Top of layout

I recently built my table on Sievers-esque frames with a 1/2 plywood top - On top of the plywood I applied/troweled a water based flooring adhesive and rolled down a vinyl flooring underlayment, and then another coat of water based flooring adhesive on top of that - and then I rolled out 1/8 cork - On top of that I painted 2~3 coats of primer to kind of 'fill' the cork grain and then a green painted base. The finished profile is less than 3/4" deep. I have gargraves track and the sound is definitely improved over painted plywood.

Mine is similar to what you are pondering Al. I used 3/4” foam board to assist with sound deadening but also for purposes of scenery; making ravines, recessed structures, altering terrain, etc. What type of track are you using?

Jay

Well, committed to fastrack, too much invested to change. Sound deadening isn’t the main issue as new house will be sprayed insulated foam in  basement ceiling  as I have specified a hobby shop environment with dust suppressor duct work.

Looking  for top material as final on top of foam . Outdoor carpet was ugly, tough to work with and not adaptable for scenery additions.

@Al B posted:

Looking  for top material as final on top of foam . Outdoor carpet was ugly, tough to work with and not adaptable for scenery additions.

Well, I opted for half-inch OSB, with half-inch foam board (the pink stuff, not the white bead board) on top, and haven't regretted it. My initial top layer was two rolls of paper-backed Bachman grass roll, which was just enough to completely cover my eight-by-eight-foot layout. On top of that, I ran my tubular 3-rail track on foam roadbed, secured by track nails through the foam roadbed into the foam top.

The first 'finished' landscaping section I did was built on thin foam board cut to fit the specific area and dropped in place, but everything since I've just done directly on top of the paper-backed grass roll. The paper backed grass roll does tend to warp and wrinkle when wet (for instance, when gluing down ballast), but so far it has pretty much straightened back out when it dries. I haven't really done any serious landscaping (sculptamold, plaster of paris, static grass, etc.) on top of the paper yet, but I'm hoping I can make it work, and if not, I can always cut the paper backed grass out of any section, and just landscape directly on the foam board underneath it. At least, that's the plan . . .

In any event, good luck on your layout!

Hi Al, I built my layout about eight years ago and I built it from scratch using 2 x 4 frames and as to the top I started with three-quarter inch plywood then a 1 inch piece of Styrofoam insulation and then a half inch top which my lumber company referred to as Canadian soundboard paneling. It’s a light brown color and I think it’s some sort of cellulose compound similar to Homasote and it holes paint well..  I used Gargraves track and I purchased track screws directly from Gargraves and they are #4 Phillips Head,1 inch black screws and they’re threaded right to the top. I very carefully applied the screws to the track and the top of the layout and if you’re careful, the Canadian soundboard will hold the screws.  I installed all of the screws slowly and carefully and stopped just as soon as I felt they were secure against the track ties. My layout is about eight years old and I have had no problem with screws loosening.

The train layout is in a large room in my basement with an insulated ceiling, and I think the sound level is great. As a matter fact, my wife has to come to the top of the steps going to the basement to even hear any of the train noise. I have some pieces of the soundboard I used and if you want to see a sample, send me your address and I’ll cut you a piece and send it right out to you. Have a great day and good luck with your new home and your new layout. Jim Lawson

@O Gauge Jim posted:

if you want to see a sample, send me your address and I’ll cut you a piece and send it right out to you.

Hey, that's a great idea -- just cut your layout top into bite-sized pieces, and sell them as snacks at York! I bet they'd go like hotcakes!

Why not just increase the thickness of the top foam layer from 1/4" to either 3/4" or 1" thick foam board from one of the big box stores and use that as your top layer ?

I bought 4' X 8' sheets of the blue/green stuff and used that. It will be the scenery foundation for your entire layout. Cut it to the size of your tabletop with a utility knife or just a plain carving knife from your kitchen and glue it down to the plywood with some construction adhesive. Put some books or other heavy weight on it and let it sit overnight.

Paint it in sections with a latex earth brown color and sprinkle Woodland Scenics fine or medium turf - green and yellow over the paint while still wet so the turf sticks to the paint. That is your base. The foam works better than just plywood because you can stick trees, lights, telephone poles, etc. into it very easily. Now you can add your scenery, hills, mountains, tunnels, etc.

You can also add edging around the perimeter for a more finished look.

Don't use carpet.  It doesn't look good.

@John C. posted:

Don't use carpet.  It doesn't look good.

Mmm, mostly agree, with the exception that I've seen some really nice layouts using astroturf-type covering with old-school tubular track and bunches of postwar accessories -- sort of what a baby boomer would have bought back in the day with an unlimited budget! Completely different esthetic, more toy train than scale realism, but effective in its own way . . . 🤔

I used carpet and I like how it looks. It’s a toy train not a scale model. IMO once you use PW accessories the scale look is pretty much gone.Thanks Steve Tyler that’s pretty much what I did, except for the unlimited budget. Indoor outdoor carper tubular track foam roadbed and accessories.

When I was designing the layout I made a conscious decision to make it toy like, cause it’s a toy.

The carpet, green also looks good with the wood trim please note there is some track rework planned.

@train steve posted:

I used carpet and I like how it looks. It’s a toy train not a scale model. IMO once you use PW accessories the scale look is pretty much gone.Thanks Steve Tyler that’s pretty much what I did, except for the unlimited budget. Indoor outdoor carper tubular track foam roadbed and accessories.

When I was designing the layout I made a conscious decision to make it toy like, cause it’s a toy.

The carpet, green also looks good with the wood trim please note there is some track rework planned.

Thanks, TS, yours is exactly the kind of layout I had in mind (which is nice looking, BTW!).

There are plenty in our hobby that relentlessly strive for realism and scale perfection, and good on them. However, there are also plenty that are more accepting of the "toy" origins of our hobby and eschew any effort to rigorously model the real world, often in favor of a nostalgia-tinged revisiting of the wonders of our youths. For that purpose, a uniform, inexpensive simulation of 'grass' is a perfect base on which to display the toys we've assembled and with which we want to just play.

FWIW, there's also a fair number of us somewhere in the middle, striving for a more realistic appearance than we were able to create in our youths, yet not recoiling in horror from some breach of scale or coarseness of detail by some addition to our layouts, if that piece brings back fond memories. It doesn't take a rivet counter to notice and recite chapter and verse how vintage O scale stuff frequently and significantly deviates from the prototypes, but there are also frequently a lot of good memories (or the memory of frustration when you couldn't get your own copy of a coveted accessory back in the day!) associated with that stuff, so IMHO we should all be prepared to cut any given hobbyist some slack if he or she prefers to recreate, or at least tolerate a nod in the direction of, the toys of our youth.

Being a contrarian, I love loud trains, provided my wife is awake, not asleep.

So, I followed to the letter the approach for building benchwork for an around the walls table top layout, in one of the popular booklets in the 1980s-1990s, about Benchwork.

The top is one-half thick plywood, then I painted the top a beige-light tan color with latex paint (I hate turpentine). Then, I have O Gauge cork roadbed (Mid-West Co. sp?) under the track.

The weirdest thing about my O Gauge around-the walls tubular track switching layout with mostly sharp 031 curves and numerous 022 switches, is the ballast: it's ground up asphalt that I found on the edges of local streets and literally filled my pockets with. My then 13 year old son, who joined me on many long walks when I found the ballast in the streets, was embarrassed and mortified to be seen in the presence of his down and dirty dad filling his pockets with filthy ground up asphalt. LOL.

Then, it's Woodland Scenics landscapenmaterials, including Blended Turf, Fine Turf and light brown Turf (forget the actual name of it) to simulate dirt or soil.

When my wife is asleep and loud ain't cool, the I run my quiet Williams or KLine conventional locomotives,

Again, for me and my train layout, it's the louder the better as long as my wife is awake.

I don't know if I heard the following expression from a Lionel advertisement or my Alma Mater, Columbia College, whose mascot was and is a lion but, for me, my trains and layout, I say: Let the lion roar!

Arnold