Show us your layout

[jbrock27]

There is some creativity there GG1!!

[Terry Toenges]

Neat job.

[GG1onFordsDTandI]

Neat job.

Thanks Terry

[rogertra]

The point is, none of the above are "right" and none of them are "wrong".  If the owner has fun, then that's all that matters.

You know where my interest lay but that makes me neither right nor wrong but it does make me discriminate over what model railroads I prefer to see.  And there's nothing wrong with that, either.

Didn't you type this post roger? Seems rather hypocritical now.

Yes, you are quite right, I did and was being hypocritical.

I actually just logged on to delete my previous posts as I realised I was in the wrong.

Please accept my unreserved apology.  I shall delete my post as, in hind sight, it was completely off the mark.

[Jerrys HO]

Hi gang.
Just an update on my layout. No pics as of yet as I have been trying to finish it off on anyrail as per Mr. Bal's request. So here it is and what you see is actually there. I'll try to post pics soon. Any replies welcome...



Wish the scenery was coming along as fast as the layout growth.

Jerry

[GG1onFordsDTandI]

Hi gang.
Just an update on my layout.
Jerry

Best of both worlds, with loops, and a yard, its tailored to suit a variety of action .

Has anyone else screwed around with the SCARM program yet? Any-rail is great for 2d planning fast, but the 3d feature on SCARM is pretty cool and full version is free. (The script is harmless, from what I've read, and experienced, and it will likely be removed soon too.)

Alright you readers from afar, as you look below, Where are we? (Double points if you're a "Yank")

2d view-(track can be colored, ties on/off, multiple trestle styles, tunnels bridges, etc..)


3d view-


3d wire frame view-


3d bare track-


Modified-
3d wire from another angle

[Doneldon]

Jerry-

I like it. You have some excellent continuous running and great display areas in the yard and engine facility. It also looks like a layout which could be a tour de force of scenery. You might need an access hatch or two in the wider areas. I am wondering, however, why you stopped the yard tracks rather than running them to the edge of the table. Assuming a one-foot grid, you could go about another 18 inches.
                                                                                                                                                                       -- D

[Jerrys HO]

Don
You got me. The track is to the edge of the table for the yard. I guess I got lazy and forgot to put them in my quest to finish. I wanted a little continuous running with a little switching and a variety of scenery. On the table across from the yard will be my industrial area, where the water is there is already a country living scene along with a beach and boat launch as you may have seen in the pics I posted a couple of pages earlier. To make more room I decided to add the extra 6 ft. for the turn table and round house  and possibly an engine shed behind the round house.
Still designing the center loops section where there will be the old coal mine (abandoned or operating?). The table in front of the TT will be houses and businesses.
Thanks for comments
Jerry

[Balrog21]

Looking great, Jerry!
I did my outer two lines, GG! and put it in 3d..my long slow 2% climb on the back is going to be awesome I think! Thanks for sharing the software!
B

[Skarloey Railway]

One of the problems on a board like this is we have a wide variety of opinions on what a model railroad is.

I think it's very simple. A model railroad is a model of a railroad. The railroad may be a particular place at a particular time or it may be some place that does not and has never existed. The modelling may be dead to scale or there may be a degree of compression so that things fit in whatever space the modeller has available, but the underlying assumption is that if you multiply by 87 then your HO model looks plausibly like the real thing.

If it doesn't look plausibly like the real thing then it ain't a model and people should call, it what it is. A toy train set.

[rogertra]

One of the problems on a board like this is we have a wide variety of opinions on what a model railroad is.

I think it's very simple. A model railroad is a model of a railroad. The railroad may be a particular place at a particular time or it may be some place that does not and has never existed. The modelling may be dead to scale or there may be a degree of compression so that things fit in whatever space the modeller has available, but the underlying assumption is that if you multiply by 87 then your HO model looks plausibly like the real thing.

If it doesn't look plausibly like the real thing then it ain't a model and people should call, it what it is. A toy train set.

Possibly, although I think "toy train" can sometimes be too much.  But let's not go there as we will upset more than half the people on this board. 

The thing with most modellers is they model what the see on other people's model railroads so what you end up with is not a model of a railroad but a model of other people's model railroads.  Classic examples?  The curved wooden trestle at the end of a peninsula, the house on fire with emergency vehicles in attendance, the traffic accident, the fisherman in a river or in a boat, a model railroad with no purpose, no interchange with the outside world, a roundhouse out in the middle of nowhere and not attached to a yard, just "'cause it looks cool" etc., etc..

Thomas is the perfect example.  There never was a real Thomas, so every Thomas model railway (It's British so it's a "railway") is a model of a model railway, not a model of a railway.  If you see what I mean?

But that's not to say they are wrong if they have fun but don't say it's prototypical or "realistic".

[jward]

roger,
that may be true of some, but it is by no means true of all. some of us are railfans first, and modellers second.   to us, a day along the line trumps working on the layout hands down.   we come home and model what we've seen, or what we wish we'd have been around to see.

as an example, we'll use my dad's wvc&p ry, which was featured a past issue of model railroad planning.  the centerpiece is a model of an obscure junction on a western Maryland branchline, accessable only on foot. the track on the layout twists and turns just like the railroad which inspired it. there are models not of burning houses and fire engines, but of the beehive coke ovens once so common in the eastern coal fields.   the track arrangements are patterned loosely after typical ones found in the real world.   the end result is a railroad which captures the feeling of actually being there.  add to that the waybills and train orders and you can literally lose yourself in running the line.

i'm not saying a model of a model is bad.   whatever floats your boat......  but to be honest, many of the layouts I see in the magazines bore me.   it becomes painfully obvious who gets what a real railroad does, and who doesn't.

[Desertdweller]

Roger,

You make a good philosophical point.  But model railroads always have available space as the great constraining factor.

Actual railroads are not faced with the problem of how to make a continuous run in a limited space.  Also, actual railroads do not build curves unless these is a reason to.  That reason is never the table edge.

So, point-to-point or continuous run, when the track runs to the edge of the table, it either has to turn or end.
You can hide the obvious with a tunnel, or tall buildings or trees.  Or you can make it a scenic feature with that long curved trestle.  Or, you can just leave your curves out there for all the world to see.  You have to allow the artist his medium.

I have operated on a model railroad that put its turnback curve in a helix inside a mountain.  The entire train would disappear into the tunnel and not reappear for a minute or so.  A variation is the "mountain with many portals".  The train goes in, but where will it come out?  Not very realistic, but very entertaining.

Les

[Jerrys HO]

Roger,

The thing with most modellers is they model what the see on other people's model railroads so what you end up with is not a model of a railroad but a model of other people's model railroads.

Don't take this the wrong way, but modeling a prototype is modeling another railroad if you think about it. In turn if everyone modeled prototypes you would visit layouts that all looked the same.
Which is not bad at all if that is what you want.
I am trying to freelance a bit and put in as Jeff said the things I like or would have liked to see. I have a little country setting of a row of houses with a boat launch near by and yes there are people fishing. This is a place I would like to end up living in or near.
I have mountains because I love the mountains and they look cool on a layout.
I even have a few acquaintances that have just track no scenery that enjoy just running and switching and the set ups are pretty awesome even without all the hoopla of houses, mountains, industrial parks, etc..  
I appreciate visiting and seeing the different types of layouts people can come up with, even the toy train setups. Speaking of toy train setups I guess you could call my layout a toy train layout, I used all Bachmann track, although you can not get some of the radius's I have in a toy train set I have no problem with you calling my layout a toy train set. I am not saying you did say that but rather I am OK with it if you do think that it is. As they say "It's my railroad and I will do what ever I like". I would love to build something along the lines like yours,but I have so much space now that I just let my imagination run wild while I was building it and got carried away.

Jeff
I would enjoy seeing some more pics other than the earlier posts, sounds like your dad had a great layout.

Les

I have operated on a model railroad that put its turnback curve in a helix inside a mountain.  The entire train would disappear into the tunnel and not reappear for a minute or so.  A variation is the "mountain with many portals".  The train goes in, but where will it come out?  Not very realistic, but very entertaining.

That sounds very cool and exciting. Round and round there she goes where she comes out no one knows.

Jerry

[jward]

jerry,

he still has it.    next time I get out there i'll take some more photos.