https://modelrailroadforums.com/for...in-its-own-hand-house-shed.29493/#post-414038
Over the years I have seen many really nice train layouts that had to be cut-up (and destroyed) in order to remove them from their home place, due to either the owner's having passed away, or his moving to another residence. Very often they are rather a custom fit in their home built environment, and thus aren’t likely candidates for a new special location. I'm even currently in possession of a very nicely detailed waterfront scene that had to be cut out of an estate sale layout, and I am hoping to incorporate it into my new layout, but I see problems on the horizon.
With these experiences in mind I decided that I would purchase a stand alone Handi-House shed, and build my new layout in there. Then if I should change residence again, I can simply load that shed onto a trailer and move the whole layout to a new location. Or if I should pass away my wife could sell the layout and shed as an entity, and the buyer could move it to his new location.
I retired to a trailer home here in St Augustine, and it had an almost full length carport attached to it. I thought why not pull that new shed into the back portion of the carport and take advantage of the extra shade provided by the carport cover over the shed. It was a tight fit, and in fact to get a 12 foot wide shed into my carport I had to move all 5 of its support columns out a distance of 1 foot (had to pour concrete footer for those new column locations). I also had to remove 3 big beams attached to the underside of the shed in order to get enough clearance to fit under the carport's roof (I had initially given considerations to chopping the peak off of the shed), but became convinced I'd rather trim the height by modifying the bottom. I needed only a few inches, but it became a major undertaking. And I did this all by myself at the age of 74 using skid pads I made and a come-along attached to a tree in the back yard.
I have now just finished insulating the entire shed and installing a ceiling fan and a small air conditioner. My interior dimensions with the insulation all in is now 11 inches short of the overall dimensions of the 12x16 shed, ie; 11' 1” by 15' 1”
I want to build a dbl-deck, around-the-wall, with a peninsula layout. At first I was wondering if the peninsula might project out from one of the 'long walls' of the shed, but I am now convinced that the peninsula needs to project out from the 'back narrow wall' of this shed that sits at the opposite end from the big door.
I intend to have a helix (likely single tracked) to move the trains between the 2 decks. And since the helix’s take up so much room, I intend to make the helix structure in its own 'box' external to the interior of the shed. This will be like a 'winged box' structure hung off a rear corner of the shed, about 5-6 foot in size to house the 26-30 inch radius helix. There will be two small holes in the shed's metal siding to allow the trains to enter and exit the helix. At the moment I am imagining the train will enter the helix at an opening just off center of the shed's wall at the rear of the peninsula, and proceed its upward climb to the top deck, where it will reenter the shed over near the a perimeter (side) wall.