Does anyone have any experience with a shelve layout (ie Iain Rice style as in mrp2007) things like the benchwork they used. composing the smaller scenes wiring and any thing else that comes with building a shelve layout. thanks August
here's some links from another thread that might be helpful: http://andrews-trains.fotopic.net/p18402993.html http://andrews-trains.fotopic.net/p10123360.html http://www.carendt.com/microplans/pa...r/index.html#4
The third link in Ron's list does not work quite right. You may want to try: http://www.carendt.com/microplans/ How much space do you have? Scenes can be broken up using all types of visual "breaks". Highway or rail bridge diagonaly across Stream / river / lake Mountain Building Good luck
Here's a plan for an HO scale shelf layout, 1 foot by 12 feel, that may work. Also includes an optional staging yard with 22" radius. It's loosely based on the former MKT spur served by DGNO here in Sherman. The sole customer on the prototype is the ConAgra flour mill, with inbound wheat and outbound wheat midds (leftover from the milling process). In real life, flour is shipped by road and rail (the latter via the former Frisco line accessed from S. Sherman Jct). An ex-GTW SW900 painted blue & leased by Econorail is the mill switcher. For operation purposes, I've added a runaround track and an extra shipper on the left (Presco). I've also done some fiddling & finagling to make the mill spur at the top right be the flour-loading track. For this layout you'd need a small switcher (anything from Athearn's "SW7" to LifeLike's Proto2000 models to be closer, or you could use a GE 44-tonner or 70-tonner or an Alco switcher), covered hoppers for grain, Airslide hoppers, and boxcars (the latter for Presco). The scenery would be kinda flat, but you can add weeds, tie butts, a road crossing, junk autos, or whatever else. If you don't have space for the optional staging, you could start operations by setting cars on the left side for switching, or put extra cars in the storage track (DGNO does this, using their power, up to & including SD45-2s on rather shaky-looking track). You could ballast the track, add grass, weather the ties & rails, etc. at some places. The mill switcher on the prototype usually sits on the grain lead when not in use- you could do the same with your switcher. If you can get more than 12 linear feet of space, more power t you- you could even add a grain elevator in the middle, much like the Anderson Grain elevator that sits on the spur. My idea for a base was some shelving material I have, plus some 2" pink foam on top, upon which goes the track (which you could get away with either using N scale roadbed or none at all, since this is all industrial trackage). Hope this helps, or at the least gives you an idea to start with.
That's a great idea FriscoBob. Hopefully these ideas will get somthing flowing for August. I guess you waste about as much time up there watching the DGNO as I do down here in Garland and Dallas. I wish I could catch them switching the Kraft plant here in Garland. I swear the person that designed the tracks at that building was a model railroader!
The ConAgra mill is switched by that blue switcher, operated remote control by a man on the ground who follows along with a beltpack. Crossing barricades are draped on the engine's sides, and are taken down & placed across the street when swapping out hoppers in the small yard alonside the mill. Basically, loads are switched in, empties are switched out. BNSF handles bulk loads in Airslide hoppers on a spur off the former Frisco line- a BNSF loco runs down to S. Sherman Jct., the switch is thrown, and the train backs up the former Frisco to the mill. The line is embargoed from the mill north to where the SLSF main rejoined the SP main (the switch was removed by BNSF, which got the ex-SP line from Denison down to a spot south of town where the BNSF line breaks off to the southwest & the SP continues south. The SP line is operated by DGNO south of Sherman, and was intact all the way into Dallas (from Parker Rd. in Plano south, it's now DART light rail). DGNO sets out loaded hoppers and picks up empties (and those loaded with wheat midds) and returns to its ex-MP line. Once upon a time, this track was ex-Katy, and was part of the Sherman, Denison & Dallas branch from Denison south to Sherman. The line is abandoned between SD&D Jct. and just south of the ex-MP line. Sorry for the history rant, I'm beginning to sound like the guys on Yahoo's Railspot group (which ain't a bad thing, really).
Thanks guys have been doing other this recently so didn't check post thanks again I'll chek those links
My former station "Naumburg" was shelf layout type. You can see it at my site Naumburg as well as in my oldie video 37MB. Wolfgang
Point to Point I have a 12' x 8' den I want to create a point to point shelf rwy in. I visited many sites about layout planning and many contain some ideas on point to point. I'd like to pick the brains of the members of the group. Do you have personal links leading to point to point ideas? Thanks. Murray
I'm repeating what has been said in many posts already, but here goes with concepts about layout design. As with all layout design your best start is to define what kind of railroad it is: Time period Geographical location Type of railroad, heavy mainline or branch line operation Types of commodities shipped to and over the railroad scale and gauge too After, you do that you can start deciding on a mainline drawing, locate towns, industries, small stations, milk stops, etc. Point to point implies that you would have to separate terminals/towns that are connected by a mainline. One or both terminals connects to the outside world providing traffic. It is possible to design a point to point railroad that isn't on a shelf as well. Your public library may be a good place to do track plan research. Many public libraries carry old Mr's and you can look through them for track plans. they usually have some model layout building books such as 101 trackplans. Researching a real railroad that is somewhat like your railroad is also a good source for ideas. I have been helping EricB with ideas for his railroad. He already has many photos of the prototype he is interested in. I drew up loose sketches of a mainline design that would be point to point for operations, but also includes a continuous run for those times he just wants to let them roll unattended. I have a good book for Colorado modellers called Tracking ghost railways in Colorado. It has an actual map of where the line ran. Too much to put in a layout but a good resource for designing. Google is your best friend if you want to find out about railroads. Fallenflags web site lists many different roads and has many pictures. historical societies are useful. Type trackplan or model railroad plan into google and see what comes up. It's really fun searching different sets of words for the same thing. Trainboard searches can pull up some amazing things too. Old buried threads are chock full of info and links. Used book stores can have great books for fairly cheap. Ok, I haven't even touched on the druthers list for layout design. I'll let someone else go into that.
Ok, i'm looking for a decent plan for a shelf layout, very industrial, switched by the following units - 1) Model 40 2) ALCo S2 3) GE 44 tonner Those are the units I intend to use, at various times 2 of them would be on the layout. THe space allowed for the layout is 2'x8', and I'm trying to keep it protable as well. I would like to have manhy industries on line, and am looking for a good track plan. Hopefully it'll have some sort of interchange track, or something like that. If anyone has any ideas, please let me know.
Best shelf plan I ever saw was from Model Railroader. The South Plans District of the Cat Mountain and Santa Fe. Two operators with a yard and an industrial district... an interchange, engine service, grain elevator, etc... Great plan. If I recall correctly, it's 11'x11' on 18" deep shelves in HO scale. In N scale, it gets smaller. I even though about taking the two operating sections of the layout and putting them back-to-back on a door with a curve on one end. I went with another plan, but even just one part of the original plan (or take them apart, stack them, and use casettes to move between the levels or locations) would work well. The articles (I think there were 3 or 4) covered the plan, construction of the base in "domino" form and track laying, scenery, and I don't remember what the others were, but I know there was some discussion of how to operate the layout.
My info deals more with construction than layout plan. My current shelf layout is comprised of two narrow hollow core doors end to end. I have found that bi-fold closet doors work great for shelves. Available in 12" and 18" widths. These are held together with a simple wooden cleat on the underside. Because I'm living in a rental, I couldn't mount it in a permanent way. Luckily the doors give excellent strength. I have used two shelf brackets per door and it provides plenty of support. The 18" width should work well with the Woodland Scenic modular sections which I plan to use for corner pieces and a turn around blob for the end. My inspiration has come from great layouts like Cat Mountain, I've just altered the modular (or domino) concept to fit my needs.
Ken - go and join http://groups.yahoo.com/group/small-layout-design/ and poke about in the files - also note that sister groups are listed on the homepage - they ONLY hold more files cos we ran out of space - if you can't find something on there - you ain't tryin'. 3700 members can't be wrong! Shortliner(Jack) co-moderator of those groups
