Three inspirational authors

In my journey towards realistic modeling in three-rail O scale I have found three books to be very helpful.

First, Lou Sassi (a former member of the NMRA Division I belong to) has written many books for Kalmbach including two on "How to Build and Detail Model Railroad Scenes". These are fantastic for breaking down industries, houses or other subjects into small, manageable parts. I am constantly drawn to his wonderful pictures.

Second, Dennis Brennan wrote "Realistic Modeling for Toy Trains" about building an urban themed O scale layout. Ironically, I purchased this book from him and asked him to autograph in 2010. It only took me 14 years to get started on my own layout! He covers weathering, structure kitbashing, and urban decay modeling in a realistic manner and in my opinion few seem to do this well. Usually, the results are over the top or otherwise unrealistic. It is a great book.

Finally, one book jam-packed with lots of New England themed railroad projects is "Model Railroading with George Dutka". He has written numerous articles for railroad magazines and maintains several blogs that I follow. I have already used it for inspiration for several projects of my own in different scales. His book focused mostly on modifying and personalizing structures and rolling stock, and each of his projects is small enough as to not become overwhelming. My new layout will draw upon his ideas a lot in the future.

Benchwork Received

The benchwork for the first side of my new layout is here. Yup, it is all in that box.

I don't mind building benchwork though it is tedious. I have used both L-girder and open-grid styles in the past and I much prefer the later but it requires a lot of precision cutting. I am usually good with my chop saw but it does take a bit of time to do. Which, because of my young son, I don't have a lot of. And, over the past couple of years (perhaps longer) the wood available at the local big box stores has gotten worse and worse.

For this layout, I decided to try something different: commercial benchwork. I looked online at various companies and one stood out for both its price and available options: Model Railroad Benchwork. The owner, Ondrew, also has a Youtube channel showing many of his custom layout builds. I was especially drawn to his quarter-circle and half-circle benchwork options, useful for making nice end-of-layout turnarounds.

I reached out to them in 2022 and asked about purchasing some of their benchwork kits to have in storage until the time when I was ready to use them, but he suggested I wait. Fast forward two years, and I was ready to order but his 3x6' sections weren't available anymore. Apparently, they are too difficult to ship. But, they worked with me and let me order them which I am grateful for.

I like the fact that the wood is plywood and not warp-prone like pine, and it uses Kreg pocket holes to hide the hardware. If I had a table saw and a friend to help I could probably build the equivalent for half the cost, but I don't. And, at the end of the day, perfect square benchwork is much more important to me than other layout things I could spend money one.

To be honest, I ordered my benchwork about 10 minutes before this NENR blog went "live" on June 30. I had drafted many posts in advance, but until I pulled the trigger on the benchwork my future layout wasn't official. 

The benchwork was received on July 09, 2024, but I am setting it aside until I take my September vacation. I can't wait to get started!

Harrison's first Lionel layout

Though Harrison is free to pick whatever toys he wants, he really likes his wooden Brio style trains. I think most kids do these days, and I personally believe that Thomas the Tank Engine has done more to interest kids in trains and model railroading in general than any other promotional campaign. Still, I don't actively push trains on him.

But, I bought him a Thomas train set for his first Christmas and he enjoys watching me run my HO scale layout in the basement (had I known this fact last year, I might not have redesigned it to remove the option for continuous running. Sigh)

I decided to built him a train layout for him to play with. It had to be semi-portable or at least movable, it had to fit under my layout, it had to be cheap in case he lost interest, and it had to have some green scenery to draw Harrison's interest. So, I dug into an old Model Railroader special issue magazine from the late 1980s that I had as a kid and found the perfect plan designed by Jim Hediger.

I started with a pair of wooden dolly carts I had left over from Harbor Freight. I cut them apart to salvage the coaster wheels and built a frame about 14" tall (a good height for Harrison) from some 1x2" lumber. This later proved to be a mistake, as the wood from Harbor Freight wasn't good.

The layout base is a piece of plywood split down the middle. The plans mistakenly called for both 3/8" thick and 3/4" thick plywood, and that must have been a typo. Splitting the difference, I used 1/2" plywood. The two outer edges are framed with 1x4" boards.

The ends are framed with pieces of 2x4" board. This is important because they need to be beefy to support the hinges which will be mounted on them. 

The right side of the table with flipped over and two more 2x4's were mounted along the edge on the underside. Then, the caster/leg assembles were set in place. 

I didn't want to glue the wheel/legs in place, so I instead glued and screwed blocks cut from 2x4" lumber on each side of the legs. The wheel assemblies slide out, but friction keeps them in place except when they need to be removed. 

As it turns out, the cheap plywood on the Harbor Freight dolly delaminated and broke so I removed the casters and modified the leg assemblies to use a solid 2x4" instead. 

The non-wheel side of the table also had 2x4" braces underneath along the two sides as well. I then mounted a pair of 14" tall legs made from 2x4" lumber on the left hand side to raise it up in height to match the right side table. Hinges will hold them together later. 

My wife helped me carry the two pieces outside and I went over everything with my power sander. For safety, I rounded over all the sharp edges and removed all splinter areas that I could find. Then, I started to paint them the same green that I used on my HO layout fascia. I thought a 1/2 pint of paint would be enough, but I was wrong. When I went to buy more, the store's paint mixer was broken. 

The next day, I bought another pint of paint which I thought would be enough, but I was wrong again. It barely gave everything two coats. But I like the way it looks. The color is "Jungle Green". I am thinking about adding some indoor/outdoor carpeting but haven't done it yet.

A pair of heavy duty 6" strap hinges bought on Amazon were installed. They look and work great though I replaced the mounting screws with longer wood screws.

A pair of handles were installed on the top part of the layout to assist in flipping it open. I also screwed some rubber "bumpers" on the corners to leave a gap between the pieces... helpful for getting fingers between them if necessary.

Some cheap building kits (Lionel MPC era, old/dirty Plasticville, etc.) were glued up and painted to go on the layout. There was no point in building something nice that a toddler would destroy. Harrison won a raffle at a local show and picked out a light-up police car, and he was also given a very old, plastic cow toy at the same show.

There you have it. Harrison's first real train layout (Brio toys don't count). Naturally, the track isn't attached but when a final track plan is picked we can do so and cut the track at the fold line. Until then, he is content to play with it as is. It might not be much, but it cost only about $100 and it doesn't take up much space once folded up and rolled away. 

He is also becoming proficient at putting the trains on the track, and manually coupling the Lionel couplers together.