I've been trying to negotiate permanent layout space, for as long as I've been on this board. About a year ago, my wife said "Why don't you use a pulley system? That way you could pull it up to the ceiling when we need the room." I politely patted her on the head. Well had I done that, trains would have been the least of my problems. I actually dismissed the idea as too complicated. Today she showed me this: http://www.costco.com/Browse/Produc...tt=401591&No=0&Nty=1&Ntx=mode matchallpartial It looks like a really neat idea. Now I know I could never raise it with trains or other loose stuff on the layout. I'm also thinking I would want some quick connects, so I wouldn't have to raise my power/DCC stuff. A frame like JohnnyBs, with a bottom to hide the wires could work great, even in my office/spare bedroom/room I want trains in. What do you think?
It looks like it would work but I am wondering how many times you would have to turn the handle before its raised or lowered significantly, you might find it a pain in the butt after a while (unless you could add a motor to it).
I stored my old layout that I built when I was in high school by hanging it from the garage ceiling at my folks house while I was at college. I mounted pulleys to the legs and secured lines and more pulleys to the ceiling. Each of the four lines were pulled at the same time and tied off at a belaying cleat on the wall. The cat found out he could get up there and had a ball. By the time I was able to retrieve it, he had about defoliated all the tree armatures of their lichen moss. :cat::cat2:
A simple four-point suspension system was written up in MR ~50 years ago. IIRC, there were four single-sheave pulleys in the ceiling above the four corners of the layout. The pulleys were mounted through the sheetrock into the ceiling joists for strength. Four ropes from the layout corners were routed up through these corner pulleys, then over through four single pulleys, mounted side-by-side to the ceiling at some convenient out-of-the-way location next to the wall. There the four ropes were combined (tied) to a swivel shackle with two loops that held them securely. A manual boat trailer winch was mounted on the wall directly beneath the shackle, where its cable/hook could be run up and hooked to the lower loop of the shackle. This way, the layout could be lowered onto sawhorses, and raised almost flush with the ceiling. The cost would be four eyebolts for the layout corners, eight single-sheave pulleys, eight screw-eyes to mount the pulleys, swivel shackle, <100' 1/4" clothesline (non-wire-cored), and a cheap non-galvanized boat winch with cable and hook....all available from building supply stores like Lowe's or Home Depot.
When my son was 6 I had a small layout the size of his bed hanging over his bed. The foot and head board were the same height so when the layout was down it sat on top of the posts. I had a 4 point pulley system fastened to the ceiling. The pulley system was made from 4 double pulleys at the top and 4 single pulleys fastened to the cables from the layout similar to 4 block and tackles. The 4 cables from the pulley system were fastened to a single soft rope so that when he pulled it, it stayed level.
My dad has an On30 layout 4x16 hanging in his garage. Eight pulleys/cables, and the whole thing goes up and down on an old garage opener motor. It works OK I'd say, he has to put braces underneath when in the down position. The Costco one looks slick, so you would not have to engineer it all. I think my dad discovered it was a much bigger pain than he thought it would be.
I used to race slotcars at my friend Frank's house once in a while.He had a pretty cool setup.He's big into hotrods,he had the track in his garage,it took up a full stall.The ceiling was ten feet high or so.He had two electric winches with multiple cables on them.He'd lower the track down,and had folding legs under it.When he got slack in the cables,he had quick realeses hooked to eyelets on the corners.He hooks weight to the cable ends to keep them from coiling up as he raises them..
I built mine to store a 6x8 foot layout. Photo's are at www.photobucket.com/bob76casey Go to "Lift Mechanism". Cost me about $80. DO NOT use rope. Bob
I visited an large Z Scale layout that was suspended by 4 steel cables durring a Columbus Ohio Layout Tour a few years ago. The layout had a robust aluminum frame, and was foam top construction, and he had a custom motorized pully system to raise it up above the pool table. It was a very robust setup, but the layout would swing a bit if you bumped it.
Yup...had one I made for my HO setup back in the 70's. Used 1/8 inch 'aircraft cable'...ran em up through the ceiling...pulleys attached to the rafters...used a hand crank in the laundry room to raise and lower the layout on and off the pool table. It made T.H.E. EX-wife very happy...she had a low tolorance level for any of my hobbies. May be why she is T.H.E. EX...LOL ! .
That setup is slick. I was going to modify a bike lift since my layout (3 x 6) is under 30 lbs and those only cost under $20. The bike lift route would have required me to build a bracing system to "slide" the layout onto. This system is pricey, but well engineered.
