First Permenent Layout

 

Hold your horses rookie!  Your application for membership has yet to be received by, let alone pass through, our esteemed admissions department.   Save your stamp - membership in the Brotherhood WILL NOT BE APPROVED.   Simply put, you are NOT Brotherhood material! Your basement is TOO nice!

 

On an unrelated note - congratulations on a permanent layout!

 

- Greg

Welcome to the forum.

 

I also have Mianne bench work and can't say enough good things about it. Hoping to make and addition adding more of it soon. Yours looks great. I also used 1/2" plywood, but no Homasote. Just using roadbed on mine. I have both Lionel Legacy and MTH DCS systems and also like both of those. I had DCS first for a few years and added Legacy about a year ago. I wired for my layout for DCS following the DCS O Gauge Companion' guide lines. That is a book by our own forum member Barry Broskowitz.  

 

So for blocking, if you ever plan to have an MTH DCS system then the isolated blocks are a very good idea and a very good thing to have. DCS goes more by number of track joints (10 or so per lock) rather than length, but in any event you should be able to go more than 5-6 feet per block. Mine are probably al at least 10 feet and everything works just fine here. All you need to do is isolate the center rails at each block section, not difficult at all.

 

I would expect you just might end up with a DCS system one of these days even if you are not planning on it right now. I would go ahead and wire for it now while you are doing your initial track laying and wiring. Wiring changes later will be much more difficult. TMCC/Legacy is not as picky about the wiring and will work just fine with the MTH star wiring system. 

 

Also, if you are using the older post war ZW's make sure you have good fast acting fuses or circuit breakers to protect your trains. The modern ZW-L's have very good circuit protection built in, the older ones do not as they were not designed for the modern electronic engines we have today.

 

I would have to agree with Greg above, I don't see a thing 'crappy' about your basement or you layout and especially not your bench work. Looks like you have a great project started and I am sure it will be very nice when you get done.

Welcome to the forum and best of luck with your permanent layout.  Cool find all the answers you need to all the questions right here on the forum a great place to learn.

If you are able to use the 30" track pieces you will save a couple of joints.  I use fastrak & my feed are 10 to 12 feet apart but I do not use DCS all Legacy.

 

Ken M

Greg;

 

Clearly the writings of someone who has never been in my basement. From the pics, you can see that he floor is bare plywood. What might not be clear is that the floor was twice under water and, as a result, it is rather warped. If you were to walk across it (before the bench was in place), you would be easily mistaken for a drunk sailor after a weekend bender. And you probably can not make out that the ceiling is covered with strips of burlap since I got sick of looking at the hanging fuzzy pink insulation. In addition, I only "finished" the area where I am building the layout - the rest of the basement still shows concrete block and hanging fuzzy pink insulation!!! I appeal the rejection.

 

Paul

RTR;

 

Thanks for he kind welcome. I have no intentions of using DCS now or in the future. Although I have never had a permanent layout, I have been accumulating trains for about 40 years. Earlier this year, I added 45 TMCC & Legacy engines to my controller (and that doesn't include all of the older conventional engines I have going back to my first set from the 60's). I am pretty invested in Lionel at this stage in life. From other posts here, I have come to the conclusion, as you mention, that Legacy wiring is somewhat simpler, and being a techno-peasant of the first order, simple is key.

 

Paul

Ken;

 

Thanks for the reply. I will be using a wide cross section of track lengths, so I guess I will have to start counting cracks! Did you isolate each section of tracks?

 

Thanks.

 

Paul

Spence;

 

Thanks for the kind welcome. As someone just beginning the process of building, I can not imagine being where you are now. I look forward to your rebuild process.

 

Paul

Paul,

glad to have you on the Forum!  I am glad to see you moving forward with your first permanent layout.  No matter how inexperienced you are, it looks to me like you are thoughtfully finding the answers to help you make it a lot of fun!!  You have learned what I did 3 years ago when I switched from HO to O gauge, this is the place to be!  I have a Crappy Basement Layout certificate thought I have paneled walls in the basement where I have an unfinished ceiling level shelf layout, and my main layout is a 4x8 in a spare room that still has our married daughter's furniture.  In both cases, I trip over everything trying to get to the trains.  I'm sure yours qualifies!  I have DCS with 3 DCS engines and a few postwar/conventional engines, so I haven't gotten into TMCC Legacy.  However, I know the Lionel guys will come at your beck and call! Again, Welcome!

Hi Paul

     All looks great, thanks for sharing your layout with the OGR Forum. 

Suggestion - send one of your photos to the O Gauge Railroading Magazine, for a section called, "Readers' Rails to Allan Miller, Editor-in-Chief     editor@ogaugerr.com

Along with a 3 or 4 sentence story, about the layout and bench work.

Gary - Cheers from The Detroit and Mackinac Railway

Paul,

AS others have already said, welcome to the forum.

 

Glad to see you are using the Mianne benchwork.  I got my benchwork from Tim, he really helped me a lot with a coupe decisions on configuration as well.  I have attached a link to some pictures of what it looks like.

 

http://www.trainweb.org/acsg/CD/CD_mem.html

 

Welcome and congrats on a fine start,

Aflyer

No I did not isolate each section of track, if I have problems I can disconnect the power to a section with a splice underneath & each track has its own ph180

 

Ken M

Welcome aboard, Paul! Congratulations on the layout.

 

You may want to isolate the loops if you have some TMCC engines with Pulmor or AC motors. That's easy enough to do by pulling the center rail jumper from the 1 3/8" pieces between the switches at the crossover. Match your voltage and you are all set.

 

You do need to make isolated blocks within a loop.

 

You may be able to use only four drops per loop, center of each straight. Switches run on track power.

 

The most important item that you will need is fast acting fuses between the ZW and track to protect the modern electronics.

 

Once you get settled past the initial outlay, consider the PH180's, a ZW-C or a ZW-L for power. Very good fast-acting breakers built-in.

 

Run the bus wiring before you put the deck on to minimize under the table time. One color for each hot and one common or neutral. One common for all. Perhaps a fourth or fifth for accessory voltage. It can be secured later to the deck bottom.

 

Have fun and keep us posted on your progress!

Paul - the Brotherhood met last night at a secret virtual location to discuss this issue.   The reason for rejection is Article 128, Section 28, Paragraph 5 - "Wall Coverings"......essentially, if even one wall is covered by paneling, a basement is deemed "too nice" to meet our definition of "crappy". 

That being stated, inspired by the Pope's pending visit and the atmosphere of acceptance and forgivess, I am happy to inform you that you have been accepted on a trial basis.   As long as no further improvements are made to your basement environment the trial period will end in one year at which time you will be granted permanent membership in the Brotherhood and be afforded all rights and privileges forthwith.

 

Welcome to the club....and forum! 

 

--Greg

 

Carl;

 

Thanks so much for the info. I do want to isolate each loop from the others, and had read about the 1 3/8" pieces, so that sounds fairly simple - like that.

 

I was thinking about running the wires first, couldn't decide if I should or should wait till I have the track down. Getting too old for crawling under the table, so definitely will run the wire before I put the deck on. In preparation for running the wire, I went out and bought some plastic conduit clamps this morning to make that a bit easier (an idea I read here!!!).

 

I am aware of the issue with needing fuses or circuit breakers with the old ZW's from several threads I have read here. Unfortunately, they may as well have been written in Urdu for all I understood. But that will be the subject of another post when I get a little further along.

 

Thanks again for all your help.

 

Paul

 

 

Ken;

 

Thanks so much - that is what I needed to know. I'm almost done with assembling the benchwork, so some wiring looks like the next task. I plan to have each loop and the yard on separate handles on the ZW's, so I should be able to cut out any line if needed.

 

Thanks Again.

 

Paul

Greg;

 

I am so glad that the Brotherhood is observing the Year of Mercy!!! I will strive to keep my basement in it's current Crappy state.

 

Paul

Mark;

 

Thanks for the welcome. As you suggested, the Lionel crew chimed in and I can now begin the next phase of my layout - wiring.

 

I can relate to tripping over things to get to the trains - and that is after innumerable trips to the local dump to get rid of 20 years of accumulated junk.

 

Paul

Wow... that is impressive. I am only having one, small elevated section of track. Your multiple levels should provide a lot of interest.

 

Paul

Gary;

 

Thanks for the welcome and kind words. I am a little reluctant to share my layout with a wider audience until I get a little further along, but I'll keep it in mind.

 

Thanks again.

 

Paul

Let me add another WELCOME to the forum. 

Your layout frame work looks great. 

Your basement looks great also.

living in the desert we don't have basement homes (there is a few) but I remember them from my childhood.

No problem. Let me correct one critical typo that I noticed in my reply:

You do not need to make isolated blocks within a loop.

 

Someone already mentioned that, but I thought I would clear it up now.

Wow, I had nearly the same layout at my old house accept the inner track went under the "Y" turn around/entrance/exit to the yard and I had a spur running into the middle from the top inner loop. I assume you are running all big articulated engines due to the 0-72? Need a place for a coaling tower. I had a large four lane coaling tower which was the center of attention exiting the yard. It is a fun layout. Note later did rip out the inner loop as I really only needed two tracks. Three was too much for me at least, too much stuff going on in a small space (note mine was also 14x20 I think). the extra space allowed me to add scenery/hills and such which visually worked better. Take that for what it is worth.