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What to do with 14 feet?


Guest WM183
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Hi folks.

I have dabbled in 2mm, 4mm, and 7mm so far, and have determined a few things; that 2mm is too small for me (my eyesight is relatively poor, even with my glasses) and that 4mm is nice. However, I built a 7mm wagon kit just to see what I thought of it, and it's got a presence and size, and permits detail, that is amazing! My favourite part of the hobby is definitely building things; kits, structures, and so on, which I can do very nicely in 4mm. However, i can also do it in 7mm. 

Enough beating 'round the bush. Ahem.

I'm debating going to the senior scale, though I am by no means a senior yet. In our spare room / office, we have a 14' (just about 4 meters) bit of wall that is free and earmarked for layout building. Assuming a 4 foot fiddle yard, that leaves me 10 feet for the layout. That's a load of real estate in 2mm, and not bad in 4mm. But what can I do in 7mm?

I like smaller engines and light freight operations; Panniers, standard tanks or moguls, and Ivatts being favourites. Could I build a fun to operate layout (guess it would need to be some kind of terminus) in my available space? If I chose 2 or 3 locomotives, say an Ivatt class 2 2-6-0, a Pannier, and a 3MT tank, would these feasibly work together somewhere in the Western region, and what kind of place could I build for them to operate in? As 7mm is quite a lot more pricey than 4mm, I'd like to get options and opinions before I do much buying.

Thanks!

Amanda

Edited by Guest
I cannot spell.
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9 minutes ago, brossard said:

Have a browse of Andy P's thread on Trebudoc: 

The layout is 9' all in and beautifully rendered.  You have an extra 5' so you could add more operational interest.

 

John

Thanks for that John, a through line for example in the re built version of Trebudoc, I was restricted in a 9ft room.

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A key determinant will be the radius/angle of point-work that you choose, and that in turn will probably be dictated by what you choose to run.

 

If you choose the larger/normal Peco points, your length will disappear rapidly; if you choose the Peco Set-track points, it will seem refreshingly large.

 

But, if you go for the Set-track, read the thread on here about what will and won't run over it without buffer locking first. Or, use couplers that are buffer-locking-proof (See the "Washbourne" thread).

 

Moving to the Coarse Scale side of things, I have an 8ft long urban terminus, which will just about accommodate three 48ft bogie coaches for running round. That has points the same radius as the Peco Set-track ones, and I use buffer-locking proof couplings.

 

In short, 10ft of scenic space is quite long, if you go at it creatively.

A8291FDC-A966-4A78-B851-9FD887116D1C.jpeg

9B8A36F8-099B-422B-84FD-57ABCFB9ECAF.jpeg

Edited by Nearholmer
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On 15/10/2019 at 18:44, WM183 said:

Hi folks.

I have dabbled in 2mm, 4mm, and 7mm so far, and have determined a few things; that 2mm is too small for me (my eyesight is relatively poor, even with my glasses) and that 4mm is nice. However, I built a 7mm wagon kit just to see what I thought of it, and it's got a presence and size, and permits detail, that is amazing! My favourite part of the hobby is definitely building things; kits, structures, and so on, which I can do very nicely in 4mm. However, i can also do it in 7mm. 

Enough beating 'round the bush. Ahem.

I'm debating going to the senior scale, though I am by no means a senior yet. In our spare room / office, we have a 14' (just about 4 meters) bit of wall that is free and earmarked for layout building. Assuming a 4 foot fiddle yard, that leaves me 10 feet for the layout. That's a load of real estate in 2mm, and not bad in 4mm. But what can I do in 7mm?

I like smaller engines and light freight operations; Panniers, standard tanks or moguls, and Ivatts being favourites. Could I build a fun to operate layout (guess it would need to be some kind of terminus) in my available space? If I chose 2 or 3 locomotives, say an Ivatt class 2 2-6-0, a Pannier, and a 3MT tank, would these feasibly work together somewhere in the Western region, and what kind of place could I build for them to operate in? As 7mm is quite a lot more pricey than 4mm, I'd like to get options and opinions before I do much buying.

Thanks!

Amanda

Consider a design where the fiddle yard is set behind a goods yard or small factory. You now have a full 14 feet to play with. My mantra is that less is more so try and avoid the temptation to fill the whole layout with track. If you still have some 4mm stock find an 8foot surface and play push trains to see which maneuvers work before committing to the big stuff.

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I like the idea of putting a fiddle track or two behind other parts of the layout so I can use the full 14 feet. I still have all of my 4mm stuff, I am just considering 7mm and wondering if it would be more rewarding given my favorite parts of the hobby; building kits and detailing things.

A train of 2 coaches + loco, or 4 or 5 wagons, is plenty for me. I love the layouts shown and linked to so far. I am back and forth on 4mm vs 7mm so much.

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O gauge is definitely very rewarding IMO.  Since changing over 3 years ago (and all of my 4mm stock etc has been sold off) I have thoroughly enjoyed building wagon and coach kits and adding additional detail.  I really like that I can use proto couplings.  Just started building a layout and getting the track plan figured out.  I have 21' though.

 

John

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Hi Amanda, I changed over to O gauge after returning to railway modelling after 40 year break. I used to do OO. I have not looked back and I think you will enjoy the benefits of working in 7mm. 

 

I look forwards to seeing a track plan develop.

 

Cheers, Ade.

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On 15/10/2019 at 18:44, WM183 said:

Hi folks.

I have dabbled in 2mm, 4mm, and 7mm so far, and have determined a few things; that 2mm is too small for me (my eyesight is relatively poor, even with my glasses) and that 4mm is nice. However, I built a 7mm wagon kit just to see what I thought of it, and it's got a presence and size, and permits detail, that is amazing! My favourite part of the hobby is definitely building things; kits, structures, and so on, which I can do very nicely in 4mm. However, i can also do it in 7mm. 

Enough beating 'round the bush. Ahem.

I'm debating going to the senior scale, though I am by no means a senior yet. In our spare room / office, we have a 14' (just about 4 meters) bit of wall that is free and earmarked for layout building. Assuming a 4 foot fiddle yard, that leaves me 10 feet for the layout. That's a load of real estate in 2mm, and not bad in 4mm. But what can I do in 7mm?

I like smaller engines and light freight operations; Panniers, standard tanks or moguls, and Ivatts being favourites. Could I build a fun to operate layout (guess it would need to be some kind of terminus) in my available space? If I chose 2 or 3 locomotives, say an Ivatt class 2 2-6-0, a Pannier, and a 3MT tank, would these feasibly work together somewhere in the Western region, and what kind of place could I build for them to operate in? As 7mm is quite a lot more pricey than 4mm, I'd like to get options and opinions before I do much buying.

Thanks!

Amanda

Consider a design where the fiddle yard is set behind a goods yard or small factory. You now have a full 14 feet to play with. My mantra is that less is more so try and avoid the temptation to fill the whole layout with track. If you still have some 4mm stock find an 8foot surface and play push trains to see which maneuvers work before committing to the big stuff.

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Assuming you are building your own boards, consider a waisted layout.  increasing the width to 30 or even 36" at the ends and reducing to 21"  in the middle has both operational and scenic advantages. It also makes less impact on the floor space.

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I have started dabbling with a bit of 7mm after many years working in 4mm scale, EM Gauge.

 

I tend to find it very difficult to plan layouts in 7mm as distances, clearances etc. that are second nature to me in 4mm are totally alien to me in 7mm, so I do my planning as if it was in 4mm. So I would look at a 14ft space in 7mm and say that would be 8ft in 4mm and design a layout that fits that space.

 

I have built two layouts that fit that size, complete with fiddle yard. One had a fiddle yard 2' 3" long, capable of taking two short bogie carriages and a 2-4-0 tender engine. It had a simple run round loop and a single slip in the loop, giving sidings in both directions. It was reasonable fun to operate. I don't recall having any photos and it was before I joined RMWeb, so illustrating it isn't easy!

 

The other was Sutton Dock, which was goods only but despite being very simple, gave enough operational interest over an exhibition weekend without boring us silly.

 

 

Was the thread.

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I’ve gone straight into 7mm, however with a scenic board size of 4ft (which was probably not such a good idea considering I have no modelling experience)

Because of my budget I’ve gone for a preserved scene so I can get all sorts of stock without region or era restrictions. 

7mm is good for modelling smaller areas like a shunter’s yard and therefore you can cram more detail into the smaller things than you can with 4mm.

You only need a small track plan for a great 7mm layout.

 

:good:

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Hi

 

my first O gauge layout started out as 4.5 m by 500 mm.


Viewing from the right, the track on the left was a hidden fiddle siding, I tried a cassette here. Coal siding, head shunt and wharf edge.

 

344D43D7-EA4C-4BA5-9E39-84B70FC41A53.jpeg.5a060c6ad6cd2eff4a8d7836587c9f3e.jpeg
 

and the other end. Goods shed run round heads shunt and the other end of the wharf siding with a kickback to the other end.

 

FF64AD14-3D4E-4EF6-ADF4-2B876079938A.jpeg.8d19aafe90f62f54e70843ec473889b9.jpeg


this worked well, but I decided the cassette was too tricky to use, leaning over the layout as it ended up being 1.5 m high. I’ve now changed the track uses, the fiddle yard is for coal and the coal siding is the entry from the yard, the heads hunt becoming an end loading dock.. trains of 6 wagons work well with a terrier or two or 08.

 

hope that helps.

 

 Roger 

 

 

 

Edited by 21C123
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