My layout is 5x17 it started as a 4x7 and my loving wife Paula had a room built for me to add on, and looks great. Since I never built a layout before, I gathered some magazines and books and did some reading.With some help from my son's Shane 15 and Dusty 8 it was fun,I found information in
0-Gauge Railroading and Classic Toy Trains, including articles about layouts as well as retailer web addresses. I also used books such as Wiring Your Layout, 1,2&3; Your First 0-Gauge Layout,
and Realistic Scenery for Toy Train Layouts. I used K-Line "Shadow Rail" track with 31-inch diameter curves and Lionel 0-gauge remote control switches. All track is ballasted. Trees are branches we collected by the side of the road on our trips to South Louisiana.The red dirt was also
collected off the side the of the road while traveling back and forth to work. Structures such as a grain elevator give good vertical dimension to a small layout, as does the backdrop,which is wallpaper border with a mountain scene. Some Walthers cutout buildings are glued at various places to help with the transition from the layout to the mountains. Even though the layout is small, I installed a Lionel TrainMaster Command System (TMCC) for added enjoyment, and I have several
TMCC locomotives including Southern Pacific GP-9s,Southern Pacific RS-11 and a Southern Pacific Consolidation.( I grew up in South Louisiana near the Southern Pacific.) I also have 3 SC-1
switch controllers to control all the switches on the layout. I also use 2 153IRs controllers for the signal lights and banjo signal and do find all they all work great with my layout |
