clecklewyke Posted March 27, 2015 Share Posted March 27, 2015 I've just received my copy of this book, which I had pre-ordered from Amazon after it had been mentioned in Colin Penfold's thread on Layout Design What nobody had mentioned was that it is an American production, by Model Railroader, so none of the actual designs are really appropriate for a P4 British layout! Nevertheless there is much that is good in it - lots of ideas about presentation, project planning and the like, and there are also plenty of ideas in the layout designs themselves which are fresh to this modeller, who is firmly UK based. There is also much to amuse, not only in seeing IAR's familiar fruity prose translated through an American dictionary and phrasebook but mainly in the American concept of "Compact". When we think of a compact layout we imagine a layout in a shoe box or filing case, or perhaps an inglenook shunting puzzle or the Scalefour Society's Standard Gauge Workbench projects, of layouts less than 4ft 8.5ins length. Think again! In America "Compact" can mean a footprint of anything between 100 - 200 square feet and the layout examples are typically designed to fill a room of 10'X14' or more. I don't remember the word "portable" being used once. But I suppose we do not have to contend with 200-car freight trains... Recommended! Ian Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
shortliner Posted March 27, 2015 Share Posted March 27, 2015 My copy arrived yesterday - and I have to agree that "compact" is one of those words that fits into the class of " two countries divided by a single language"! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold colin penfold Posted March 27, 2015 RMweb Gold Share Posted March 27, 2015 I certainly think that the book provides a good summary of the principles in the now-hard-to-get Haynes book on which my thread was based. A good introduction to the Rice approach to planning, and as Ian says, Iain's writing style is certainly unique. Perhaps he is the Terry Pratchett of model railways I would concur with Ian that this is worth a buy even if you don't think you will be interested in US layouts. I've had my moneys worth already and I'm not up to the first design yet as half the book (page 45 out of 95) is general advice and half is layout designs Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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