Model Railroading Tip: Planning Your Model Train Room

One method I thought of for a spare room is to have a layout which lowers from the ceiling. Ideally this is lifted by an electric winch on fine flexible wires but a hand winch would also be viable. Electric winches are actually surprisingly cheap on the internet.

The idea would be to have a layout which roughly follows the walls with an open space in the middle for the operator. This would also mean that a central ceiling light wouldn’t need to be moved. The room I was considering had a slightly odd entrance which would naturally mean that the door would be outside the layout’s area but otherwise it might be necessary to build a U shaped layout. Actually a U shape has the advantage of allowing the operator to enter or leave the space in the middle.

I said roughly following the walls because it would need to clear any wardrobes, pictures or other objects above layout height. There’d need to be a couple of vertical guides to position the layout and to stabilise it in the ooperating position. Clearly tall buildings would need to be removable and backscenes might need to be folded forward for raising but if the walls are a suitable colour the back scenes could quite low with a primary purpose of preventing stock falling over the edge.

Stock could stay in position and the closeness to the ceiling would protect the layout from dust. This could be emphasised by adding a pelmet to the ceiling both for the lighting and to close the box. You’d be lifting the layout into its dust cover.

Clearly this method suits rooms with high ceilings best but if the structural depth is kept low by using a honeycomb door type of construction, then it might only lower the ceiling height by about 6″. That form of construction would also provide a flat soffit which could be decorated to suit the room when up.

Even if there isn’t a problem with the door a retractable bridge would be usefull with a round and round layout. The height problem would suggest a rotating or retracting bridge or perhaps something on the lines of
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folding_bridge

Archie

I didn’t like the idea of incorporating furniture into my layout, and only a 12 x 12 room, with large computer desk, file cabinet and two 30 inch wide cabinets. I just moved all the furniture together in one corner and freed up a smaller layout than I wanted, (3′ by 5′) because of a closet, but worked out very well until after a couple years the wife got tired of looking at my “train table” I had even stained the layout table to match the furniture and the grands and I enjoyed the table for quite some time, but we all got older and now comtemplating a “new” layout as I have all this space still empty, by design, not letting the wife put anything in there, but she still has the double door closet for her stuff, but in “MY” room…lol

Sounds like a great idea Archie. I would love to know if someone has actually done something like this.

Thanks for the comment and great idea.

Dan

I hope your design doesn’t get out of hand. I started with an 8ft 4in x 5ft layout, then decided to tinker with it in order to get the best use of DCC.
It has now turned into a 22ft x 11ft monster and in order to build it we are buying a log cabin to put in the back garden.
I know you say you are better with paper and pencil but I used a downloaded, paid for, design layout program it has provide me with a much better prospective of the proposed layout as it holds all the types of track available and each section can be easily laid in place.
The main problem I always found was the getting round the layout. I didn’t want a centre section as this would take away my planned town centre. I have designed a removable centre section with the town centre and then there are 4 ‘eyes’ hidden at each corner with a pulley system that will be attached above to lift the section clear in case of problems out of reach. The rest will be accessed from the edge. I have aimed for the cabin to be 2.5ft larger all round for that access.
I wish you all the best of luck with yours.

Thanks for those tips Rick. I wish I had seen them before I started my layout. I looked for a Plan to suit my room size in a Kalmback Plans Book. With great anticipation, I found one that JUST fitted in the space I had, which was a semi U shape. Now, having created all the framework, and laid the track, I am about to fill in the scenery in between but discovered a horrible fact – being a U shape (against the walls on 3 sides) two thirds of my scenery or towns won’t be able to be viewed from the wall sides, so now everything has to face to the inside! The advice – as Rick has done – Plan, Plan, Plan!

Rick,
How about cutting a hole through the bookcases and make one shelf size a HO railroad track exhibit . I turned part of my attic into a 10′ X 16′ insulated room with A/C and heat. Don’t have basements in South Louisiana. But I am fixing to add an outside garage which will have a second story with a 25′ X 40′ open room for me to expand my layout. I had to use several methods such as folding sections in order to reach the attic for service of the A/C units.
Wish you luck in fitting everything you want in the space.
Steve

How do I sell a set of trains? 1977 train set.

David, try eBay or the forum.
Cheers
Dan

Hi Dan, Good Idea from Rick standing baseboards on furniture and doing his pre build on paper.

One of my ideas is I have is to photocopy some old magazine pages which contain a lot of old tin poster advertisements, such as Soaps different brands. Players cigarettes. Palethorps sausages, etc. Then laminate them… the largest one is approx 50mm x50mm, smallest is
about 10mm x 20mm, cut them out and use them say on station buildings,shop walls,on backdrops, etc. This might be of help to others.

Ralph

Most of the planing I do is with excel ( as I am a programer) where I change the grid to equal squares where each can equal 1/4 or 1/8 inch depending on how detailed I want to make the seen. What is nice about this program is you hold down the Ctrl key and run the scroll wheel on the mouse and shrink or blow up the seen. Windows 2000 or 7 work for this Windows 95 does not have this scroll option, not sure about 98. Then select the shape you want and place it on the grid to locate Buildings, Tracks, & Yards. Then in or on the shape put your labbel as to what it is, which help in later viewings. In a another cell (tab) it is a good idea to place a simple program of scale you are working with, first square is the actual dimention the second is the scale you are working with and the third is = First cell * Second cell. Actual program is done by entering the = sign in the third cell then click on the first cell (letter and number of cell will apear) now press the * (asterex key) then click on the second cell, now press enter, your scale will apear in cell 3. The program might look like this =B3*B4 before pressing enter, I reserve A for the identifier of what is being done, Dimention, Scale, & Equals. Sometimes it is a help adding a division factor below your previous answer as to how many squares it takes to get it to scale on the grid. Curves can be a problem and that is where the size grid works in your favor. Many small straight lines magnified and then shrank down will resemble a curve.

There is a program out called Cad Rail that can be purchased, you ask why I went to excel, my Cad Rail is a DOS program and W2000 & W7 can not read it.

Some even do chalk lines in plywood that can be removed.

Go with works best for you as you know what you can handle

This is commenting on the Excel design system.
The concept of replacing the squared paper grid and the stickit furniture can be turned electronic by using an Excel grid with graphic shapes for the furniture.
Graphics shapes can be simple, ie rectangles or any other of the range available in Excel graphics or compound, ie any number of simple shapes joine together to make a complex shape which can be moved as one.
Archie