Finally building that dream layout...

So my Father and I are working on building a massive N Scale layout on two 4x8 boards, arranged into an "L" shape.
This thread will be both a place for me to seek advice/suggestions from the community, as well as posting our progress.

We have already constructed our table, and I am in the process of finalizing our track plan in ATPS, which I will ultimately share here for your thoughts/critique once it is complete.

There are two caveats:
1) We need to use Atlas Code 80 track (we've acquired too much over the years to switch over now, and neither of us are really bothered by the look of it)
2) It will initially be DC powered. We would like to eventually switch to DCC, but are considering old-fashioned block wiring until this thing is built and we can splurge on popping decoders into the fleet.

The design that I am working on will require some custom pieces of track to be made, typically so we can create junctions like this:

Do any of you guys know how we can go about building these with Code 80 (or compatible) track?

Congratulations on your project that sounds like so much fun!

I too have a ton of the old stuff like that too, which is all packed up.

I don't know how to build custom track like that, but you might have to take some of the rails from the flex track and create your crossings and stuff with it. I recommend subscribing to this website:

http://model-railroad-hobbyist.com/magazine

There's some great articles, an awesome forum, and some really, really awesome how-to videos as well.

Thank you, John. I will be sure to subscribe to the forum there, as we will surely require a great deal of advice throughout the course of construction.

Now, without further ado, I present you all with (what my Father and I have aptly deemed)...



Excluded are the elevations (not all of those crossings will be made at grade) as well as a downtown interurban terminal, which is the purpose of the two "tracks to nowhere" just above the yard.

Any comments/critiques/questions are welcome and encouraged!

That's definitely a Widow Maker!

Have you done a mock up in T:ANE to see how the tracks will fit on the board? I did that with my old layout and it came out pretty good. I didn't scenic the route or anything and deleted it a bit later, but it was proof of concept to see how things could go together mostly because the plan came from a book and I had the suspicions that the book plan was only a pretty picture, which it was and ended up making some adjustments in track spacing.

I have built a lot of model railroads over 20 some yeas and I can tell you have a bad layout there, on the left side you have two switches on top of three other tracks. That will be where you can not reach to fix something and where it will need a fix, it always happens at the hardest place to get to. My first one had a 90° crossing in the middle of a 4x8 and it always gave problems.

Hmm, I could've sworn I posted a reply, but I guess the forum ate it...

Anyhow, are you referring to the "double-wye" on the left-hand side? It is not clear from my image, but that is actually going to be lowered into a cut beneath the three horizontal tracks. So far I haven't had any issues reaching the middle of the board there (I do think I am going to get rid of that double crossover). Where we will have an issue, is accessing the area in the upper left corner. We are considering leaving the left side of the table about 1' away from the wall in order to better reach that section.




The red lines illustrate cuts, while the green lines illustrate an embankment.

Should have at lest 18" walkways.