There was a brief period when I thought that I could provide some special effects with luminiscent paints and black light. I experimented with it a little it just did not work. I also put two engines on the same train - one at the head and one at the rear. The result was buckling trains and derailments galore. Not some of my better thinking.
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All of my ideas work.....yea, right.....LOL
Pusher trains take length, planning, and slow careful running due to non-protypical weight and huge swing of lobster claw couplers vs fixed/ body mounted/ etc.
Double heading is do-able though.
No huge, monumental flops that I recall. An "almost" or two thou in track laying overhang and headroom. Luckily, I build without much permanency in mind and adapting was usually easy enough nothing was extreamly memorable. I'm also usually good at spotting flaws in any mechanical plan and building things comes kinda easy to me too though.
The grade on my ceiling layout was too steep for pulling more than three or four cars. A strip of two sided tape on one rail allowed me to leave it be. I de-tack the top with my fingers or a tightly woven cloth and it works like a charm. About every three years it needs a 3ft replacement tape at the top of the grade.
I did start a loco bash only to find no glue will stick to the plastic. Not super glue thin nor gel, not JB Weld, not two kinds of Devcon epoxy, not model glue, not hot glue ...I have nonstick pans that more sticking ability.
Ha... in painting. I tried silver and brown on a GG-1 after seeing chrome (silver) accent on a brown automobile I liked. (and I thought I recalled a silver stripe on a pw unit) It looked so bad I cut it in half. (a copy of a real one converted to ice-melting)
I called it the "uGGly-1 " (check the photo title) , the other is commonly called the GG-1/2 online.
Oh yeah, I built a tiny covered bridge last Dec.. that was 1/16"too narrow to clear near a curve.. The covered portion is now busy becoming a garage, that needs a "cement" foundation wall to raise it just a tad before a van would fit. (like my real one, lol)
It's likely soon to be elevated much more to be used as part of a barn's loft instead. ....maybe anyhow. I like to keep my options open for changes 
About a decade ago a friendof mine (really it wasn't me) cut an MPC era tank car in half and filled the halves with confetti. He tack glued the havles together. With one loco ahead and one behind pulling in opposite directions you can guess what happened. I think he is still finding pieces of confetti around.
Attempted to splice 2 traditional GP9's into one flexible transfer like engine with 4 trucks and 2 motors. All together it couldn't tolerate 072 curves, looked awkward at best and never received an actual flexible center section that worked. The 2 halves in various states of assembly still haunt my work space.
Bruce
Nothing. However, my layout is small (5x8) and built in my bedroom. That meant I saw it at least every morning and night. Also, I was not in a rush (took 2 years), so it had plenty of "thinking time".
Wanted small wheeled 0-4-0 drivetrain to power a 3 rail Dunkirk logging engine kit...to get small drivers, tried to bash an HO chassis, which had plastic-centered drivers. Murphy's Law applied, especially when trying to widen gauge, but not only that. Sits in box awaiting power train. Unusual grain elevator in central Ohio had stone approach ramp/bridge. Burned and bulldozed in 1950's? Photos of back of building allowed lot of work to build big structure. Spent whole day in that local library's newspaper files looking for fire or other photos of front. Not found, structure half-finished for years.
My previous layout had a great track plan: a folded dogbone with one loop over the other. Plenty of vertical separation; smooth, flowing curves; realistic easements: but the grades worked out to be about 4% on curves. Some of my engines couldn't pull their trains up it. Oops.
The new layout is FLAT (at least for the O3R).
I used small "chick grit" for a gravel lot in an industrial area.
Although the color is fine, to me the grit is way too large to simulate O scale gravel.
Either HO or even O guage ballast would have worked better.
That chick grid looks good for a mining camp built in a stream bed from which water has been diverted for a hydraulic mining dredge. And Creede, Colorado was built (thrown up, in it's rush) in a stream bed that might well model. ("there's a prototype for everything")?
I extended my table and cut a hole in the center for a down-to-the-floor canyon. Of course, I didn't realize that later I was going to change my mind on what I wanted to do for my track plan. That hole in the table, combined with a mountain, has thwarted my attempts to build a point-to-point layout that also includes a realistic trolley run. Bottom line, one shouldn't plan any massive scenery features unless they allow flexibility in case one's mind changes or unless one is absolutely certain he or she wants said massive feature.
Hump yard. It worked on paper, it worked on my ruler, it worked in my head - but just barely. Then the construction began and that "just barely" ran right into real-world tolerances and variations. A hump yard can begin to resemble a ski jump pretty quickly. Fortunately it didn't take much work to see the impending failure. I turned it into a flat yard using a Ross 6-way. Works, looks good and gave me longer tracks, as there was no hump to take up room.
The hump would work well with modern RS; I just needed another 2 feet. In my next life I'll get it done.
HMorgan125 posted:I used small "chick grit" for a gravel lot in an industrial area.
Although the color is fine, to me the grit is way too large to simulate O scale gravel.
Either HO or even O guage ballast would have worked better.
The "chick grit" error is seen with regularity; I congratulate you on seeing the issue. Many don't, even after using it. (It does, however, beat cat litter. Ouch.)
I moved my temporary-on-a-door set up from the front porch to the living room.
Electromagnetic uncoupling tracks and operating knuckle couplers. On one layout I built, we put the magnets of the uncoupling tracks immediately adjacent to the siding switches. Bad idea! Turns out the spacing was such that MTH & Williams geeps ended up with one roller on the switch, and one on the non-conductive part of the magnet, leading to a loss of power and stalling. What a PITA to loosen all of those tracks and flip them around!
Even then, automatic coupling and uncoupling was a total boondoggle. 90% of the freight cars made between about 1980 and 1995 or later (by a variety of manufacturers) either would not uncouple reliably (because of too little travel in the coupler armature), or wouldn't stay closed.
They also wouldn't couple reliably at anything approaching a realistic speed. Sometimes if they were two different manufacturers' cars, they wouldn't couple even if they were slammed together! When we were attempting realistic switching operations, the convention was to make contact, stop, and then engage the closed knuckles manually by lifting the car off the track. More than a few of them ended up permanently closed with twist ties or hair bands.
The proliferation of manufacturers during the 1990s left us with five different geometries for the operating knuckle coupler. Bob B., who also does operations, spent hours fine-tuning his. Some others converted everything to Kadees. Things like this make me wish for an all-Postwar layout!
I tried to construct the 25 st PRR viaduct in south Philly by memorie. I disliked it so bad it is now part of the Stafford county dump, it still had the roadbed on it as it went sailing from the van into the rest of the trash.
One day I said to myself what if someone saw this piece of crap, you would be ashamed forever, it came down that day.
It will be correct on the new layout.
I made a control panel out of clear plexiglass, left windows on the backside for graphics to show though before I painted the back black except for the windows. Then I had the brilliant idea of flame-polishing the edges and holes for my Lionel push buttons, looked great until I used lacquer thinner to clean the plexiglass before I painted the back. As soon as the lacquer thinner hit the plexiglass the whole thing turned into cracked glass. Apparently, flame-polishing alters the plexiglass and makes it crack really bad. Even worse, I flame-polished two of these before I realized that lacquer thinner or even spray paint would crack the plexiglass. Works fine if you just hand polish the edges, you can even use a polishing wheel, just can't use heat.
Chris S.
It doesn't takes paint to start plexi crackleing* after heat.
I've used flame to take out scratches bad enough to be considered "fog". The heat cleared it, but also crackled*
(*vs cracked, it didn't loose integrity and fall apart or create sharpness from raised corners or edges, it just looked like broken saftey glass....that I could now see thru again, which was more important at right that second )
pittsburghrailfan posted:I extended my table and cut a hole in the center for a down-to-the-floor canyon. Of course, I didn't realize that later I was going to change my mind on what I wanted to do for my track plan. That hole in the table, combined with a mountain, has thwarted my attempts to build a point-to-point layout that also includes a realistic trolley run. Bottom line, one shouldn't plan any massive scenery features unless they allow flexibility in case one's mind changes or unless one is absolutely certain he or she wants said massive feature.
What's stopping you from getting all "Voodoo Chile" on it? Block the hole with plywood from underneath and add a filler on top of that. Do the same to the mountain area if a smooth surface is the fear.
John P. , that would be worth a few attempts imo. ( @John.pignatelli.jr)
Designed a layout with operating accessories in mind until I built it and discovered they take up a lot of real estate and wouldn't fit. Grades that are too steep. Switching from HO to O 
And of course the mistakes I have not made yet but will one day.
Bob
Some great reading here. SAVED me from getting some chicken grit as I was about to do. Although I don't really think it looks too bad in the pics I'll hit up my LTS for scale stuff.... Love all the pics. Thanks everyone.
Chick grit: The actual ballast doesn't look too too big there, but the gravel elsewhere looks larger. Same product with a color illusion?
Rare to see today maybe, but I can recall a couple of Northern Mi. towns where the gravel was more like river rock and a good bit larger than track ballast. (Walking barefoot on those rocks wasn't easy... and painful enough to be a memorable experience... but for a cold soda on hot days, worth it )
RSJB18 posted:Designed a layout with operating accessories in mind until I built it and discovered they take up a lot of real estate and wouldn't fit.
That could have been a big problem for my small layout. I bought a MTH operating fire station on eBay. It worked fine for a very short time, then broke. I'm glad it did, because it took up far too much real estate.
Adriatic posted:Chick grit: The actual ballast doesn't look too too big there, but the gravel elsewhere looks larger. Same product with a color illusion?
Rare to see today maybe, but I can recall a couple of Northern Mi. towns where the gravel was more like river rock and a good bit larger than track ballast. (Walking barefoot on those rocks wasn't easy... and painful enough to be a memorable experience... but for a cold soda on hot days, worth it
Adriatic,
The ballast I used everywhere on the layout is Brennan's Better Ballast (which in my opinion is a GREAT product). I wanted to have the industrial area covered with a different material to simulate gravel/rock lots in the St. Louis area in the late 1950s. "River Rock" was also typical as you mentioned, however, the small "chick grit" looks to me to be just a bit too large.
I have been wondering if I can sprinkle a bit of sand or HO ballast to the "grit" area to simulate smaller rocks.
Adriatic posted:It doesn't takes paint to start plexi crackleing* after heat.
I've used flame to take out scratches bad enough to be considered "fog". The heat cleared it, but also crackled*
(*vs cracked, it didn't loose integrity and fall apart or create sharpness from raised corners or edges, it just looked like broken saftey glass....that I could now see thru again, which was more important at right that second
Yup, it was weird, plexiglass was still structurally pretty sound but beautifully cracked. Ruined it for my use of painting the backside and letting the graphics and black paint show through from the back though. Without flame they came out perfect.
Chris S.
I don't know if we would call it a "mistake," but I certainly had a First Phase in my adventure of having a layout. I had installed the typical (for some of us) "Spaghetti Bowl" of track, which included 20+ switches, most of them O-72's. I had trains zipping around in every direction, switching, often tripping (de-railing,) and plenty of nostalgic "noise" (music, to me) accompanying every operating session.
Then I got tired of it. My wife was only passively interested in my "playroom," and I never really invited many guests to see the Spaghetti Experience
I even had a facsimile "RR-yard" with an attempt at an attendant roundhouse and turntable.
Whenever we did invite guests to see the layout, they all had many questions of me, while I was operating the whole shebang, and the idea of my operating a trainyard was not practical, I being the host and hobbyist.
After one session, my wife stood alongside the yard-turntable-roundhouse configuration and "suggested," Get rid of this," gesturing over that whole section of the layout. That area had been, and was replaced by, the "suburban" neighborhood you can see just beyond the coal facility, here...
She was right.
And by then, I had become more interested in crafting scenery and structures, all of which had become the main focus of interest and comments and questions from guests, than backing freight in and out of a trainyard. Having a layout became less of a personal, solo experience, and more - rather , exclusively - an experience to be shared, which to me, is the best part of life - sharing with others.
So, I stripped the layout right down to the plywood, and happily began again. Here is another example of that change. This was initially a small RR-side-yard for the mainline on the left of the photo. Then, the "acreage" got stripped and became a rural vignette....
I don't see that experience as having been an error; rather, I exercised one interest and evolved my attention into new directions.
And yes, I am content with the layout, now.
FrankM
Odenville Bill posted:I moved my temporary-on-a-door set up from the front porch to the living room.
I would imagine that caused more trouble than it was worth!
In less than two months, a bedroom became available! Moved to an 4x8 board with seven switches, 75+ feet of o27, and about 18 feet of elevated track. I am preparing an expansion proposal to be delivered while the boss is still happy with her birthday present. A bad idea turned to good.
Tried converting the Lionel NYC Mohawk from 1990 to tmcc so I could run it with the Lionel ("Elephant Ears") Mohawk (#10864) and double-head them. I also wanted to upgrade the smoke units on both. That was a big fail...one fail after another fail...There was hardly any room for a motherboard in the LTI engine, I mutilated the front end of one them trying to install a dummy coupler, and I think I blew both smoke units and had to replace each!
When I finished the project, they performed horribly together and were jerky likely because the tooling was slightly different on each...one would constantly stall because of the stress of trying to push or pull the other engine.
The only good that came out of the "What Was I Thinking" Chapter was learning from my mistakes and how BAD of an idea it truly was!
In a former NYC apartment building I constructed a switching layout. The tables were two 2X8's plywood connected together for that 16 feet across. , 2X4 Framework and ledges lagbolt construction! My wife came home from work and said you are build a house not a layout! I just said it's got to be sturdy. The room was 18 feet long so my "house fit with a foot of space at either end. So I bolt this thing together and realize that the ends exposed is just asking for trouble. So I bought cut to fit plexiglass 2 feet wide and about 8 inches tall with pilot holes ready to screw them at the ends. Looks great now! In about four weeks I had all the gargraves in tight and turnouts ready for operation and it was wired methodically. Time to unveil my layout and demonstrate its operation. Too many engines on the narrow layout my wife says! Yeah, isn't this exciting! So one of my F3 was out of control when I accidentally powered it thought it was in neutral throwing a switch We watched as that heavy beast cast coupler went through the Plexiglas shattered into a million pieces! The engine now on the floor. My wife looks at me and says good thing it didnt go through the nearby window too, but what a sound it made! The F3 was a Frankenstein parts engine. Manage to fix it. what can I say, I learned a lot. At least the plexiglass looked good before the mishap. And I like making my wife laugh.
I only started this hobby in January 2018.
I saw a very sharp-looking battery-operated toy train for about $8. The problem was that it kept jumping the track. I had to put a few coins in the back of the last car, and a few coins in the locomotive. If the batteries were fresh or old, it jumped the track. If the batteries were "in the middle," it ran great, and you could not tell that it wasn't an HO train.
I got so frustrated with it that I demoted it to a display, and when my equipment filled up my train table I demoted it to storage.
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