How many people have more than one layout on the go?

[TravisM]

I've got just the one layout, finally based on Sleaford East Junction in the summer of 2009 on the go, but when I recently saw that Athearn had announced that they were releasing a Amtrak 5 car Surfliner set with DCC and sound (just DC is available), I just knew I had to have the set.  I spent a large part of March 2008 going up and down the Surfline between San Diego, LA and Santa Barbara.

 

I'm not going to abandon my East Midlands Trains layout as it's too far advanced with track laying in progress, stock acquired, etc, so I'll do a small portable layout based in So. CA but using the same size base boards as Sleaford, so I can use the same trestles.  I must admit, it did make me wonder how many people have two or more personal layouts on the go?

Edited July 3, 2021 by jools1959
Spelling

[shanks522]

Technically I have four on the go, two N gauge ones, 2018 ish WCML and a1980s Southern era, one 00 1990s NSE 3rd rail and then an ho french steam depot. 
 

keeps the interest alive. 
 

Graham 

[F-UnitMad]

Guilty, M'lud.

My 'main' layout is American O Scale, 17ft x 8ft, a long-term project. I have two British O shunty-planks, one still unfinished after a decade or more, and just recently started a 4ft x 2ft-ish American O plank as a light-hearted diversion. Like I haven't got enough engines in bits, freight cars to weather & detail, & unfinished buildings to keep me occupied....

[CloggyDog]

I currently have 3 (arguably 4, including the canal boxfile) layouts 'in progress' at the moment - Dounreay (H0) , Mynyndd y Ddraig (009) and Hasselhöf Nord (H0) - to join the 3 completed micros (Barbers Bridge (EM) , Reading Signal Works (OO) and Nové Město na Nedostatku (TT) and 2 completed boxfiles and the CROC Steampunk diorama. 

 

And then Hasselhöf Ost Hbf (H0) can be built.

 

Then Harlem Transfer/B&O 26th St (H0)... haven't 100% decided which, yet. 

 

Oh... And something small(ish) in O gauge needs doing at some point... 

 

Layout storage space is becoming the issue, at least until the shed gets a tidy once the cooker moved from there to its rightful place in the kitchen! 

 

But I do really enjoy the variety of scales, eras and prototypes, plus the 'quick win' and cheapness of serial micro layout building. For me it keeps things fresh and interesting. 

Edited July 4, 2021 by CloggyDog
Forgot CROC...

[sncf231e]

One in the garden and one in the house.

Regards

Fred

[ColinK]

Several….

 

1 - HOf tiny layput in a coffee table - it’s finished and has done two exhibitions already.

2 - A 00 blue diesel end to end layout which is finished, exhibited many times and due to be dismantled soon, I would like one last exhibition with it first.

3 - Less serious is my 0-16.5 narrow gauge shunting layout of a rail served chocolate factory called Quality Street.  It’s been stored for a while because it has an electrical problem I can’t find. When I get tine to fix it the plan is to double it’s size.

4 - an indoor G scale layout under construction. Hopefully it will be finished by the end of the year and I might be tempted to exhibit it if asked.

5 - I’m not sure if it counts as a layout, but I have a tiny working diorama in N gauge, built for a competition celebrating 40 years of the New Mills Club - the diorama had to be in 40 square inches, mine is 20” x 2” with a railcar that shuttles between tunnel and station.

 

Once the G scale is finished, I’ll be dismantling the 00 and have the space to build a new one - bigger with continuous run and branch. It is already planned and much of the track ready to be laid. I’ve also got a plan and the stock for a little N gauge layout, just need the time - I’m technically retired but have a part time job which averages out at 40 hours a week.

 

 

[SteveyDee68]

Look at my signature! 

 

At this moment, in active (but haphazard) mode are Castlebrook Sidings (sorted out the track plan, have wood for baseboard, about to build baseboard), DRS Engineering (foamboard micro layout, track and scenic design sorted, about to be laid and wired up!), Blackford Wharf (4 foot long dockside layout, trackplan sorted, buildings mocked up, track to be fastened down and wired up). To go with Blackford Wharf I need to build a traverser using the discarded baseboard from Castlebrook Sidings.

 

Meanwhile, I am still thinking through how to build a train ferry but have decided to leave planning Broadhaven alone for the time being, until I have built the ferry.

 

Currently "on hold" is Woodhey Quay, which I plan to build with foamboard baseboards at a later date

 

I am also (crazily) trying to build a skirted drewery shunter using a Bachmann "not Thomas" chassis and a Dapol kit, a Y2 tram engine using a Hornby "pug" chassis, and modifying a Bachmann Junior diesel to look like the skirted diesels (class 05?) that served Ipswich docks.

 

I am also getting together bits for attempting to build a 4-BEP from a 4-CEP for way less than the cost of a new Bachmann model ... I think that will be a summer holidays project!

 

So many pies, not enough fingers!!

 

Currently none of this is happening as I am reorganising the loft space to make it work better (shared workspace for lesson planning/music arranging/storage!)

 

HOURS OF FUN!

[PMP]

Three WIP at the moment 

Shelfie2 (almost complete)

 

Shelfie3

 

Shelfie4

 

[Gilbert]

Several on the circuit:

• Bakewell Street 7mm BR 50s-70s
• Gare de Brindille 16mm WDLR 1917

Ready to show:

• Penmaenbach 4mm Railfreight - hopefully in RM this year
• Lockdown Fen 4mm W&U.
• Cropper Steet 4mm mainly blue diesel - the replacement for Dock Street

To build:

• 4mm  S&D branchline through station
• 3.5mm   US generic switching layout for my CP/CN/IHB and Guilford equipment

Plus a yet to be determined home for my recently acquired and/or ordered DRS locos and nuclear stock....

[CloggyDog]

10 hours ago, SteveyDee68 said:

I am also (crazily) trying to build a skirted drewery shunter using a Bachmann "not Thomas" chassis and a Dapol kit, a Y2 tram engine using a Hornby "pug" chassis, and modifying a Bachmann Junior diesel to look like the skirted diesels (class 05?) that served Ipswich docks.

 

They were 0-4-0 DMs, slightly shorter than the much more common 05s.

 

BR Class D1/1 (all 3 were withdrawn before TOPS) and sadly the one sold on to industry before being scrapped in the mid-80s, despite a preservation attempt. 

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_D1/1

 

They've been on my 'to-do' list, so I'd be interested in how you tackle yours. 

Edited July 4, 2021 by CloggyDog

[Clive Mortimore]

Only two Pig Lane (BR Western Region) and Sheffield Exchange Mk2.

 

Pig Lane is a small stabling point on the WR circa 1969-70. It has been to a few shows.

 

Sheffield Exchange is a 20 by 15 ft stay at home thing that now and then gets worked on.

 

[Clive Mortimore]

10 minutes ago, CloggyDog said:

 

They were 0-4-0 DMs, slightly shorter than the much more common 05s.

 

BR Class D1/1 (all 3 were withdrawn before TOPS) and sadly the one sold to the NCB was scrapped in the mid-80s, despite a preservation attempt. 

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_D1/1

 

They've been on my 'to-do' list, so I'd be interested in how you tackle yours. 

I made one many moons ago, it ran with a Tenshodo motor bogie. Said bogie with a different plastic card body was swapped for a curry one night.

 

 

I think this is the only photo I have of it and someone placed a tank wagon in the way.

[The Johnster]

I am in awe of anyone whose life and whose ability to model allows them to undertake more than one layout at a time.  Cwmdimbath takes up most of my spare time despite that I am retired, and could be a full time enterprise if I allowed it to become one; this is a BLT with a run around loop and 4 sidings, so it is probably fair to say that this situation is more to do with my congenital inability to organise myself in any productive or efficient way than the degree of challenge the layout affords me!

 

[tetsudofan]

One indoors:

 

 

bit of a mish-mash, no real theme. if I like it it ends up on the railway.......

 

The other line is in the garden;

 

 

Plenty to do and keep me out of trouble.....

 

Keith

 

 

 

 

[Phatbob]

Amongst those of us with a passion for exhibiting, having multiple portable layouts for exhibition is, to feely quote Sir Tom Jones, not unusual. 
I have three exhibition layouts of my own and a fourth one that belongs to Roundhouse of this parish on loan for as long as the exibition invitations keep coming.
For those who have a "fixed" layout for use at home, I would say that the norm is one all-consuming layout.  We exhibitionists tend to have more than one, with a new project under construction at the same time.

 

[The Johnster]

Yes, that is part of the world of exhibiting and of course very rewarding for those who enjoy building layouts more than operating them and the imagined life of the place; I think of Cwmdimbath as a real reailway serving a real place, only small and long ago... 

 

If you are exhibiting a layout, then of course it has a shelf life that limits it's being asked back to shows, and very few layouts have the capacity to exceed this; Borchester comes to mind but I can't think of any others off hand.  I wouldn't mind another chance to see North Shields...  But for most exhibitors, be they clubs, groups, or individuals, you need to be building the next layout while the current one is on the circuit, and then the one after that as soon as the next layout enters the circuit, after which time the first layout is stripped of re-useables and scrapped.  I was once a member of a club that created a sequence of layouts in this cyclic way, and found it, and the actual exhibiting, somewhat stressful (not saying it wasn't satisfying and gave one a feeling of participating in an achievement, but it did increasingly stress me out).  The club lacked the internal co-operation, discipline, and ability to satisfactorily complete, test, and prove tasks in good time for shows and there was always a feeling of rushing things to meet the show deadline, and as we were one of the promoters of the biggest show we attended, this put even more pressure on.  I got rapidly tired of the mantra that exhibiting an incomplete layout to show the punters how things were being built was an acceptable philosophy; it wasn't, at least not to me!  I learned a lot about how not to go about things from them, though...

 

A home layout is a different matter, and of course Borchester is primarily a home layout.  I doubt that I will ever finish work on Cwmdimbath, and if I ever do I'll relay it in code 75 bullhead, though it is complete in the sense that the track plan is laid and operating and there are no parts on the scenic section that are unscenicked, and that I have sufficient locos and stock to run the timetable.  It isn't finished, though, and I don't intend it to ever be, nor will it ever be in a condition in which I would be happy to exhibit it.  I have mental health issues that mean that exhibitions are largely a thing of the past for me nowadays anyway, except small ones at quiet times.

 

But I owe a massive debt of gratitued to those who have built layouts for exhibitions over the last 50 or so years.  Inspiration, guidance, experience to tap into and learn from, a sense of what is possible and what I might (and might not) be capable of, as well as much subjective and difficult to quantify stuff concerned with presentation, sight lines, lighting, and 'effect'.  I have had my share of failed layouts like most of us, and learned from them, but I think I learned more (and certainly in a more positive way) from exhibition layouts.  Much of this has borne fruit in Cwmdimabath, perhaps not everyone's cup of tea, but the most 'successful' layout in all respects that I have ever built for myself, and a size that I can fit into a not huge flat, and a complexity that is conducive to coping with operating alone in real time at a level of challenge that satisfies me.  It is my Goldilocks layout, just right, and I would like to thank a host of exhibitors, and magazine/website contributors, without whom I could not have built or been able to operate it as successfully. 

 

Keep buildin' dem show layouts guys'n'gals, we all need 'em!

[steve1]

Four for me:

 

Rectory Farm Sidings - Freight and PW - 4mm/16.5mm - BR Blue or 2000s(ish) depending on stock chosen.

 

Catte Lane - 5 linked boxfiles - 4mm/16.5m - industrial/PW

 

Diversion/Umleitung - 3 linked boxfiles - OO/HO - UK or German depending on stock - industrial.

 

Duncan’s Mine 2 - 3.5mm US - Mine loader and general freight- 1959 North Michigan.

 

All are exhibition layouts.

 

Plans for a couple of EM layouts set in Scotland, plus a German and another US projects.

 

steve

[The Johnster]

Steve, that's an impressive spread. Out if interest, do you use the layouts at home as home layouts, I mean apart from test running and operating practice for exhibitions?

 

In the back of my mind for some years now has been a BR steam period Central Wales exhibition RTR double ended plank in N, but I doubt I'll ever build it and all my railway money goes on Cwmdimbathkj.  I can imagine myself sitting behind it at a show, protected from the agoraphobia/stress inducing crowds, though...

[steve1]

1 hour ago, The Johnster said:

Steve, that's an impressive spread. Out if interest, do you use the layouts at home as home layouts, I mean apart from test running and operating practice for exhibitions?

 

In the back of my mind for some years now has been a BR steam period Central Wales exhibition RTR double ended plank in N, but I doubt I'll ever build it and all my railway money goes on Cwmdimbathkj.  I can imagine myself sitting behind it at a show, protected from the agoraphobia/stress inducing crowds, though...

 

Thanks and, essentially, no I don't. Somehow I never get round to it. 

 

Diversion/Umleitung will fit on the dining table and, when it's 'finished' I might, might, try operating it domestically.

 

steve

[t-b-g]

Guilty!

 

A number are joint projects with other people but my "main" project is the gradual restoration of Buckingham but I have 3 other layouts that have been exhibited and are probably best described as "in store" (Sutton Dock, Church Warsop and Mansfield GN), another one that I had given to somebody else but came back when he passed away (Shonewood) plus 2 part built layouts in EM gauge (Mansfield Market Place and Attercliffe LD&ECR) and one at a very early stage in 7mm scale (Warsop Vale), plus baseboards for another EM and another 7mm one.

 

Those are all pretty much mine.

 

Then there is Narrow Road, which now incorporates Valleyfields plus 3 other stations which is a joint project with Ken Hill and lives at his house. I help Laurie Adams a small amount with his 2mm scale Yeovil Town project and until a few years ago I was helping Malcolm Crawley with his Thompson's End layout plus Roy Jackson with Retford. Both those fine modellers are no longer with us.

 

That doesn't include a few that I work on as a "modeller for hire".

 

Sometimes I think that I spread myself a bit thinly but I really do enjoy the variety and the ability to switch projects and scales if I get a bit stale on one.

[Kris]

I have either 3 or 4 depending on how you look at it. There are 2 n gauge layouts that hopefully one day will be joined to become one. There is also a OO layout for my children and a small shunting OO layout. 

[The Johnster]

It is all accentuating the idea that some of us build railways, and some of us operate.  I regard myself as being on the operating side of this particular fence, but have enjoyed and am still enjoying the building and visual development of the layout as well as the etched brass coach kits I've built.  And most of my future plans for the hobby may be best described as modelling; a Southeastern chassis for an 1854 pannier and a twin set of TVR auto trailers are in the pipeline; completely scratch built coaches will be a departure for me. 

 

My current project, very much in the experimental stage so I won't say much about it in case it ends up being something I'm a bit ashamed of, is providing lit head and tail lamps powered independently of the track supply for a steam era DC layout.  It is the testing of some theories I've had knocking about in the mortal remains of my head for a while, and may lead to night time operations on Cwmdimbath...

[Northmoor]

Mutter mutter envious grumble whitter self-pitying moan...... More than one layout?  Pah!  Wish I had space to erect even my 5'6" BLT in this house.  It's standing on it's end in the garage, surrounded by the detritus that comes with being a family of four in what is laughably referred to by estate agents as a 3-bedroom house (it's two-and-a-half bedrooms buddy, if you think that's big enough to be called a bedroom, you come and sleep in it).

To be fair it's partly my own fault that the loft is so full (much of which is stuff that I want to keep), that the layout framework I built 20 years ago became a shelf.  However it isn't my fault that moving up to bigger property around here became utterly unaffordable a long time ago; since I've lived here house prices have gone from ridiculous to hilarious, rising much faster than my salary (and that's not been static either).  There is no way we could afford this house on our salaries now, I can't imagine how anyone starting out in this area manages to buy anything (and renting isn't cheap either).  Hopefully one day we'll retire to somewhere bigger.  In the meantime my modelling is limited to pulling a few items out of the loft and setting up a temporary workbench which gets cleared away again after a few days of getting in the way.

This isn't a jealous dig at anyone; I know everyone here has earned the houses they live in as well.  Good luck to you all.

[The Johnster]

The near 4 decade hiatus in my modelling was when that part of my life (house, mortgage, career, kids) was ended by a divorce that was in all honesty not my fault; it wasn't me who slept with my best mate (who stopped being my best mate around this time as well,) but which I came out of with nothing, no chance of rebuilding by earning money that would not have been appropriated by the CSA, bless 'em, and nowhere to live.  it might be frustrating for your modelling ambitions, and I understand and sympathise completely with how you feel, but trust me Brother Northmoor, it could be very much worse. 

 

My situation is now stable enough to take up modelling again, but I rent a flat and do not own a property or a car, and cannot afford holidays (which I'm told I don't need because I am retired).  My credit rating is in minus figures, and I have been robbed, cheated, and generally done up like a kipper.  I am 69 years old and will never now be able to even aspire to such things short of coming up on the lottery,  The future I worked hard for never happened, and the broad sunlit uplands were a dream that turned into a nightmare.  And I'm not playing the violin for myself here; this is a story that has happened to many like me, and often results in lives even more destroyed than mine!

 

Hang on in there, mate; with luck it'll work out good for you in time!

[Northmoor]

1 hour ago, The Johnster said:

The near 4 decade hiatus in my modelling was when that part of my life (house, mortgage, career, kids) was ended by a divorce that was in all honesty not my fault; it wasn't me who slept with my best mate (who stopped being my best mate around this time as well,) but which I came out of with nothing, no chance of rebuilding by earning money that would not have been appropriated by the CSA, bless 'em, and nowhere to live.  it might be frustrating for your modelling ambitions, and I understand and sympathise completely with how you feel, but trust me Brother Northmoor, it could be very much worse. 

 

My situation is now stable enough to take up modelling again, but I rent a flat and do not own a property or a car, and cannot afford holidays (which I'm told I don't need because I am retired).  My credit rating is in minus figures, and I have been robbed, cheated, and generally done up like a kipper.  I am 69 years old and will never now be able to even aspire to such things short of coming up on the lottery,  The future I worked hard for never happened, and the broad sunlit uplands were a dream that turned into a nightmare.  And I'm not playing the violin for myself here; this is a story that has happened to many like me, and often results in lives even more destroyed than mine!

 

Hang on in there, mate; with luck it'll work out good for you in time!

Thanks @The Johnster, you hang in there too; my cynical moan above aside, I am aware there are so many in a MUCH worse position than myself (not being able to have a model railway the size you want is the very definition of a First World Problem!).  I have been through a period of poor mental health but was lucky enough to get out of a workplace culture that was making me ill, before it did so irreversibly.  Many don't.

The positive side is that my too-small house (I was spoiled being brought up in a large 4-bedroom house in rural Wales with several outbuildings and a lot of land) is at least paid for.  It took two redundancy payments and some inheritance, but the sense of relief at paying off the biggest expense of my life was another contribution to better mental health.  Many of my wife's friends have amazing houses but I'll bet that their mortgage and the loan on the car on the drive means that if either wage-earner is made redundant, their first call will be to the other half and the second, the mortgage company.

Again, I am envious of other's space and achievements but not jealous or bitter.  They've all earned it and as you say, some have earned it and had it taken away.