Designing My HO-Scale Room Layout

[Gary S]

Certainly there have been baseball players who have hit home runs in their first Major League at-bat. I think biL was talking about the first-ever at-bat!

[steinjr]

So maybe I should just build a 4x8 just so I could have something to run trains on, it could be built in a reasonable amount of time and I could practice building scenery and if I mess up it would be not big deal. Would this be a good plan or should I do something different ?

It is not a big deal if you "mess up" no matter what kind of layout you build. If you mess up, you just change whatever you didn't like and try again.

You already know what the challenges with a 4x8 in a bedroom is. If you still want to do a 4x8, it is your room, your money and your time, so you get to make the choices too :-)

Personally, I feel that your smartest option is to neither make overly big plans nor get overly defensive.

You drew up several good (in my opinion) track plans for a shelf layout along two walls. This one is my favorite among the ones you drew:



Looks reasonably easy to build, gives you plenty of room to experiment with scenery. Spurs can always be adjusted a little if you decide you want them to run slightly different. Buildings can be swapped in and out to create very different scenic looks, like on Reinhard (faraway)'s layout. It is a decent test bed both for scenery and for operations, with fair chances of reuse - wholly or partially, depending on what kind of layout you later want to make.

But in the end it always comes back to the fact that it is your layout, and you will have to decide what you want to do.

Whatever you decide, I wish you the best of luck.

Smile,
Stein

[Justinmiller171]

Thanks Stein!

I have a small trainroom where I was thinking of building the 4x8, and then I could build the shelf layout in my room after I had had a chance to work on the 4x8 for a few months. I don't mean to sound silly but there are some days where I just feel like running trains around in circles :oops:, but then there are days where I want to run trains realistically. Building just a shelf layout would still leave me with the urge to run trains as fast as they can go, and that may lead to some broken trains!

[Justinmiller171]

Here is a design for a shelf layout:



It is based upon Lance Mindheim's east rail layout track-plan. I ran some trains on it with Xtrkcad and it is very fun to operate, I designed it to be able to change era from the 1990's to the 1950's by replacing some of the buildings, The top two warehouses will be replaced with a log loading area, I have yet to decide what I will replace the other buildings with.

The layout will be set in early December, Specifically December 15th because that is me birthday . The scenery will still be mostly green but with a little bit of snow.

Now before I get to set on this track-plan I have to ask, Are there any problems with the plan that I didn't notice?

[P5se Camelback]

Personally, I like the one that Stein reposted of your earlier design. Run some trains on that and see if it doesn't offer interesting opportunities.

Now ... (he says with a stern voice and serious look on his face) ... all this time Galen and Stein and several others of us have been trying to gently nudge you in a positive direction. The time has come for me to speak my frustration-wracked mind ...

Lance Mindheim is a talented young man. He has done some very interesting and innovative things on his shelf layouts. His model work is very convincing. He has learned how to use a video camera to put together some very interesting model railroad videos.

BUT ... he is NOT a GOD to be worshipped!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Look at what he's done, sure, then look at what John Armstrong and John Allen and Bruce Chubb and Allan McClelland and Tony Koester, not to mention our own Gary S. and Faraway and Stein Jr and Steve and other "Linear Modelers" have done! Study what you see, learn from what you see, and then, by God, do your own thing!!! We will be here to help you find your way, that’s what forums like this are for, and this one is the best at that, hands down! [This place is like working on a college Masters program in Model Railroading for free, with the best possible grad students teaching you!]

Stop copying others! You quite obviously have decent gray matter inside that cranium … USE IT for more than a hat rack!! Your track plans have had some real insight … some very good options. (There have also been some things that needed improvement, and there has always been one of us here to volunteer our insight to critique and help improve your plans.

So … roll with it!

But PLEASE … let Lance Mindheim write his articles and run his business … and you … you Justin do YOUR thing … NOT his!

O.K.! I’ve said my piece. I apologize if it seems harsh. (I didn’t rise to the level of corporate design management that I did by keeping my opinions to myself!) I’ll go sit in the corner for a month if that is the consensus … or if I have totally crossed the line, I’ll just bow out and go back to doing my own thing by myself, as I have done for the decades prior to discovering this wonderful forum full of very talented model railroaders. It was really great fun while it lasted.

But I have been getting frustrated reading all this good advice that’s being meted out to a bright young man like you, with a mind full of wonder and an apparent passion for railroad history, who doesn’t seem to be reading the words that we have been typing, the comprehension and understanding that we have been trying to pass on to you in nicest and most gentle terms. (When I was 16 I didn’t know another model railroader and it was still another 10 or 12 years before I met one, and within a month I moved for a new job!) It often seems as though what we are saying is flying right on by … not sinking in at all! (That’s why in my last post I kept saying, “Now, go back and read what Stein wrote again.” I meant it!!)

I have tried to contribute in a positive way to this thread, as I believe that with proper tutelage, the young people of today will continue our great hobby through tomorrow and pass it on to their offspring.

But I have done all I can, said all I can say.

Goodnight.

I’ll watch my email for my banishment notice on grounds of unnecessary harshness.

Edit: Corrected a couple of typos … bad form in a rant! .

[Justinmiller171]

I only used a few of the parts of Lance's design, I only used the part with the team track and scrap yard, the rest I designed myself, I added a runaround, an interchange track, and changed location and era. I have been trying to follow peoples advice about making my own design but I am Really terrible at track-planning. My Miami layout was based on Kurt's design and the plan that Stein likes was taken from 102 Realistic Track-plans.

Don't worry about sounding too harsh Bil, I like getting criticism

[tetters]

Lance might not be a god.... but I am!

I demand you stop posting track plans and start building a layout.

pretty please?

[Gary S]

O.K.! I’ve said my piece. I apologize if it seems harsh. I’ll go sit in the corner for a month if that is the consensus … or if I have totally crossed the line, I’ll just bow out and go back to doing my own thing by myself

Don't even think it, biL. Although the younger generation may not see the difference between "grumpy old fart" and "very wise man," there are enough folks around here that do.

[Gary S]

Oh... Justin, I second Tetters motion!

BUILD SOMETHING ALREADY!

And if you don't like how it is going, wreck it out and start over!

[Justinmiller171]

Lance might not be a god.... but I am!

I demand you stop posting track plans and start building a layout.

pretty please?

As you command!

Later this week I should start construction of the 4x8 skill-builder layout in my train-room, this should be a small project and I should have most of it done by the end of the year, After that I will start building the shelf layout for my room, Ironically the wort weather we get where I live in during late winter and early spring, So I should start construction of the layout in my room just in time for the bad weather!

If I ever sounded ignorant to any of your guys' advice, Its just because I am A teenager and sometimes I just skim through posts, but I really respect all of your opinions and I look up to all of you(even more than Lance Mindheim). My Miami layout was based on Kurt's layout not Mindheim's, and this layout uses a heavily modified version of one of Mindheim's designs but all of your advice is what inspired the design. I am probably the least experienced person on these forums and I have enjoyed hearing all of you advice and criticism .

[steinjr]

Here is a design for a shelf layout:

<snip>

Now before I get to set on this track-plan I have to ask, Are there any problems with the plan that I didn't notice?

Not sure that the third (lower) wall is worth it. I think that I would have been tempted to stay with two walls, and maybe make two changes:

a) make the runaround a little shorter at the bottom end to free up room for more cars between at the right end of the runaround and the end of track at the lower right hand corner,

and

b) maybe stick a extra track in beneath the track just below canal on the left wing - making the new track be the scrap yard track, and the existing track just below canal be the track towards the rest of the world, while also being work space to stash a few inbound or outbound cars while you work. It would be located reasonably well for work space while switching the industry along the top wall, the upper corner, the scrap yard and the team track, and could also function as your interchange track (where inbound cars start the session and outbound cars end the session). That would allow you to delete the BN interchange, and free up the entire front of the right wing of the layout for scenery.

But what you have will work, and it will give you more space to develop the scrap yard and team track scene. So it is six of one kind vs half a dozen of the other. And those suggestions I make is is relatively minor tweaks anyways - it's easy enough to later add an extra spur or remove a spur or make things longer or shorter if you decide to make changes later.

Not sure you need to build a 4x8 for the express purpose of experimenting with scenery. By all means - build one if you want to run trains fast on a continuous loop . But the plan you have here should be perfectly fine for scenery experimentation - there is room for a gentle hillside in the upper right corner between the curve and the industry in the corner, you can do a railroad bridge over a road (or a road bridge over the railroad) in the lower left corner and do some stuff along the aisleside on the right wing.

Smile,
Stein

[Justinmiller171]

The 4x8 layout I will be building is the Arkansas Southern from the book "Practical Guide to HO model railroading. It is a fairly simple track-plan and shouldn't take very long to build. This layout is mainly just for running trains, and I figure if I am able to run trains, then when I start building my shelf layout I won't rush, and that will allow me to take my time which means The layout will be much better.

[P5se Camelback]

Sounds good, there, young gun ...

so ........

... let's have ...

Less talk ... more action!

We're all pullin' for ya!

[Steamtrains]

Welcome to Big Blue, Jessie....

Go ahead and start a new thread of your own where people can give you some input to your particular situation. Give us some information as to the size of the room, scale you're modeling, the kind of "railroading" you like, what you would like to have (and not have), and so on....You'll find the folks here full of good ideas that will help you along...

Good luck...!!

[paulus_jas]

The Construction of my Ho-scale East-Rail Miami layout is nearing completion and I Began thinking of what I would do when the weather gets too bad to go out to my trainroom to work on my layout, I live in the California Foothills and During Winter and Spring the weather can get pretty bad, Heavy Rain( And Even Snow) During winter, and Rain and Hail during spring. I Decided to build an around the walls shelf layout in my bedroom.

My Main Inspiration for this layout is once again Lance Mindheim. I was reading through the December 1996 Issue of MRR and it featured his Ho-scale Monon Layout, He had to build it in a bedroom so he built it 70" off the ground, I will be doing the same, I will be using a stool to work on the layout.

Edit: Another Inspiration for this project was some of Steinjr's Wonderful Designs he made for me back when I was too stubborn to realize I needed a smaller layout, http://www.trainboard.com/grapevine/show...p?t=118794

Hi Justin,
i do not understand the above, it might be i am not a native speaker. So please help me.
In another thread you just ordered track for a Palmetto Spur version.
In this thread you are planning to build a version of Lance Mindheim's East Rail, which was almost completed and
above all you seem to need gaining experience, so you start building a 8x4; the Arkansas Southern.
BTW as far as I know his Monon Layout was an N-scale empire with a peninsula, lots of pics appeared in MRR=magazine, especilly about a little stream through the fields.

Smile
Paul