My 1st Scram design of my 1st perment layout design.

Hi Kris,

SCARM does not include pre-made accessories like the track piers. Elevated track takes a little bit to learn.

Will you be happy with running multiple loops?

Dear Carl

Hope you are have a safe and enjoyable Labor Day weekend. Thank you for your reply. No not really crazy  running multiple loops. What is on the diagram more or less is everything that currently own.  I have more Fastrack 10' straight, 30' straights and more 36 Fastrack curves. I currently do not  own any switches at all, that can be fixed in short order.  I currently own NYC and PPR passenger car and diesel and steam engines. I also have a lot  of PPR freight cars of every type of design. The other theme that also have in house is the Tri-State area mass transit system. Example MTA subway cars, Metro North passenger cars and L.I. passenger cars. I have also made my own MOW cars with the MTA theme. I also have NJ transit Lionel passenger cars from the 1950's and the modern ones as well. I also can expand the layout another foot on the length. I can build up to make it a two or more levels.

What I am trying to do is build a layout that is generic that I could run both themes on and that could be expandable at a later date. Right now this is planned to be in the nose of a two car garage, that is stand alone and not attached to the house. I plan to insulate the garage, upgrade the lighting, sheet rock the garage walls around the layout to give me a canvas to paint on. I plan on placing a heater in the garage that will bring the temp up from freezing in the New England winters.  I have 50 amp service to the garage that is two phase. I plan on using one phase to power the garage only. The other phase would be dedicated only to the train layout.

Any help, suggestion or comments would be greatly appreciate.

Best regards

Kris

Kris,

I don't want to rain on your parade, but heating the garage will be a costly commitment for a train room. I don't think an electric heating system would be cost effective.

It would truly take a small home size system . A forum member named Lancer was going in that direction in Ohio. He had the insulation in and the layout nearly built. The quotes for a natural gas heating system knocked his socks off.

Using a small heater when building the layout, the floor was always too cold. I think it will always be too cold.

Then, you'll have the build up of heat in the summer. Air conditioning, too.

Now, you move a vehicle in or out and lose most of the accumulated heat or cool.

I understand the dilemma of not having a room available in the home or a room large enough to use for trains only.

I am only trying to point out that you have to consider the installation and operation costs thoroughly.

The out building as the train house is good, many do it, but, it would need to be the train house only.

Ok, the layout...

I don't see a problem commingling all of the equipment that you have. You know that certainly get some input on the design. I have put up a snip of the track so that others without SCARM can contribute.

It's a 178" x 91" inch space that you are working with.

Dear Carl

Thank you for your reply. I value your insight on layout builds greatly. I have read other threads where you help out other OGF folks with their layouts. Since the garage layout is a bad idea, I do have the utility room. Since this room houses the heating and A/C and has a space that I can  place a smaller layout and not deal with the heating and cooling issue. Now I will need to get permission from the wife to place the trains in the utility room. Also I will need to reconfigure the garage for more storage space, instead of a train layout space. I rather do this now in the planning stage then having built and then finding out it does not work. Thank you for you in sight and valuable knowledge on this issue. I can run a dedicated 110 v 15 amp single phase from the main circuit breaker box to the utility room. The run would be less than the length of the house (50').

Thanks for looking at my SCARM layout design. I might have to change some of the layout to fit the new room. This is my first time working with a CAD program it is a pleasure to work with.

Kris,

I did not intend to say that it is a bad idea to put the trains in the garage. I wanted to share the experience of one person that found it uncomfortable and the realties of dealing with the climate.

Perhaps you could still use the space in the garage. Wall it off the to be a room of it's own. Then, you could heat and cool it more affordably.

What size and shape area could you isolate in the garage?  Then, design a layout to fit in that space.

Hi Carl

Since this in the planning stage I value your insight and experience.  I was not planning on isolate the train layout in the garage.  I was going to insulate and sheet rock around the train layout and leave the rest of the garage as is. Since this is our first house purchase space is a premium. The utility room is now the best candidate for the train room. The utility room is 10 x 10 feet and has the furnace, A/C  and hot water heater on one side of the room. It also has a walk out to the back yard, the door open into the utility room. We are going to closing in a few weeks, once we are in the house and settled in I will measure the room and use the SCARM design for the new room. I would appreciate any suggestion, insights or comments once I have the design posted.

Congratulations and good luck with the new home!  Ok, we are saying the same thing - enclose the area for the trains in the garage that needs climate control.

Look it over after you settle. You have enough going on now.

If you pursue the utility room idea, make sure you consider access to those utilities for servicing and/or replacement.

Gentlemen, Thank you, for your comments and suggestions.

Dear Carl, The plate is over flowing with everything going on with the house.

Dear Dave, I was thinking down the road as well. I was thinking about making part of the layout would be permanent. That part would be against the wall opposite side of the heating, A/C and water heater. The build out from the permanent would be temporary (modular).  The modular part would be for easy of a removing if something need to be replaced in the utility room.  I saw a thread in which the folks on the west coast that go to the shows and had a nice set up. They used two by two modular sections that fit together very nicely.