The Spare Bedroom Layout

[Nearholmer]

44 minutes ago, Lacathedrale said:

Thoughts?

 

My thought is that even I, who is perceived by his nearest and dearest to put train space above all domestic priorities, would be asking first which was to be the "master bedroom", and mentally preparing to be granted whichever room is smallest, lest well lit, etc as a study.

 

Isn't that bay window in the top right room potentially a feature that you might want to make something of in a main bedroom? Does it have a good view?

[woodenhead]

6 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

If you are going to the trouble of creating a helix, create a tall one, and build another terminal station 18" above the first one.

The helix to another terminal does answer one of @Lacathedrale wants - that trains need to be going somewhere and they can cross anywhere from either terminal to within the helix if it's all double track so lots of opportunity to up the service intensity.

[Harlequin]

There's a potentially nice fit of several of the recent ideas, the home office / study 5ft cube and the bottom left bedroom with the secret door. Like this:

 

(Assuming 2mm scale.)

 

The study cube has access to the window. The layout doesn't impinge on the study cube at all. The main scenic part of the layout is not affected by the roof slope. The entrance door allows for decent width behind it.

The reversing loops could remain in place for most of the time assuming access to the storage is infrequent.

 

Edited January 16, 2021 by Harlequin

[Lacathedrale]

The master bedroom, thankfully, @Nearholmer - is off on the other side of the house

 

I was fully prepared to fight my ground but I think as @Harlequin has pointed out the smallest room actually might have the best layout potential. I had totally ignored that the top-left room has cupboards so can't have a continuous loop unless those would removed or taken out of commission - and the orthogonal nature of the small room makes a continuous run (should one be desired) pretty straightforward if desired.  The top left room also has a huge south facing window, which won't be comfortable for trains or computer screens! Interesting how we both ended up gravitating towards it...

 

Here is my rendition of the space this sacrifices a few inches behind the desk for an iterative construction approach, and a notional continuous run, although I like it less and less the more I think about it...

 

 

Rather than your design of one removable loop section, I've got two lift-out sections and two non-scenic bridge pieces - which feels a bit flat now I look at it!

Edited January 17, 2021 by Lacathedrale

[Zomboid]

That configuration doesn't give you much space in any scenic area, even in 2mm scale.

Put the desk next to the secret door and potentially you've got the whole top wall to build on.

[Lacathedrale]

That's a great shout. I'd sketched up with the desk infront of the window to give this hybrid of Harlequin/your plan and my idea of an iterative approach:

 

Starting with a simple L-shaped layout, it can be extended with a bridging section over the door, and then if neccesary or desired, around behind the desk to complete a continuous run:

 

 

One sneaky thought was that if I build Holborn Viaduct, the widened lines can be modelled as scenic during Stage 1, but potentially connect up for the continuous running when Stage 3 comes along - for all that through goods traffic, MR, LSWR, GNR, LNWR locos, etc. - particularly if half of Ludgate hill is modelled elsewhere on the layout.  I think that is going to be a little ambitious, but it does get the juices flowing!

 

If I put the desk area on th eleft, it would limit me a little because now I've got two walls that ""need"" a thin, non-scenic run:

 

 

 

 

[Keith Addenbrooke]

On 14/01/2021 at 21:13, Keith Addenbrooke said:

If I’m reading the plans correctly, there is 10’2” x 9’ in the left hand end of the top-left bedroom that doesn’t block the door, and still gives some access to the wardrobe?  But as you say, this is the room least likely to be available.

When we’ve moved house, the allocation of rooms hasn’t always stuck to the original plan, for various reasons.  If I read the plans right earlier in the thread, there are matching spaces in bedrooms two and three.  Given the progress being made with some good ideas for bedroom 3, the thought crosses my mind that - at this preliminary stage - they could be planned so that they could fit either bedroom 3 (first choice) or turned through 180 degrees for bedroom 2 if needed, thereby avoiding the need to start again.  Just a thought, Keith.

 

Edit: realised I was actually thinking of a mirror image ‘flipped’ along the adjoining wall (the ‘x’ axis) for use in bedroom 2, not rotated.  Apologies all.

Edited January 18, 2021 by Keith Addenbrooke
Edit for poor Geometry.

[Lacathedrale]

You're right of course, no point getting very far down the line with designs before rooms are notionally allocated. By my understanding an  L-shape of 9' x 9' can fit into all three bedrooms (top right - across bay window and r/h wall, top left - left wall and bottom wall, bottom left - top wall and left wall)?

 

Thinking about it, I'll already have a few spaces already fully allocated to me - namely an attached single garage (17' x 8') and a (13 x 7' int dimension) workshop in the garden. The garage for now plays host to my '72 MGB GT but that is unlikely to be the case forever. With that in mind, I think If a family comes along, my office space will probably end up shifting into a room that also functions as a spare bedroom. So maybe that means:

 

• Start off in one of the larger rooms from the get-go, with the assumption that the room must host a double bed AND an office cube AND a potential layout
• Build a layout in my 14' x 8' workshop for now cohabiting with my tools
• Build one or two small parts of a larger system-layout in a footprint no more than an L-shaped 9' x 7' -  so they can move into any one of the rooms or the workshop, or the garage, after the dust settles

 

I like the idea of using a detachable cassette on a swing-out cantilevered support, see this link (timestamp 7:36) :

 

 

 

Edited January 19, 2021 by Lacathedrale

[Zomboid]

6 hours ago, Lacathedrale said:

think If a family comes along, my office space will probably end up shifting into a room that also functions as a spare bedroom.

It may be different for you, but my experience would actually suggest that you can pretty much do what you like, because if a family comes along then the layout's probably doomed anyway...

[Nearholmer]

Very much down to how large you are content to allow the bags below your eyes to become in my experience, in that with children free time disappears even faster than free space, so you end-up building models at the dead of night. You will always find room for a layout, even if it has to be a really tiny one, or a garden railway.

[Zomboid]

Yeah, space isn't the issue so much as time with our little one. I've got a whole room I could attempt to commandeer (see above), but I reckon I'd be doing well too have trains running by the time she starts school if I actually tried it.

[Lacathedrale]

Well I joined the 2mm association in 2017, built one 2' x 6" plank and one mostly-finished 1' x 3' plank - so those numbers don't look so bad to me @Zomboid

 

I am very much considering a garden railway @Nearholmer - having just built myself a single-acting horizontal steam engine from bar stock, and finding it extremely rewarding, I have a Stuart 10V lined up next and a stationary boiler, and then it's definitely onto a live steam loco:

 

 

Maybe I should start a different topic for that...

[Nearholmer]

A lot also depends upon how young you are yourself. When my now grown-up daughter was small, I used to be out twelve hours a day at work, active in local council things, we had a modest social life, and I still built models, 'cos I was young and managed happily on five hours sleep. Come when my much younger son and very much younger younger daughter were at pre-school stage, I found that while I was still working full time I could work OR be a parent OR have a hobby, simply because I got significantly older in the meanwhile! Which is a large part of why I "down-geared" to part-time working.

[Zomboid]

8 minutes ago, Lacathedrale said:

Well I joined the 2mm association in 2017, built one 2' x 6" plank and one mostly-finished 1' x 3' plank - so those numbers don't look so bad to m

Actually a good point - I wasn't exactly barrelling along at a fast pace before my daughter was born. Even if you don't produce a small human in the near future your pace of modelling and other distractions might mean that a room sized railway isn't the right answer for you.

 

Only you can determine that. But if you're also building larger scale model engineering things and keeping a 1970s British car from falling apart then where is the time for a room full of trains going to come from?

[Keith Addenbrooke]

33 minutes ago, Zomboid said:

Yeah, space isn't the issue so much as time with our little one. I've got a whole room I could attempt to commandeer (see above), but I reckon I'd be doing well too have trains running by the time she starts school if I actually tried it.

I came across an interesting take on the “time - space - money” equation recently, when reading about a basement empire HO Scale American Model Railroad.  Contrary to what I’d expected, the owner had not set off at a great pace in the early days in order to get where he finally ended up.  Rather, as a single parent with very limited finances, he intentionally worked slowly, handlaying his track and scratchbuilding his structures, so that the little money he had to spend on his hobby lasted longer.  He’d worked out that if he’d used ready-to-lay track and building kits he’d have spent more and run out of things to do before he could afford anything else.

Although I don’t think he actually said it, I formed the impression that this developed a habit in him of working at a sustainable pace, and it was that which perhaps proved the key to long-term success.

I thought it was a lesson worth learning, and - noting @Lacathedrale’s comments above -  may be of relevance here.

[Lacathedrale]

@Nearholmer while it's not a done deal forever, but both my partner and I are working from home and not likely to return to commuting for some time/at all - I'm 36 and she's just about to turn 31. Obviously neither of us are parents but my very broad expectations is that a few hours a week is not unreasonable to expect to have to oneself?

@Zomboid - the larger scale is replacing the smaller scale model engineering for now, as I have disposed of aforementioned 3x1' plank and decided to not start anything new until the house situation resolved itself.

 

As I see it, one of the definite plusses for garden railways is how intrinsically child-friendly they (appear to be)/are with regard to robustness and interactivity even from a young age. So, for the sake of completeness, this is the garden. The grassy area is 90' long by 45' wide.

 

View from the rear towards the house - green shed is fully insulated/powered and 'workshop' shed previously mentioned:

 

 

View from the patio (adjacent the shed) towards the back of the garden. Just in shot on the left of the above shot, and nestled behind the fir tree in this shot is a smaller 12 x 5' shed - you can see the slight slope.

 

There's a large and active 5" gauge locomotive society at Beech Hurst which runs for the public, so having an equivalent 5" gauge track at home could be fun - but feels like may be a bridge too far - particularly since a 20' radius curve will really be skirting the minimum even with gauge widening! I'm a member of the Gauge 1 association, and a G1 layout in this space could be quite significant!

 

Either way I definitely cannot sustain both a garden railway (and associated model engineering) and a model railway at the same time - they are definitely mutually exclusive!

 

[Lacathedrale]

@Keith Addenbrooke I also watched the Jack Burgess docs on YouTube - note he also 'doesn't operate his own railroad' ! - but sustainability is most definitely something I'm interested in. One of the largest challenges I've got is maintaining interest over long periods of time, hence all of this 'chunking' of design and building.

[Nearholmer]

5 minutes ago, Lacathedrale said:

a few hours a week is not unreasonable to expect to have to oneself?

 

Spoken like a true parent-to-be.

 

(Awful lot of gardening to do there, too)

Edited January 19, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Lacathedrale]

8 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

(Awful lot of gardening to do there, too)

 

Sounds like a perfect job for a 5" gauge weed killing train, job done thank you and goodnight. On the bright side, it's going to be at least a year into the future for any new humans to turn up so I have at least a small chance before my world implodes.

 

Based on how long the rudimentary horizontal engine I built took, is it a better choice to attempt to build a live steam loco since they are known to take a bloody age to build anyway, and as such delays and lack of time are not felt as earnestly - or better to build a layout from ready-to-plonk components where minutes snatched here and there can have a meaningful impact on progress?

Edited January 19, 2021 by Lacathedrale

[Nearholmer]

I am slightly teasing - the really time-consuming bit only lasts until they are about two or three.

[Harlequin]

52 minutes ago, Lacathedrale said:

@Nearholmer while it's not a done deal forever, but both my partner and I are working from home and not likely to return to commuting for some time/at all - I'm 36 and she's just about to turn 31. Obviously neither of us are parents but my very broad expectations is that a few hours a week is not unreasonable to expect to have to oneself?

@Zomboid - the larger scale is replacing the smaller scale model engineering for now, as I have disposed of aforementioned 3x1' plank and decided to not start anything new until the house situation resolved itself.

 

As I see it, one of the definite plusses for garden railways is how intrinsically child-friendly they (appear to be)/are with regard to robustness and interactivity even from a young age. So, for the sake of completeness, this is the garden. The grassy area is 90' long by 45' wide.

 

View from the rear towards the house - green shed is fully insulated/powered and 'workshop' shed previously mentioned:

 

 

View from the patio (adjacent the shed) towards the back of the garden. Just in shot on the left of the above shot, and nestled behind the fir tree in this shot is a smaller 12 x 5' shed - you can see the slight slope.

 

There's a large and active 5" gauge locomotive society at Beech Hurst which runs for the public, so having an equivalent 5" gauge track at home could be fun - but feels like may be a bridge too far - particularly since a 20' radius curve will really be skirting the minimum even with gauge widening! I'm a member of the Gauge 1 association, and a G1 layout in this space could be quite significant!

 

Either way I definitely cannot sustain both a garden railway (and associated model engineering) and a model railway at the same time - they are definitely mutually exclusive!

 

Very Nice! You could really DO things with that space - I mean garden things as well as railway things.

 

The discussion above assumes that child time and railway time are mutually exclusive but if you become skilled in another form of engineering, social engineering, you should be able to get your children interested in railways and then CLICK! everything falls into place.

 

Yes, you could become the square-jawed, pipe-smoking Dad in mustard-coloured cardigan helping your offspring to build their model railway - but which is, of course, really yours.

 

And here's another idea about gauges and gardens which will please @Nearholmer : How about splitting the difference in scales and choosing O gauge? That would run very well in a garden without it taking over completely and a decent scenic section could be fitted into a (large) shed. There's increasing RTR support for O making it easier to get something up and running quickly and providing a source of cheap bits for the kids.

 

Edited January 19, 2021 by Harlequin

[Zomboid]

15 minutes ago, Lacathedrale said:

a few hours a week is not unreasonable to expect to have to oneself

I've found that in the early days, a few minutes a week when you actually feel like doing anything is optimistic.

Now my daughter is 15 months old, there's a bit more time after she's gone to sleep in the evening, but she wakes up pretty early, so staying up past 10 is a recipe for feeling awful for the whole next day.

 

Before the pandemic hit (she was 5 months at the start of the first lockdown) I had managed about 4 whole days to myself, but they had to be away from the house...

 

Once she's old enough to take an interest I have bought a simple wooden 16mm/ft loco kit to have a go at and we'll see if I have to paint it pink and sparkly...

[Nearholmer]

Garden railways and small children definitely mix well. Many was the hour we spent creating playmobil scenarios around my modest 45mm gauge garden circuit, and youngest still has her own train on my 0 gauge (very lego-figure compatible) layout, although it sees hardly any use nowadays.

[Lacathedrale]

I think for the garden G1 is the smallest for me, the garden is big enough for it, and it allows live steam which for me is the whole point of going large.

 

G1 and 5" tight curves both scale out to about 3.5 chains in radius, the same as a 3' radius curve in 4mm. So it would be possible to think of the garden space as either:

• 14' x 7' layout in 4mm if modelling in 5" gauge
• 36' x 18' layout in 4mm if modelling in 1 Gauge

 

This might help keep the content of this part of the discussion vaguely on-topic with the forum

Edited January 19, 2021 by Lacathedrale

[Nearholmer]

Do you mean SG G1, or 45mm as a narrow gauge? Steam is common in both, of course, but the design considerations are very different - my small line is all 4ft radius curves, which looks and works perfectly fine with the smallish narrow gauge stock I have.

 

(Note football and dog proof construction)

 

In your space you could build a NG railway, all of one, without things becoming busy or cramped, certainly in 45mm, and I’ve seen it done in 5” in a much smaller space, but if that sort of thing doesn’t float your boat ....

Edited January 19, 2021 by Nearholmer