, at least temporarily.
I have about 280 freight cars plus 15 or so cabooses and a few passenger cars and I'm still buying. In other words, I have far more freight cars then will ever fit on my layout.
You might ask why I am regularly buying new freight cars if I already have so many? The answer is that I am trying to upgrade the quality of the cars. When I first started into the hobby, I thought Athearn BB cars were a great buy so I bought a bunch of them. That left me with multiple mediocre cars, many with the same numbers. Those so-so cars will either be sold or donated to my old club (the latter is more likely). I am replacing the Athearns with somewhat upgraded cars from the likes of Bev-Bell primarily because they tend to not have duplicate numbers, and the lettering isn't faded (I'll do that myself). Most of the Athearns that I own have very faint printing which makes re-numbering difficult. I don't like cars with faded logos and fresh numbers.
My home road is Canadian Pacific with a few Toronto Hamilton and Buffalo cars thrown in. I would say that the two roads account for about 60% of my inventory, maybe more.
If I can offer some advice to newcomers, I would say to keep your boxes where the cars will still fit into them with the couplers installed. I threw out most of the boxes simply because I didn't have space to store them. Now that I have some storage space (once the cabinets are assembled) I will have all sorts of room for them. I just ordered 50 new 7"x3 1/2"x2" boxes from Uline. Fortunately they are not too expensive ($2.00 ea. incl. shipping and taxes), but in hindsight it is still money spent that I could have avoided.
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
"Too many cars?".Yes I do have too many same with locomotives no way I can run them all on my layout but I like it that way.
Russell
csxns "Too many cars?".Yes I do have too many same with locomotives no way I can run them all on my layout but I like it that way.
“He who dies with the most trains wins”
I remember years ago when I had too many trains on my layout, so I added some hidden storing tracks. I then expanded my layout with 4 sidings for my western-themed town; all passenger tracks. I added some freight cars into a couple of the trains, to bring supplies into town.
Marlon
See pictures of the Clinton-Golden Valley RR
kasskaboose Defining "too many" cars is near-impossible. I don't keep my 100 freight cars on the layout. Instead, I keep all on a shelf until I need to stage operations. Operations are fun, depending on the siding, I put 6-12 cars in each. This might appear low, but they are longer since I model the 1980s. When I combine cars from 2+ industries, I can get a suitable number of cars without looking unwieldy. I defer to my engineer friends who can discuss force, acceleration, etc. Bottom line: there really isn't an easy answer.
In a way this just shifts the perspective of the question.
If you control [via whatever method] how many cars are on the layout at one time, you can own as many as you want and swap them out between sessions.
But the question of "How many cars is too many [to have on the layout at once]?" is still the same.
Chris van der Heide
My Algoma Central Railway Modeling Blog
maxman“He who dies with the most trains wins”
riogrande5761 MisterBeasley At some point, I read that some high percentage of rolling stock should be "home road." It depends. D&RGW being a bridge route probably breaks that convention, except coal trains.
It's a pretty good "general" rule of thumb overall (if you're modeling a "general" layout and not necessarily a specific location to rigourous accuracy), but if you're modeling a specific line/route/location then the specific geography plays a role.
e.g. if you model a busy main line with lots of connections and industry, you'll see a wide variety. If you model a "bridge" connecting line, you'll see a wide variety of "overhead" traffic beyond what's even modeled on the layout. If you model a stub-end branchline, you'll ONLY see what originates or terminates on that line, so your % of home-road cars will sky-rocket if the line originates more traffic than it terminates.
My railroad is mostly a backwoods resource hauler that runs at right angles to other main railroads. The majority of traffic is originated on line, and even a good portion of that is entirely on-line. It does interchange some of its traffic, and has a limited amount of bridge traffic (although it's not a major route) and receives very little inbound terminating traffic from other roads. So home-road cars make up a very good percentage of cars.