I hate my layout

[joefryfry]

....I do have more room in my house to put a layout, but the room is a storage room that is unheated. It gets very cold in there in the winter and warm in the summer. I live in PA, so we have all 4 seasons here. I've read a little here and there about expansion and contraction on a layout. I wondered if I put a space heater in there in the winter to minimize the temperature range if that would make it a good place for a layout. Could I put a layout in a place that possibly has large temp swings?

If you're already having some issues with track moving on you, most likely due to expansion/contraction; moving the layout to the storage room would probably give you fits! Depending on how your bench work is constructed and the materials you used, it may be subject to a lot of expansion/contraction issues.

I haven't worked with N scale since about 1970, but I do recall that working with that scale and even HOn3 was a lot less forgiving then HO. What is a minor shift of the track or very slight bump in HO would most likely be compounded in N scale.

Most important, we've had a half dozen homes burn so far this winter here (KY) because of space heaters (electric and kerosene) so think long and hard about that too.

I'm still considering the storage room, but would have to really not push tolerances with the track laying I suppose. We've used space heaters since we bought our home. We use the plug in radiator kind, which I feel is the safest type.