Plan or Just Go For It


brubakes

brubakes

Member
Just wondering if when building your layout if you had it all planned out ahead of time and who just had a rough idea and just started building.
 
The problem with not planning is there are a lot of things to think about. It would be very easy to not allow for a scenery transition or room for an industry that might add to the fun. Or a road to get your Lilliputions to work at the industry.

Obviously it is hard to plan if you don't know what you want. The first step is to develop a vision. What do you want to see on your layout? What do you think would be really cool?

If you haven't done so yet, read or re-read my beginner's guide clickable below. Takes about 5 minutes.

Here are the two layouts I am working on. Notice the level of planning. I want my layout to turn out well.

Indiana03.gif


RockRidge19f.gif
 
I was gonna wing it with mine but ended up planning it out and I'm glad I did. It allows you to set your grades and curve diameters ahead of time - easier to use up pieces of paper than plywood! :)

At least get the basic design planned out (the mains, the layout mainframe and shape). You can leave large areas open for interpretation later on if you like.

Mark
 
As someone new to the hobby and creating my first layout, I gotta say plan first, build second. Certainly for the reasons mentioned above but for another reason too. If your building your layout based on a time in RR history or locale, planning gives you time to research and find other "cool" details that you may want to add that would effect your layout.

In my case, I'm planning a layout that includes both logging and mining operations, along with freight and passenger lines. In my research, I've discovered the use of "narrow gauge" tracks and equipment, something I hadn't considered before, and now have to figure out how to integrate into my standard HO.

Whatever course you take, the best to you!
 
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Plan ahead and don't wing it . You are building something in miniature. Would you build a house without a plan ! Don't think so although I have seen some people do it . And it looks like the house that Jack built.
 
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The current, existing layout was a 'wing it' based on some plans out of Model RR. After the basics went down, I then started to modify the track plan to add/delete stuff. There may have been some minor sketching going on, just to remind me what I wanted to do.

For the big layout, there will be some planning involved. But, I suspect there will be a fair share of winging it.

Kennedy
 
My brother and I planned all our layouts out. We had one a neighbor gave to us and we still planned when we decided to change it around.
 
I build it 1st & plan it later. What I mean by that is; I plan it out in my brain & then try the track before I nail it down. There's 1 advantage I have over most engineers of layouts, I always have plenty of room to make mistakes.

When I do metal art work, I never draw a picture of what I'm going to make, I just make it & 99% of the time it turns out just how I pictured it.
I tried many times over the years to draw out a plan, but when I started building it nothing ever looked like the drawings, so, I stopped that procedure after my 2nd layout.
This layout I'm building now is the ultimate for me. No grades, lots of mainlines, using all of my buildings off my other layout & still will have plenty of room to add more. Long & tall scratchbuilt bridges.
So, some people need to plan things out way ahead of time, not me.
Like a builder here in my town says, "cut it twice & measure it once".
If I have to take time planning something, that's time taken away from the actual construction. That's my 2 cents WOrth.

larry
 
Larry, meet Chip. Chip, meet Larry. :) I guess you two are about as opposite on this issue as you can get. I'm somewhere in the middle. I knew exactly the space I had available so I used the Atlas rail planning program to do a preliminary layout that incorporated all the aspects of the layout I wanted. It didn't include the buildings but did include all the sidings, the yard, and the general orientation of the town and the roads. Once I started to lay it out, I made a few changes as I actually laid track but most of the track turned out like the plan. The town changed many times as I found different kits I liked and needed to change the orientation of Main St. to accommodate a street running spur. Since I'm more of a scenery person than an operations person, you could remove all my scenery and the track plan would be pretty close to what's actually laid. The scenery changed in my head lots of times and still continues to evolve even though all the track is in place.
 
I'm very near Jim in how I did mine. I planned for several months and used 3dPlanit to put it on paper. Much of the mainlines went as per plan per inch, but as I got into spurs or town and industry sidings I saw better ways and modified the plan to fit the scene. It is very difficult to get a proper perspective of town buildings, hills and mountains, and industrial complexes until you have it in front of you. Other than the mains (and even a couple of them), there is very little that hasn't been changed, even if only slightly.

THEN came the virus for operations. My biggest challenge was to have a marriage between scenery and operations. Many passing sidings had to be added, yards needed modifications to accommodate heavier traffic, and industry feeds had to be adjusted.

In summary, I would always recommend a master plan to begin with. However, do not be afraid to make changes or adjustments as you go along. You will learn different or better ways to do things and also see what looks good and what is "not-so-good".;) :)
 
What works for you ? No right and wrong here. When the railroad ran through a town the town grew up along side the track...then spead out from there. Is this not a plan ? A reality plan ? Keep that in mine while you build. My major industry was a pipe foundry. It's the first thing I built. I staked out the space alone the tracks and the only planning I did was where the scrap lead would be. I first built the old part of the foundry. Reality again...then the new cupola building with two short campaign furnaces. Business was good so a new melt shop was built with a large long campaign furnace. Then more shops were needed. When I was done it looked real because I approached it from a history point of view. Mills keep there old building almost all the time while new additions pop up around them.

Larry
 
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I Agree, its more what works for you might work for me, but not somebody else. My current shelf switching layout is about half planned half winged. I got the plans outta MRR and spent some time planning out in my head and on paper, the rest of it, like some of the roads, non rail industries, are winged ...
 
Bread&steel said:
What works for you ? No right and wrong here. When the railroad ran through a town the town grew up along side the track...then spead out from there. Is this not a plan ? A reality plan ? Keep that in mine while you build. My major industry was a pipe foundry. It's the first thing I built. I staked out the space alone the tracks and the only planning I did was where the scrap lead would be. I first built the old part of the foundry. Reality again...then the new cupola building with two short campaign furnaces. Business was good so a new melt shop was built with a large long campaign furnace. Then more shops were needed. When I was done it looked real because I approached it from a history point of view. Mills keep there old building almost all the time while new additions pop up around them.

Larry
Click to expand...
As a steel guy, I have to say that foundry is awesome. I know this post is old, but do you happen to have more pics from other angles, showing the entire complex?
 
I have to come down on the side of those working from basically a reasonable idea of just what they wish to accomplish and include in their layout, plus a few sketches. Far too often I've seen folks, particularly newbies but even longtime hobbyists, get completely absorbed in the planning phase, to the point where they never get around to building the layout because they are too invloved in repeatedly revising their plans. In fact, I've seen the planning aspect actually become some hobbyists sole involvement in model railroading, producing nearly infinite technical drawings and realistic representations (complete with trees, structures, elevations, like those seen in MR, even fully detailed computer replicas) of the layout they "plan" to build at some point...but never do.

My advice? Built something now or very soon, or you could ultimately plan yourself right out of the hobby.

NYW&B
 
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I had a friend from NY that came down every year & said his track plan was just about ready to be built back in NY. One year he stayed here in Arcadia w/his family & his grandparents & lived here for about 10 years. He had been making revisions to this dream layout for 20 years. The last time I spoke to him he had actually put down about 50 ft. of track. Nothing else. Then he went from N scale to HO scale & then to O scale.
That was about15 years ago. No telling what he ended up with.

Larry
 
Well, I started with a 4x8 table... I has some track and a few turnouts, so I stared by laying out a basic oval with a couple of sidings. Wow, there's tons of space in the center of that oval... I'd really like a double main line...

I ended up expanding my table to 5x8 with the extra 1x8 section about 1.5" higher than the main part of the table. Okay now what? You can go buy a bunch of track and turnouts and start experimenting... OR download XtraCAD and experiment virtually.

I went for option B. The best thing about the CAD program is that you can put virtual trains on the tracks and run them. So you get a good sense of how many cars will fit on a passing siding or on an industry spur. Very cool.

So to answer your question... I started without a plan, but quickly realized that a plan was needed. After many versions and modifications to my virtual layout, I bought the needed track and am now fine tuning in the physical world. Once all is running well, I'll get out the glue.

From my project management experience: Failing to plan is a plan to fail.
Doug
 
I also started planning a 4x8, then quickly moved up to a 5x9. During planning (and reading this forum), I got some grandiose ideas for a U-shape with a 5x9 on one leg. As soon as I started buying track and cars, etc. my pocketbook told me I'd better do it in phases. So, I built the 5x9 first and put down some temporary track just to start running trains. Then my wife said, "it doesn't go anywhere". Well, that was all I needed to start working on the extension.:D

So the point is, it's good to plan, but only to a point. You gotta start building before too long. You can always revise on the fly.
 
You will have to do some planning one way or another. Some can see a three level monster layout in there head others use paper or computers.
Even it you just buy a bunch of track and lay it out a dosen different ways.
 
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