It has been a long time coming. 
I couldn't think of a better way to spend a long Thanksgiving week than building a new layout! 
-Greg
Well, I could spend it running trains, but I think I need to do the building step first. 
Can't wait to see, looks great
I really can't wait to see it!
Glad to see you finally have the benchwork. As RTR12 said, once you get started it comes together pretty quickly. As I have mentioned I am very happy with it. Also Mianne was great with phone support if you have any questions with the assembly process. By the way those LED lights you installed in my NYC passenger cars look great.
That stinks about the shipping damage John. Seems anymore that there is ALWAYS shipping damage and its not getting any better. Its almost like when you thought you'd seen it all, guess again, here comes some other kind of damaged stuff in.
I hope that they get you the replacement stuff in quick(which shouldn't be long). Can't wait to see what you post here next.
It'll all get sorted out, I've been pretty busy with other non-train stuff anyway, so I'll live. The holidays are always a busy time around here.
I had a couple of hours, so I started the assembly. Not much yet, but it looks like it'll go together pretty quickly.
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Lookin' Good, and no mess! Enjoy, it goes fast. Might be the easiest part of the build.
I put in another hour, time to knock off and watch a little TV. The upper deck is on.
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It's coming along nicely!!
-Greg
Looking great, John!!
Looking good John
Alex
Looks great John. It’ll go faster than you think, and before you know it, you’ll be laying track. Looking forward to following along.
Andy
Nice work John!
John! What happened to painting the backdrop first?!
John,
The nice part: NO sawdust !!
Fred
Sweet!!! Train meetings for NPOG’s at your house soon... ;-)
Very nice John. Yea- no sawdust 
Thanks guys, it's good to finally get started on it.
Traindiesel posted:John! What happened to painting the backdrop first?!
Got carried away when the benchwork came.
BHalfway posted:Sweet!!! Train meetings for NPOG’s at your house soon... ;-)
You bring the beer.
john, quick question. First I was unaware they did upper level benchwork. will the upper level hold our heavy trains? btw looking go so far.
The upper deck is plenty strong to support most anything you put up there. Since it's only a 12' x 2' space, it's going to be a town with a 'Streets track, so heavy won't be an issue in any case.
Looking good John! Your moving right along! I do have to say it looks a lot cleaner then my bench work! LOL
It doesn't have a top on it Mike, it'll get covered with something once it has a place to put things.
Its funny how that happens John, I had a nice clean room but once the top went on it started to collect stuff I didn't even know I had! LOL
gunrunnerjohn posted:
This is the whole basement plan. The red is where the current layout will go, and it will also fill that back cavity, too lazy to draw that shape.
John,
What did you use to model your basement like that? Is that some kind of architecture tool?
John, it's Sweet Home 3D, a pretty neat and free tool. You can draw a plan view and then view it in 3d and rotate it around for different views. Very slick tool for planning, we used it for all the rooms in the new house to decide where to put stuff.
Sweet Home 3D
Here's the plan and a couple of the 3D views.
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Looking great John, where's the thumbs up emo?
That looks like a very quick way to setup bench work. I may look into some of the prefab bench work when I am able to use my whole basement for my layout.
GRJ, If it's possible to slide the bench work out away from the wall, you can always fasten 1/8" tempered board to the backside of it. Then paint that or use it for mounting back drop poster. That way you don't have to mess up those nice walls and it will also strengthen the bench work. It's about 9 bucks a sheet w/tax. Just a thought.
Dave and Tom, There should be a lot of built in support for a hardboard backdrop on the configuration Mianne sold to John!
The slide in variety is slick, if John wants to make it removable. I don’t think he plans to move again, but I may. I ordered a single level from Mianne, so I need to build support.
The back side of the Masonite was framed like picture frame matting with 2 1/2" strips of 1/4" multi-ply plywood.
The contribution above was an attempt to show the slot idea. Photos above were for a traveling module.
There was also a sturdy corner brace to retain an even curve, otherwise the curve tends to flair out at the top on module mounted curved corners:
For Mianne bench work you could fashion a filler insert panel to provide a flush flat background mounting surface.
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Yes, I get it now on the slotted variety for easy setup and teardown. I have moved more times than I would have liked, so moving a layout is on my mind. The coved corner support looks quite sturdy!
And now back to our regular scheduled GRJ layout build...……...
I agree. Nice discussion on background building, if it had its own thread. John already indicated tentative plans earlier in the previous page.
Tom has a tendency to make complex woodworking look easy. It looks like he has more clamps on that corner than I own! 
I try to make electronics look easy, but I'm not capable of making complex woodworking look easy.
Dave Zucal posted:GRJ, If it's possible to slide the bench work out away from the wall, you can always fasten 1/8" tempered board to the backside of it. Then paint that or use it for mounting back drop poster. That way you don't have to mess up those nice walls and it will also strengthen the bench work. It's about 9 bucks a sheet w/tax. Just a thought.
Interesting thought Dave, that would be easy. The benchwork will slide right now, it's not that heavy and all the legs have levelers with nice smooth pads on them.
Congratulations on the beginning of what will become a very nice model railroad for your enjoyment, and ours. I suppose it’s to early to ask what your minimum radius will be? To me, building the layout was as much fun as Operation. Thank You for sharing your achievements with us. Happy Railroading.
