I leave my trains on the layout. I do have a staging area which is covered where most out-of-service trains live, but I don't pull cars from sidings just to store them for a few days.
Seriously, I would guess that all the handling, boxing and unboxing would be more likely to damage small parts than leaving them there and just worrying about a bit of dust.
My trainrooms have always been in finished spaces, not basements, and the last couple have had air conditioning that keeps the air pretty clean. The trainrooms are a good ways from the kitchen, and nobody smokes in the house, so dust and other airborne contaminants aren't a problem.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Some stay on the layout but most are stored in travel boxes with foam lining. Some I made myself from Bankers Boxes that you can get from Staples and others stores like that. I glued thin foam to cardboard dividers between rows of cars. 8 HW passenger cars or about 20+ hoppers, boxcars, and others. My locomotives go back into the original boxes.
Pete.
As an off-shoot to the thread...Do you save the boxes....I'll create another thread since many folks said that they throw away the boxes.
My personal experience. I have a small layout. As a general rule, I swap out cars and locos from time to time, so I'm always taking them from and putting them back into their boxes. Also, when I'm not running the layout for a while, I clear out the layout of all cars and locos just to keep them from getting dust and damaged.
Of course, I do this because I have a small layout and I don't mind.
In MR, I often see these wonderful layouts with lots of cars on them, and think to myself what a chore it would be for me to do what I normally do.
Do you keep your trains on the layout? Do you park them in a "safe" place? How do you protect them and do you have suggestions for others?
- Douglas