Finished layout, now what?


Gdelmoro

Member
For 45 years I've been building my layout. Now, I'm about 75% complete and considering operation options but I'm not sure i can leave it alone. There must be something to improve, add, replace or improve.
For those of you with essentially completed layouts, what do you do now?
 
While I am no where near complete, I see several options. Not sure what level of complete that you mean, but here's a few ideas that I am going to do myself. Add more trees, one can never have enough. Add more detail parts, trash cans, mailboxes, manhole covers, backyard clutter and animals. If you haven't already done so, add drivers and passengers to vehicles that are on the road. While I am adding lighting to many structures as I go along, there will inevitably be many more that I can do later. Upgrade some older portions of the layout with newer materials, i.e. replace lichen with ground foam if you started that far back, or simply give the lichen a dusting of foam. Weather your rolling stock and structures, dull-coat your vehicles. I have a (not yet completed) creek that I am going to add skinny-dippers to, in order to use up some of the "artists and models" part of a Preiser unpainted figures kit that I have. Improve your structures with added details like hanging baskets, clotheslines, shutters or a fresh coat of paint. I still have a backlog of freight cars that need metal wheels (90 or so out of 800). Most of all, RUN TRAINS!
Hope that this gives you some ideas.Willie
 
For those of you with essentially completed layouts, what do you do now?
I will never have a finished layout because the running of the trains always gets in the way of the work. I just want to be able to "wish" the layout to be finished so I could run more trains.
 
When reading the first post, my initial thought was, pull finger then. 25% to go :p. But really, I'm envious.
 
Emulate real railroads and run trains prototypically (Operate). This takes as much study as building the layout. Mine is maybe 60% complete and I have attempted to "Operate" since all the track was down. Operation tends to show where things might not work as planned and where improvements can be made, which puts you back to layout building again (If you want).
 
I have been working on my layout for over 30 years. It was built mainly as a switching layout from the very start. Now all of the track is down and the scenery is probably over 95% complete. The layout operates just as designed. I had particular industries in mind when building it and really enjoy operating it. Over the many years of construction, I learned a lot. There were no internet forums back them. Model railroad magazines were about all that was available. I made mistakes, corrected tham and gained many skills in the process that I didn't have when I started.

Now I am planning on putting in many smaller details and mini scenes and over time will upgrade and improve older parts of the layout. Curt from the Coffee Shop is probably in the same boat. He is now also working on smaller details and replacing some of the older plastic kit buildings with more detailed wood and cardboard structures with a lot more detail.

A layout is probably ever done. I often go down to the train room with all good intentions of working on a project or two, but being that the layout does operate as designed, I end up just running trains and enjoying all of the work done over the years.

Post some photos of your layout if you would.
 
I am never finished. I need to work on finishing scenery so I added to staging instead.
I start with trackwork and operations are my major interests in the hobby.

My layout is designed for the branch to be extended if I ever get bored with the main areas. Right now I am not very focused on the layout. I keep buying stuff and not building the kits.

Modeling the roaring 20's
President of the Lancaster Central Railroad
President of the Western Maryland Railway
 
Thanks for the replies, if I ever finish (all track laid, turnouts all work flawlessly, electrical all hooked up and scenery complete) I already see LOTS i would have done different (better) knowing what I know now. I'm an operation rookie so there's that whole world to learn about, implement and test how the layout lends itself to operations.
The best part of this hoppy is it never gets boring. :D
 
You should post some photos of your layout and maybe we can come up with some suggestions.

My layout is a point to point with a yard and engine terminal at each end, and with the use of hidden staging tracks I can run continuously. As I mentioned, my layout was built mainly for switching. Being that I am a lone operator and rarely, if ever, run more than one train at a time, still operate DC only. I have four towns on the layout with twenty some rail customers. I do model the area right where I live and am familiar with what industries are, were or could have been in the area. I model the transition era as I grew up in this period and like to have steam and first generation diesels on the layout.

For an operating session, I'll bring a train in from one of the hidden staging tracks into one of the yards. The incoming cars will be sorted and a local freight train will be made up to deliver to various customers as well as picking up outbound freight cars. The local freight will return to one of he yards and any outbound cars are made into a train which will leave the yard to go off stage onto one of the hidden staging tracks.

I am just like you as during the building process I learned a lot in the school of hard knocks and can go to older parts of the layout and make some improvements in scenery and add some mini scenes. There will always be something to do.

Click on the video tour in my signature below to visit my layout.

Stop by the coffee shop, meet the gang and swap info some time.
 
Here are some shots. I can only post 4 per post so I'll post another.
IMG_0093.jpgIMG_0090.jpgIMG_0074.jpgIMG_0068.JPG
 
I am between layouts. I only build them so that I can enjoy running trains in reasonably convincing scale scenery. I don't really enjoy building layouts, but I do like running trains. So.......................I'm stalled. I lost enthusiasm for my current project about 16 months ago and have only dabbled in it ever since. My domestic circumstances are not ideal with a sickly wife, which tends to rob me of my spark. My hope is that I will regain my spark before the summer ends and that I run my first train on newly laid track before the end of September. If I can manage that, I'll be very happy and relieved. I do eventually call a layout finished. By the time I have made the last bit of terrain, added ground foam and bushes/trees, and some lineside details and level crossings, I figure my mind can fill in the rest.
 
Nice photos of the layout. Really nice. Being a big fan of switching, I can see a lot of opportunity for switching. When I was building my layout, I tried to use some industries that would support other industries on the layout. A logging branch supplies logs to a saw mill which in turn supplies lumber to a lumber dealer and a furniture factory as well as shipping it to points beyond the layout. A few grain elevators supply grain to a mill which in turn generates outbound traffic. Cattle pens supply cattle to a meat packing plant which generates outbound reefer traffic.

Modeling the transition era, freight stations supplied many good to towns as long distance trucking was not what it is today. No FedEx or UPS, so REA and small local trucking companies would deliver the good that came in by rail as well as picking up any goods that needed to be shipped out. I like you have oil distributors which needed to be suplied by rail.

You have some really nice looking scenery. A few shots are a bit reminiscent of some scenes on John Allens Gorre & Dapheted. I was lucky enough to have operated on his layout in the late 60's while on temporary duty in the Bay area.

You've done some nice work there so now an operating plan is needed.
 
John's layout was my inspiration to move from toy trains to scale model railroading. Thank you for the complements.

I need to learn a lot more about how I can operate my railroad as up till now I've just been running trains and randomly shuffling cars around. The industries will include; lumber mill, building supply, freight depot, Produce supplier, a car ferry that will simulate connection to a class 1 railroad and a second freight depot to serve the city. There will also be several businesses on short sidings (not yet installed) that will require freight delivery and pick-up. There is a small sorting yard and the car ferry yard.
 
OK, Here is what I can see with what information you have supplied. Apparently your car ferry is you connection to an outside railroad so any inbound freight would be coming in on the ferry. The inbound cars would most likely go to a yard to be sorted into a local freight train that would deliver to the industries on your layout. In the yard, the cars would be sorted to make delivering to the industries as simple as possible by putting them in the order of delivery. While delivering to your rail customers, you would also want to pick up any outbound freight cars that would be taken to a yard later to be loaded onto the ferry as an outbound train.

Just a suggestion.

I have a friend, Pete Ellis, who passed away a few years ago who laso was inspired by John Allen's layout. It was started in a quanset hut later to be expanded into an addition to the original building. When he passed away, he willed his layout to the Montana Museum of Railroad History in Great Falls, MT. The Great Falls Model Railroad Club also runs the museum and they moved what they could of the layout into the public School building on the fairgrounds. http://mmrh.org/ They are working to connect it to the club layout in the near future.

Here is an old video taken in 1995 of just part of his layout. The quality is not the best as it was recorder from a TV screen and the format extended the scene's width to fit the screen.

[video=youtube;eFyOJRDsuWM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFyOJRDsuWM&t=477s[/video]
 
Pete had been working on his layout for decades. A few years after the video he celebrated the 50th anniversary of his railroad. He had a number of special box cars built for the occasion.

IMAG1169.jpg

He was quite a craftsman. Most of the structures on this part of the layout were scratch built and all of the track was hand laid code 70 track and turnouts, as well as the dual gauge track. He finally started using Shinohara flex track and turnouts in the addition he built on mainly to save time and move construction ahead faster. He showed up at my place one afternoon with this turntable.

IMAG0007.jpg

When he built the addition, he had to tear out a town and an engine servicing facility to extend the main line into the other building. You probably were able to pick out where that was in the video. This turntable was scratch built using brass and is powered by a motor from an old player piano. When he started his layout, there weren't all of the kits that we have today.

Enjoyed your photos. Post some more.
 
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