The dream never dies! New house, new "train room", new layout fantasies...but maybe this one will come true.
Room is 17x15. I want to run an around the room shelf layout, including a lift-out 3-foot section for the door, and including running across three 33-inch windows on one wall. Height on the high side, maybe 48 inches. I'll have trains on Railrax on walls above it, and work tables around the room below it. Track lighting. As 1950s-ish as possible: Tubular three-rail O track maybe with ties added; ZWs with many feeder wires; building flats and backdrops; 3-track mainline; maybe one area with static sidings with milk car, cattle, coal ramp/397, etc.; run 773 with Madisons, Super Chief, 671 with 2400 cars--all trains with extra cars, extra B units, etc.
So many questions:
1. Who makes lift-out sections for room doors? Reliable? Affected by weather? Get out of whack easily?
2. Problems with running across windows (roadbed can be supported every 33 inches): Affected by sun (but trains won't sit there)? Need UV film on windows? Am I crazy??
3. What's minimum width for shelf for three-track, tangent main line?
4. Radius: Would like 72 but maybe protrudes too far out from corners? 054? Anything in between with sectional, tubular track? On curves could the inside track most into the room be 72 but the other outside one or two nearest the corners be 54? (Or do I have it reversed, and should the 72 be nearest the corner--but then whole curve would protrude into room again?)
5. Minimum separation on curves for engines and manifests as above: Madisons, alum cars, 773, ABBA SF, etc.?
6. Carpet coming April 10. Before then, should I criss-cross the sub-flooring (22 feet diagonally) with 14 gauge braided wire--does it have to be two-conductor--of different colors (or at least each end ID'd somehow) anticipating future track feeder wires and power wires to accessories, etc. even though I have no idea yet of where controls will go; how many feeders I'll need (how many WILL I need); where operating sidings will be, etc., etc.? Should I just put down a mess of them, taped to the sub-flooring? Or is the whole idea hardly worth it, as I'd just staple wires to underside of shelf around the room???
7. Shelving: 3/4 plywood too much? 1/2 inch? (Homosote eventually on top.) Use some other wood--why? Put wood support pieces underneath at shelving joints for support--or maybe have joints fall at brackets?
8. Brackets: Anchored to studs, obviously. How close (32 inches close enough--don't need 16, do I)? Fasten shelving directly to brackets, or sub-wood on brackets and then shelving fastened to that? What kind of brackets: Simple right angle (do they come that long)? Or heavy right angle with support brackets across the hypoteneuse? How broad a shelf can they support without wavering?
9. ZWs: Can they be connected together with only one set of controls dominating? Should they be?
10. Tubular track: Whose? Three-foot straights, right?
11. O72 switches: Modern? Didn't they go through some modifications??
Geez, that's enough, I'm exhausted already! Basically I want a long, smooth run, sweeping curves, to showcase all my great trains from the early 50s, and some accessories. Can you suggest a book; prior magazine articles in OGR or elsewhere; even TCA? Thanks a million.
Best,
ron
