Home office layout (RRTrack can be Dangerous)

Wild!!  What track system?  How many linear feet?  Imagine programming a route with the Lionel ARC and watching it switch & switch & switch!

Of course if you built it you would spend the rest of your life repairing switches

fastrack due to switch reliability/size.

Ok, am I the only one who just sat and stared at the last plan for longer than I should have?  That is a neat concept!

So...many...whys?

I mean wyes

I will bring the cubans and spiced rum!

4,800.00 is really not that bad a figure, some of us have that invested in just a few engines.

Per RRTrack it says 141' 8.9" or 141 cars. Obviously not realistic, here's a simulated 51 car train

You are right, it is too bad it won't fit, the look on anyone's face as they watched it run would be priceless.

Of course, it would have to be a glass shelving system for proper effect.

No.

Exclamation point.

!...for the doubters.

First of all, I am going to be laughing about this all day.  I hope nobody at work asks me why I'm laughing.  It's a train thing.  They wouldn't understand.

I'm also envisioning a turntable within each circle/oval.

So, my OCD, being a Taurus and retired Senior Chief Submariner kept saying "Get it done". It'll require cutting down the four 90 crosses, but...

I present it in 12.25'x12.25' !!!

Now to convince my wife I need a glass ceiling or serious carpenters to do a scalloped coffered ceiling. It's a good thing she also likes trains!

OK, I love it but I must caution you, you will need some overhang for cars and engines along the outside edge. Especially as they enter and leave the corners. Hopefully you have about 3 inches extra around there.

Far out!  Is this built yet? 

That is just sick. What's worse though is I can't even imagine how much that would cost with so many turnouts.

How about adding a second story to the room with a walk-around mezzanine?  Then you could view it from above and below!

Your track plan will be perfect for the Editor's Corner column I'm planning to write for the magazine about "spaghetti bowl" layouts.  

It's not a spaghetti bowl, it's a symmetrical mosaic! The Art of Model Railroading.

Okay, Ace, if you say so!  

I completed a home office layout in addition to my main layout in a unused guest bedroom and as a location within the house, it's worked out fine. That being said, the reason for the agreement to put it there was due to it's relatively small size. As far as the design of your track plan goes goes, ( from my point of view) it stands on it's own as an original. Call it unique. However, as a materialized layout, to me, it seems like a mismatch of design to any sort of pragmatic use. The wiring would be contentious. Considering your proposed location, I think it's simply overly ambitious. Nice to look at on a piece of paper as piece of art.

I suggest scaling it back. 

but...but...but...it's not prototypical!  

I'd have to agree, I tend to look at layouts and measure how much I like them based on how many trains I could run simultaneously without risk of collisions.  Unless I missed it, it looks like the answer may be only 2, one on the extreme outer loop and one on the extreme inner loop.

I definitely think the pattern is cool as anything out there, and it would be awesome to try to think of switch settings that could cause the running train to automatically modify it's path as it progressed (assuming non-derailing switches, which FasTrack are if we are talking about remote). 

Unfortunately as Nuc Tuber found, the cost for such awesomeness is not insignificant in the track department!

-Dave

Wow, I'm gonna try to find my old Spirograph set and see if I can use that as a planning tool to come up with something similar for my space...

You guys are hilarious.

I posted this back in May, when I had gotten home from Japan, and prior to flying to Norfolk.

It's not built, like I said, can't afford it. If I could, you'd have completed/running pics. Maybe I'll set up a kickstarter donation account.

I'm including the RRT files for the large one, and the smaller one that would fit in my office if built. So yo can see the actual parts/price breakdown. I'd kill soem of that by buying 30in sections and custom cutting them down. COME ON LOTTERY!!!

I haven't given up the idea of a ceiling mounted/shelf layout in my office. It'll be simpler, but I was thinking of building it with a few log cars carrying cigars. Then when the guys are over, I can pull the appropriate car to the chute, and the cigar slides down to them in their seat. The other option is to make a tray that lowers the whole train down to seat height.

I build my layouts for fun, so Jay Jay, You're 100% correct, it's not prototypical. I also like symmetry (OCD) and the ability to reverse directions. I'm not afraid of turnouts, i was amazed how nicely the FasTrack switches functioned on last year's **** layout running on track voltage


BTW, my moniker, Nuc Tuber is due to being a retired Reactor Operator (Nuc) on Submarines (Tuber) . If you look at my Avatar, that's me having a cigar while running on the surface after departing Singapore. 

I love it have to wire it so each switch activates another, then turn about a dozen #50 gang cars loose and see what happens!

Clem 

Ya know something scary....that design doesn't look so freaky after several adult beverages.

Thanks for the compliment Ace. I value it after some of the layouts I've seen of yours on here.

I've gotta vote for the original design, it has all the grace and fluidity of the labyrinth in the floor of Chartres cathedral.  The 90 degree crossovers add a level of complexity that the revised version just lacks.  And the 45 degree crossovers with their completely unnecessary little by-pass sections, make it aesthetically just that much more compelling.

This thing is a work of art, my friends.  Somebody just has to build it.  With the right trains running, and a waltz playing in the background, it would be truly kaleidoscopic.  

Did you say shelf layout? That's a bit of a shelf. Maybe a G scale garden set-up with a ten-foot tall obelisk rising in the center?