Cheap Layout

[Guest]

In the days before my divorce I had quite an extensive HO layout which I had built with my youngest son. I have no idea what happened to it but my son (he's now 32) has always kept an interest in model trains.

Last weekend I went to a farm clearing auction locally and amongst the items up for sale was a 8 x 4 layout with all the trackwork, scenery etc. It had obviously spent a lot of time in a farm shed as it was covered in bird crap and looking a bit battered. When it came up I put a bid of $10 on it and won! It has now been cleaned of and is under restoration in my grandsons (11 yrs) care. As well as the basic trackwork it has some working electric signals, most of the buildings (which are Faller and the like continental style)have internal lighting, the points are all electric. Rolling stock consists of a Hornby 0-6-0 tank engine and about four goods wagons.

My grandson has just had a soldering gun bought for him and he has almost finished re-wiring it (the original wiring had been pulled loose) under Dad's supervision and the loco now travels around just about the whole track.

Basic layout has been cleaned off and the buildings are being refitted as they are cleaned. His father (my son) does sculpture for movies and TV and has taught him how to make latex scenery.

Given that the buildings are a bit rough and there is such a small amount of rolling stock (not much to replace) they are going to decide which era and locality they are going to do before much longer. Probably U.S about 1925-30.

For $10 it's worked out pretty damned fine!!

[Guest]

A great basis to get someone going in such a hobby. To start off buying from scratch would cost a lot of money and no guarrantee they will take to it.

I had a lot of second hand stuff on my layout when I was a kid bought from shows etc.

My favourite though would be a UK layout from the 50's or the 60's when steam was taken as far as it would go and we were seeing such loco's as the Flying Scotsman and the Mallard.

[Guest]

I love a bargain too. Sounds like you've done well there!

[Guest]

I can only agree with the others here, sounds like a great bargain and a good basis for expanding the layout too. Get what you have running nicely and then work on expanding it. I still love model railway layouts to this day although it is a long time since I sold mine off. I had many happy hours with my trains and a massive layout...maybe I will return to them once the flying models and cars stop !!...That won't be for a while yet as I have been flying my heli's on the sim today....My Skills are still there, my hover is still perfect and of course my circuits too.

Regards.....Mark

[Guest]

I was talking to the grandson today on the phone and he tells me that there are anly a cople of metres to go and the loco will then be able to run over all the track. Once that is done they will then look at starting to block wire it, (currenlty it's all wired together as one block)and will have to get some more switches for the control panel. After that is done he will look at wiring the points.

They have basically 4 choices for era/location'

New Zealand- cos ours is a 3'6" gauge to use 00/HO track means modelling in Sn31/2 difficult for someone his age as nearly everything would have to be scratchbuilt, what locally made kits are available are expensive.

Continental- the buldings are currently all European style, expense of rolling stock woul be the drawback here cheaper to eventually modify/replace the buildings.

British- I can understand Bunkerbarges preference for this but it's still all foreign to us out here, to use Flying Scotsman, Mallard etc you need to pull long passenger trains which look out of place on a 8 x 4 layout.Not much available here except Hornby stuff mainly.

U.S, readily available at a fairly good price and a good number of manufacturers.Plenty of magazines and how-to books. About 1930 means steam and the first of the diesels, short trains and varying stock types (unlike the long trains of containers we see these days) small towns, dirt roads, few cars, trackside industries all of which suit a 8 x 4.

It's his choice, I'll just supply bits for birthday presents once I get told of the decision. Before and after photos have been promised!

In the meantime I'll stick with building my Heinkel 46, takes up much less space!