Track plans and Track plan books

[Hippo]

I have and for some reason continue to buy track plan books. 

I love to read them and think "I could build that", or "if I built that I would build it in such and such away".

But i never get round to building them, I've started a few micro's but never got much further than laying track. I build all the baseboards a couple of years back to have a go at building a copy of Phil Parkers Edgeworth, but that was as far as I got.

 

I am just interest to know if others have this obsession with track plan books or is it just me and have you ever built a layout from a track plan or magazine. 

 

Thanks

Owen

 

[Joseph_Pestell]

Yes, I think I have an obsession with trackplans, both as drawn for models and the real thing, as per OS maps.

 

I don't think that I have ever built a layout that was an exact copy of a published plan but some have certainly influenced.

[john new]

I like them for ideas, current layout based on the Inglenook track/siding design if that counts (internet sourced though not from a book).

 

Definitely want to build Minories at some point but currently have no space to store if built.

[The Johnster]

These are so pervasive that I doubt many layouts can claim not to have been influenced by them, especially Cyril Freezer's '60 plans for small railways' (well, somebody was going to mention it, weren't they?).  A plan from this book, Minories, mentioned in the previous post, is probably the most influential in UK modelling, and designed for RTR stock which needed propelling, hence there are no double curves in the crossovers at the station throat.  My own layout, Cwmdimbath, set in the South Wales mining valleys of the 1950s and a long way from the London suburban feel of Minories, uses it's throat concept to avoid reverse curves and is somewhat influenced by the restricted site as well, only here it is a shelf cut out of a mountainside that hems the railway in, not brick cuttings.

 

My other influence is Iain Rice, coming at things from a different viewpoint, realising the fun of having not enough roads to shunt in properly and having a bit of a feel of space to the restricted site.  The trackplan is funadmentally a terminus with a run around loop, goods siding off the end of it parallel to the platform road, and 2 kickbacks, one from the loop and one from the platform road.  It is deceptive, and shunting can be quite intricate, especially as an imagined steep bank just the other side of the scenic break means that vehicles are not allowed to be left on the running line during shunting moves as per the Sectional Appendix instruction; only vacuum braked vehicles connected to the locomotive are allowed to be shunted into the section on the 'country' side of the loco.

 

I'd suggest a plank as a starter layout; have a look at 'Sheep Chronicles' on the Layout Topics for inspiration.  Once you've got yourself going, you can build confidence and momentum to the state of starting a 'proper' layout, and have the plank to play with and test run your stock in the interim.  Or you may decide that the plank was what you wanted all along; win win both ways!

[Nearholmer]

I’m a terror for track-plans, real or model, can’t get enough of ‘em.

 

All that looking at track-plans for 50+ years undoubtedly plays into what I build, but I don’t think I’ve ever copied one from a modelling book precisely.

 

I did build The Dyke (LBSCR) in EM, to scale, or rather I built the boards and laid the track, but I never did the scenic work.

 

Track-plans are almost a hobby in themselves!

[Legend]

I used to like them. I remember the 1974 Hornby Catalogue showing pictures of layouts for the then forthcoming 3rd edition of the track plans book. It didn’t actually arrive in 1975 . Had hours of fun trying to design the layouts for the parts we couldn’t see in the catalogue , then when actually got the book spent even more hours perusing them and dreaming about my future layout even though at the time I only had an 8*4 board. Great times . Inspirational. Parts of the plans did actually find their way into my layouts . Layouts, plan 8 with the criss crossing mainlines being a particular favourite . Not at all prototypical but fun to operate! As with all Hornby publications, I had to buy the latest edition, but as with the last few I was terribly disappointed . Some of the layouts are quite farcical with terminals that are barely long enough to take the incoming loco, never mind train.

 

I also collected the Peco track plans books , 60 plans for smaller layouts etc , when they were little booklets. Again imagined building and running layouts with my choice of stock. My favourites were always the bigger layouts and terminals . Later I used the track plans as a basis in Aurans Rail Simulator where you could actually build the layouts and run them on the computer. Great fun!

 

So , no you are not alone .

[Kris]

I love looking at track plan books. The minds eye can see the trains progressing around the layout, and how you could scenically develop it. Fantasy is wonderful. 

[Argos]

Hi, my name is Argos and I am a trackplanoholic.......

 

I broke my habit in 2017 but still find myself picking up the track planning magazines (and after an internal fight putting them down again!).

The problems is they lead to endless daydreaming instead of modelling and, if I'm not careful, another project distraction.

 

Oh look! the next edition of Model Railroad Planing is out soon........

Edited January 21, 2019 by Argos

[Hippo]

I'd suggest a plank as a starter layout; have a look at 'Sheep Chronicles' on the Layout Topics for inspiration.  Once you've got yourself going, you can build confidence and momentum to the state of starting a 'proper' layout, and have the plank to play with and test run your stock in the interim.  Or you may decide that the plank was what you wanted all along; win win both ways!

I think this may be one of my problems. I prefer roundy roundy layouts but don't have the room for one. I keep starting planks, but soon get bored as soon as the track is laid becasue I can't just watch trains go by.

 

 

The problems is they lead to endless daydreaming instead of modelling and, if I'm not careful, another project distraction.

 

Oh look! the next edition of Model Railroad Planing is out soon........

My other problem, I keep buying these books and bookazines (is that even a thing) and day dreaming.

 

I have seen a Paul Lunn plan that is a roundy roundy, and only a small loop. Its in one of the Modelrail bookazines and is completely from Peco Setrack. I am very tempted to build it exactly how it is in the mag.

 

Thanks for the replies. Its nice to know I am not alone

[Rivercider]

Me too.

I have a number of C J Freezers track plan booklets, and have spent many many hours over the years looking through them.

I must have also doodled hundreds of track plans on backs of envelopes, without ever seriously intending to build any.

 

I also like studying real life track plans, signalling diagrams, and other maps (like the Baker rail atlases),

 

cheers 

[Nearholmer]

I wonder if counselling is available?

[PatB]

I think an interest in trackplans in general is a whole sub-genre of the model railway hobby in itself. Cheap and economical of space too .

[t-b-g]

The search for the elusive perfect track plan!

 

I am more obsessed with drawing them rather than reading what others have done, taking inspiration from the real thing, other models and some plans drawn by others. Minories has been a huge influence on layout planning for me.

 

I draw a plan, think how I could improve it, alter it, improve it again several times and end up back where I started. Too many ideas and not knowing which version is "the" right one is both theraputic and frustrating in equal measures. Thereputic because it is a great mental workout and frustrating because I never reach a conclusion.

 

So no collection of track plan books but a great deal of fun planning hundreds or maybe even thousands of slightly different plans that will never be built!

[kipford]

Some people do build from plans!

The first proper layout I built was for my son way back in 1993 for his sixth birthday. I was looking for a new project and a trip to Pecorama on holiday started a interest that persists to this day. The layout called Kipford (hence my user name) was based on plan SP12 in Cyril Freezers 60 plans for small layouts. This was drawn as a looped end to end with a high level terminus, but with a bit of modification it seemed it could be built as lower continuous run, with a return loop to enable out and back running to the high level terminus. The first picture shows the original plan with the proposed modifications.

 

The first thing we decided though that 15” radius curves had to go if we wanted to run modern (at that time) stock. Hence I redrew it using 18” radius curves and added a bay platform. This increased the layout size from 8’ x 4’ to 9’ 3” x 4’ 6”, which just fitted in the bedroom. The second picture shows the final track plan including the tramway which added another 9” to the width.

 

The third picture shows how the boards were configured, this allowed it to be racked up the bedroom wall when required.

 

The layout was built to a running state in 3 months, it took a further 12 months to complete the scenics. The following pictures show it its original state with its seven year old owner shows how it was only 24” off the ground. Later we put extension legs on it to raise it to 3’ 6”.

 

These pictures were taken by Tony Wright for a BRM magazine article and show the layout in its final form.

[sammyboy]

I'm also one of those who loves looking at model railway track plans. I've got several books about the subject and in my spare time, other than working on my N Gauge layout, playing computer games/surfing the internet & watching football, I find it easy to relax after my shift at work with a drink and a bar of chocolate just to sit and read from the works of CJ Freezer, Iain Rice, etc... and thinking 'That'll be a lovely layout. I would like to build that one day'.

 

Sam

[BR60103]

I've built a couple which started out as a plan but eventually only used the footprint. I built a Minories to be part of a layout and is part of my current layout. My previous layout had a large terminus which was a reverse of one in CJF's books.

One of the Platelayers built one which is a terminus inside a 4-track loop.

Another friend adapted a Model Railroader plan which had one turntable serving 2 stations.

[The Johnster]

I made a conscious decision not to build Cwmdimbath to a plan, only to a general sketch.  I have previously meticulously planned my layouts and never been able to build them without jiggling them about a bit.  Cwmdimbath started out with 2 basic dimensions as untouchable and unalterable holies of holy; 10 inches clear headshunt for the loco release and space in the loop and at least 2 fiddle yard roads for an 11 wagon and a van coal train hauled by a 42xx.  In the even I have been able to have a clear foot for the loco release headshunt and there is an extra wagon length in the loop.

 

I built from the baseboard up rather than end to end, allowing flexible track to follow it's own alignment and putting turnouts in places where they felt natural; the result is a station occupying a narrow site because of the geography (it's hemmed in between a river and a 1,600 foot mountain) on a long sweeping curve. 

 

I am happy with it.

[Pacific231G]

On 1/21/2019 at 4:01 PM, The Johnster said:

These are so pervasive that I doubt many layouts can claim not to have been influenced by them, especially Cyril Freezer's '60 plans for small railways' (well, somebody was going to mention it, weren't they?).  A plan from this book, Minories, mentioned in the previous post, is probably the most influential in UK modelling, and designed for RTR stock which needed propelling, hence there are no double curves in the crossovers at the station throat.  My own layout, Cwmdimbath, set in the South Wales mining valleys of the 1950s and a long way from the London suburban feel of Minories, uses its throat concept to avoid reverse curves and is somewhat influenced by the restricted site as well, only here it is a shelf cut out of a mountainside that hems the railway in, not brick cuttings.

 

 

Hi Johnster

I look forward to seeing  some pictures of Cwmdimbath when existing attachments come back on line.  So, apologies for being pedantic but, while I agree with you about the influence of Cyril Freezer's Minories, it does have one immediate reverse curve in its throat; the route between the "up" line and platform 1. However, its great virtue is that while all the other five routes involve reverses  they are separated by one or two point lengths of straight track so should avoid buffer locking (actual or apparent)   There are also no routes that require two reverse curves.

This basic arrangement is the shortest possible throat (without using slips or scissors) to connect three platforms directly to a double track main line and is actually the same length as that required by a two platform terminus but Minories flows far better. 

By comparison the straight version (the upper diagram) does have two routes with no curves at all (1 to down and up to 2) but three of the other routes involve a straight crossover and the fourth (up  to 3)  may also have a reverse depending on how platform 3 is set out.  Platform 3 to down may actually involve two reverse curves though there is a point length between them.

Experimenting with Peco track and mainline bogie coaches, I've found that with medium (nominally 3ft radius) points, the back to back points in Minories (up to 1) give slightly less  throwover than crossovers on straight track but you would still get buffer locking on that route if using the buffers to propel a number of coaches. I found no buffer locking on the other five routes. The most economical way (in terms of length) to avoid buffer locking on that one route seems to be to use medium radius points as the outer points in  the Minories throat with a pair of back to back long (nominally 5ft radius) points between them. With a straight throat you'd need four long points to avoid buffer locking.

I've tried endless permutations of throats including replacing points with Ys (the same length as medium left and right) but as soon as I tried them out with actual coaches found that I simply could not improve on CJF's classic arrangement. This wasn't just with Peco track, I tried the same arrangement with some SMP 3ft radius points and got exactly the same results.

The only other way to avoid potential buffer locking with the same throat length of four medium/three foot radius points is to have the main line at an angle to the platforms and so avoid reverse curves altogether.

The angle of the main line to the platforms is double the divergence angle of the points (about 24 degrees for Peco) and I'm sort of wondering whether, for portable layouts particularly, we're maybe a bit too wedded to rectangular baseboards in a straight lines

All this only goes to prove just how good CJF's classic plan really was.

 

 

Edited February 1, 2019 by Pacific231G

[LNER4479]

Love track plans. Got all the Peco track plan books. Pored over them for the last 40years. Never built any of them ...

Love doing track plans and am currently involved in three layout projects which are based on track plans of mine - but they were all 'to order'.

[The Johnster]

21 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

Hi Johnster

I look forward to seeing  some pictures of Cwmdimbath when existing attachments come back on line.  So, apologies for being pedantic but, while I agree with you about the influence of Cyril Freezer's Minories, it does have one immediate reverse curve in its throat; the route between the "up" line and platform 1. However, its great virtue is that while all the other five routes involve reverses  they are separated by one or two point lengths of straight track so should avoid buffer locking (actual or apparent)   There are also no routes that require two reverse curves.

This basic arrangement is the shortest possible throat (without using slips or scissors) to connect three platforms directly to a double track main line and is actually the same length as that required by a two platform terminus but Minories flows far better. 

By comparison the straight version (the upper diagram) does have two routes with no curves at all (1 to down and up to 2) but three of the other routes involve a straight crossover and the fourth (up  to 3)  may also have a reverse depending on how platform 3 is set out.  Platform 3 to down may actually involve two reverse curves though there is a point length between them.

Experimenting with Peco track and mainline bogie coaches, I've found that with medium (nominally 3ft radius) points, the back to back points in Minories (up to 1) give slightly less  throwover than crossovers on straight track but you would still get buffer locking on that route if using the buffers to propel a number of coaches. I found no buffer locking on the other five routes. The most economical way (in terms of length) to avoid buffer locking on that one route seems to be to use medium radius points as the outer points in  the Minories throat with a pair of back to back long (nominally 5ft radius) points between them. With a straight throat you'd need four long points to avoid buffer locking.

I've tried endless permutations of throats including replacing points with Ys (the same length as medium left and right) but as soon as I tried them out with actual coaches found that I simply could not improve on CJF's classic arrangement. This wasn't just with Peco track, I tried the same arrangement with some SMP 3ft radius points and got exactly the same results.

The only other way to avoid potential buffer locking with the same throat length of four medium/three foot radius points is to have the main line at an angle to the platforms and so avoid reverse curves altogether.

The angle of the main line to the platforms is double the divergence angle of the points (about 24 degrees for Peco) and I'm sort of wondering whether, for portable layouts particularly, we're maybe a bit too wedded to rectangular baseboards in a straight lines

All this only goes to prove just how good CJF's classic plan really was.

 

 

Minories is a superb plan with immense operating potential; no wonder it has stood the test of time and will no doubt continue to do so.

Cwmdimbath has it's own thread on 'Layout Topics', 'South Wales in the 1950s', where much of my disgusting bodgery is pictured and some of my 'differently sane' ideas given an airing.  It's original station throat owed much to being a 'half Minories' but has been relaid after a rebuild and now includes a reverse curve, but the turnouts are slightly separated.  Running, with tension lock couplers and medium radius Peco Streamline at the throat, is pretty reliable drawn or propelled, as it is over a 4th-3rd radius curved point in the fiddle yard.  The engine release crossover (this is a BLT) is Streamline small radius, and short wheelbase goods stock can be shunted through it without problem, including longer wheelbase 20ton brake vans.

The history of this is that the layout started out as intended to employ scale screw and instanter couplings, but I found that my eyesight and steadiness of hand had deteriorated over the couple of decades I'd been away from the hobby, and I had to revert to tension locks.  Then a full refurbishment of the flat by my landlord necessitated a strip down and some damage was caused in storage; this led to a rethink with an extra baseboard and extended fiddle yard now that the tension locks had enabled setrack curves to be used when it was rebuilt.

 

[steve22]

Hippo, thanks for starting this thread off; a topic that I warm to very much!  I've got the usual Peco CJF collection of '60 Plans' (two editions), 'Plans for Larger Layouts (two editions) as well as, what was the first for me, 'Track Plans' which I bought as a teenager (including a replacement some years later when the first one seemed a bit worn).   I also admire the work of Rice, Lunn and others.  

Dave, my thanks to you too for Kipford; I knew I'd seen your development of Plan SP12* before but couldn't recall where.  It's one of those 'I'd like to build sometime' and like yours I would wish to include continuous run and reverse loop.  I've always liked the idea of a station with an incline behind and a bit of 'train appears here then disappears there' and this plan has all that as well.  The lovely photos (TW) show us how good  the completed layout can look.  A real inspiration for me now that I've insulated my new 10' x 6' shed ready for a layout sometime this year. 

 

Steve.

 

*For fellow plan perusers, the original is Plan S16 in '60 Plans for Small Railways' 3rd Ed. and 'Plan of the Month' in January 1961 Railway Modeller.