Benchwork For My First O Layout

Matthew, That is a really neat way of supporting the bench work! Is it going to be table top or open grid? Keep the pictures coming.

Very nice carpentry, also a nice idea. Your frame work is very neat and square

keep the progress photo's coming.

 

Thanks, Alex

Monkiejohnson,

 

This will be open grid. I want to keep the weight of the benchwork as low as possible.

I completed my benchwork this week so here are several photos. The next step will be to work on the backdrop and then overhead lighting.

 

The higher part of the benchwork is 51" from the floor, which will give me a nice eye-level, closeup view of the layout.

 

As mentioned in my original post, the benchwork is suspended from the ceiling joists.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Very nice. Nice to have that floor clearance. Good luck.

Very nice bench work.  I could have saved myself a lot of work.

Very nice, indeed.  Except for stopping short of the floor, it looks very much like my own...cantilevered from the walls. 

 

BTW, you could extend the support to the floor by simply building a short-stud wall to sit on the floor and fasten to the hanging studs.  You could build that short wall (looks like about 18-24" would do it) of pressure-treated wood and fasten the floor plate down with Tapcon screws, tie the short studs into your hanging ones with screws/bolts.  That would give you additional support/stability, and yet allow you to unfasten the lower wall in the event of a flood, replace it, or simply remove it to outdoors for drying out and re-installation. 

 

Also, I made a couple of temporary legs for my cantilevered layout to provide extra support for when I lean on the edge during construction/scenery work/etc.  I took a length of 2" PVC pipe, cut a notch across one end to engage the bottom of the table edge, capped the other end into which a threaded bolt was inserted.  The bolt is the length adjustment for inserting/removing the leg and to apply just enough pressure to give that additional support to the layout edge while working. 

 

FWIW, always...but you've DEFINITELY made a good choice of benchwork construction!!

 

KD

KD,

 

I like your ideas, especially the temporary support. I did test the strength by putting close to 400 lbs across the top surface. Hopefully that's more weight than all the track, buildings, etc. will weight. But it never hurts to have additional support,, especially if I need to lean on or get onto the benchwork to work on the backdrop.

Wanted to share some progress photos of my layout. Been very busy at work so haven't been able to work on the layout much. But have now completed adding backdrop, ceiling and track lighting. I hope to start planning and laying track soon.

 

 

That's looking real good.

Very nice, neat benchwork Matthew. Looks great!

 

Andy

Looking very, very good, Matthew!  I'm looking forward to tracking the development of what I suspect will be a very fine layout.