layout question


H

hoscaler

New Member
layout question from new modeler

I am looking to do a ho scale layout but I am not real good with the building thing. is there something that would make a good frame that would be fairly light weight but durable. I am in the military so I move quite a bit so it would have to handle a little bit of "travel damage". i was thinking maybe a boxspring from a bed maybe queen or king sized. any ideas. I tried building one from scratch but it was too unstable.:confused:
 
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Do you have to stay with 4x8? You could build a shelf layout that's something like 2' wide by 12' long that could break down into two six foot sections. You can attach folding legs to the botom so you don't need to actually attach it to the wall at your new duty station. You could build removeable facia boards and a top so it was essentially a six foot coffin when it was ready to travel. I can almost guarantee you that 4x8layouts are going to suffer a lot of damge, both being moved and while in transit.

I'd guess by your user name that you a confirmed HO guy but looking at N scale opens up a whole new world. You can build quite an empire on 2'x12' shelves or a 4'x4' board and it would be much easier to transport.
 
I'll try to see if I can get you a pic of the way I'd build a portable 4x8 because it's not really able to be explained (by me that is, I am not good at explaining things).
 
If you dont mind bending down some when I started my first modular layout I used two folding cardtables with a couple layers of foam on top to get it up higher.
 
I already have a ho scale train that I was planning on using but I could consider selling it and going n scale. i would appreciate a picture for a better visual of how you did yours. I was thinking the same thing about the transit damage to a bigger layout so the tables or something that could be disassembled a little to make it not so bulky might make it a little better. the card table might make it a little easier for my six year old to watch it.
 
This is what I did in HO:

OverallViewMedium.jpg


The place is still kind of a mess but it will give you an idea of what I did. I used two 2x4 plastic banquet tables for each end and a 6' long by 30" wide table for the middle. The tables obviously already come with legs and are very strong. I joined each table together with one inch mending plates screwed to the metal supports on the underside of the tables.. I overlaid the whole thing with a one inch layer of foam glued down with latex caulking. If I walked on top of the whole thing before I laid the foam and it never moved. With the foam, it's pretty bulletproof. It was also inexpensive compared to building conventional benchwork. The 2x4 tables were on sale at Lowe's for $20 each and the 6 footer was on sale for $35. My total cost was $115, which was just about $20 less than I calculated the lumber, plywood, and supports would have cost. It was up in two days with no mess and no drilling or cutting.

Although I didn't build it to take apart, I could have done so with some careful planning of track and scenery. If you had this size layout in N scale, you could have a real empire. In HO, I have 22" outside radius curves with 18" inside radius curves passing tracks. I have 22' of mainline track and it fits perfectly in the end of the basement behind our pool table. It's a bit unconventional but it might be a good answer for a layout that needs to be moved often. You can also rearrange the sections to fit your space, something that's hard to do with standard benchwork.
 
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My layout is two 4x8 sheets of 2" pink foam on top of a box structure made of 1x4s. The whole thing sits on top of six sawhorses, which came from what I used to set up tables for wargaming.

Kennedy
 
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