Hello all, My name is Jim and I am using the "handle" James66. I have been a railroad follower since I was 8 or 9. After I was married and moved to Syracuse in an apartment I decided to model in N scale because of space restrictions. After 3 years we bought our first house and I expanded the railroad. Then with a move to the second house, the arrival of a daughter and work constraints, the railroad was mothballed. Now, 20(!) years later, after retirement, I am going to start over. I have a lot of N scale track and rolling stock, so I will continue modeling in that scale. I have finally secured the right-of-way in the finished basement. There was a lot of talks with my wife about where, how big, how tall, etc., but we came to an agreement and a space of about 3"-0" x 9'-6" has become available for my "Empire." That should be plenty of room for a great N scale railroad. I have talked to another member here, MC Fujiwara, about track design. He has offered a lot very helpful suggestions and I plan to use his service, Yardgoat Layout Design.
Welcome to TrainBoard! Glad to read you have hooked up with MC. I'm sure you've seen some of his ideas and work in our forums. It will be good fun to see what you guys design and the outcome.
Welcome Jim. Well, you've already found that there are members here that can provide all kinds of assistance, so I'll just say I hope you find many more inspirations from the members.
Welcome Jim. Don't worry about having the long break. I did the same and now enjoy my model trains. Trainboard is a good forum and you can get assistance (advice) when you need it.
Hi Jim! Welcome to our fine family of railroad enthusiasts. One thing about being out of the hobby for 20 years ... there's lots and lots of new stuff available for your new pike! Keep us informed with your progress (photos would be nice).
Welcome aboard Jim. We are glad to have you and we hope you find the information you are looking for here. Charlie
Thank you for the warm welcome. MC and I have been talking and I have sent him some photos from the Central New York area that i want to model. The N scale layout will be about 9 by 3 feet with a 3-4 foot extension for staging. He has talked about a second level, but I'm not sure I want to do that. I have looked at MC's Port Henderson @ Alameda design and I am thinking about doing something along that line first. I found small (5'-4" x 1'-6") scrap of plywood in the basement and I think it would make a good starting place to practice all the skills I will need. It will also give me a chance to run trains quickly and see what condition my rolling stock and locos are in. I will post photos as I work on this small switching layout. Jim
This has been a good weekend for me. I started Thursday afternoon getting some of the stored N scale cars and track out. I wanted to see if the locos still would run. I thought about putting some track on a scrap of plywood to see what I really had. Well I had just seen MC and daughter's 6 foot switching layout on here. So, when I found a scrap of plywood 64"x18" I was hit with the idea of building something similar. After a quick trip to Lowe's Friday afternoon, I had styrofoam, 1x2s and I was building. I do have photos of how it went. I will have to get them out of the camera tonight to upload. Jim
I finally have some photos of the very beginning of my switching layout. That is the 64"x18" scrap of plywood I found in the basement. I added 1x2s on edge for strength and light weight. I plan on moving it around a lot during construction. I I added 1" styrofoam insulation board to the plywood. The weights are to hold the foam board in place until the adhesive sets up. Um...No that is not gin in the box, just books. I had a hard time waiting until every thing was completely set. I started playing around with track and roadbed just to see how it might look. I have now progressed to actually laying track. I Had a lot of great suggestions from MC Fujiwara and even a trackplan! Thanks MC. I will get some more photos as the track laying progresses.
Jim, Welcome to the TrainBoard. I like what you have done, and look forward to photos of your progress. BTW, I spent the summer of 1951 in Cazenovia where my mother's family lived and she grew up.
Cazenovia is a beautiful town with great restaurants and a beautiful lake. It is about 45 minutes from me.