Foam can be found at places like Lowe's and Home Depot. Home Depot has the 2 inch foam, Lowe's from my experience has thinner foam(3/4'' I think). There's also special adhesive for attaching the foam to another surface if you wish to do so. There's a site out there with a bunch of small track plans,you may be interested in looking it up and trying some of those plans out just to see if any of them fit your liking,of course,you can always stick with what you have.
I have two of those bachmann cabs on my layout hooked up to the bus, one for each side, even though they control the whole layout (same bus). not sure what's going on with yours. As to the foam board, they sell those at Lowes or Home depot; it's Dow Insulation foam boards. they come in a 4x8 sheet but you can cut them to size.
I would suggest that you at least upgrade to foamcore project board. Scenery involves water and water and cardboard don't generally mix. If it were me, the 2 things I'd consider changing are I'd move that recently added 3rd spur to another location. I can't pinpoint where would work best, if anywhere, but I'd fool with it to find a place. Secondly, and this is just me, I dislike having the standard oval. I would try, in the upper left swapping 1 curved section and 1 straight to cut it off a little differently. This has the added benefit of giving you more room in the corner to senic and thus hide the sharp edge of the layout.
In reply to YoHo's post re: 3rd spur track, he could move it over to the other side; make it long enough for one car, and flip it so there's a second switchback. The building would be between the switches and could be served now and then so that the challenge is there, but doesn't always have to be used. just an idea
Is the current layout size fixed? If it isn't, then you could use the switch to go of the main layout to provide a fiddle yard. Or, you could widen it in 1 dimension just enough to get another spur in. Usually I'm all for K.I.S.S. which translates to not stuffing in more spurs than you can handle, but If you want to use the switch, those would be my thoughts.
ok its a little hard to judge what you guys' thoughts are over text sooo heres what im gathering...(red means removal...green means what the new track would be.) i know ovals are not the most "fashionable" but since its a super small space, i want a continuous run. i myself dont want an oval either. the untouched version gives me a runaround too as for power...ill want to get the track set first since when i move my locos around, sometimes the track joints open up due to loose joiners (im trying to replace those as they crop up). as for foam, ill go see what i can find. its got to be thin. as for water, what water were you guys alluding to? only liquid i can think of is scenic glue...that stuff wont harm the cardboard...at least it didnt on my other diorama i did for another project.
I'm thinking scenic glue, "wet" water, paints, washes..etc. I think the run around is more important than another spur. And to be clear, I wasn't suggesting breaking the oval, Just forming it a little differently. I'm at work and can't find an example of what I'm talking about, I'll look more tonight.
how about this one...still not sure what is best for the upper left corner but i swapped the wye to the right (thus giving me a longer track length) i guess i could do without the curve coming out of the wye on the right. and added more straight track to the left. if this is an improvement, i might need to pick up some more straight track. im imaging this to be hard to operate too...blah. cant have too many cars on the inside tracks otherwise it will be too crowded to switch anything. red squares are where i can add industry. that upper left corner does seem like some space i can use for something.
I believe you said you wanted a yard, correct? If so, make the closest section of the layout, bottom of the picture, into a large industry, use one half as staging, the other half as an actual industry. Mind you, staging isn't exactly a real yard, but it works instead of having to take your cars off the layout. Just my 2 cents.
I'm sorry i am coming to this so late. My own thoughts are: Skip the switch back Do a yard off one the near side of the table. Do a couple of industries off the other. Build scenery of any type in between. Run trains have fun. Hang onto the spare track. Maybe life will provide other opportunities.
still a little hard to put text into action...hmmm. not sure what skipping the switchback and making a yard nearest part of the table looks like. the more i look at this, the more i can see that a yard isnt possible right? seems like to me a yard comes in from 1 mainline, branches into many lines, then comes back into 1 mainline, creating a sort of stack/pyramid from birds eye view. the most i can have is a staging area. someone correct me if im wrong.
The entire layout is an abstraction using selective compression. The smaller the layout the greater the compression.
yea which means a yard probably wouldnt be too helpful given its size in my layout. oh well. i think im mostly satisfied right now. i shall play with it a bit to see were i can change it up before setting it in stone
Lots. I was taking a ride on the Railrunner through Albuquerque last summer. In the industrial section there were many tightly curved spurs leading eastward off the main track. Curved buildings, along with curved loading docks, lined those spurs. Depots, too, are often curved. For the most extreme example I know of, see the Northern Pacific depot in Yellowstone Park.
oh yea i see it. thats quite a curve. i think it will probably be easier to model some industry on straight track...i could fit more cars on a curve though.
I'd suggest trying to couple and uncouple on a curve before you allocate a place to store a car. Beyond that - follow your dreams. Don't get locked down into planning / replanning / ...
