I really liked the subject of this video: You designing a layout from scratch, the design challenges you faced, and the problem solving techniques you used. Seeing the layout develop over it's multiple revisions along with your accompanying explanations was very interesting to watch unfold, and educational to boot. More videos just like this, please. :)
I wish you had also built the layout because I like the work you put into the planning! I would hire you in a heartbeat! Good job! The customer's loss!
This was a great video. It was very interesting on how you worked with and addressed customer changes. Being in the metal finishing business for over 30 years I can definitely feel your pain.
Peter, this was very informative and I appreciated your explaining the back and forth with the client - and our logical in trying to propose a workable layout. Thanks. - Dean from Minnesota USA
Thank-you for noticing that. Even if the customer doesn't really know what he wants, it's still his railroad and his desires are what drives the layout design. Although I might try to talk a customer out of wanting an ore dock, a coal mine and the Empire State Building in the middle of the Tehachapi loop, if that's really what his heart is set on, so be it.
There are several suggestions for building a railroad layout yourself Find a suitable set of plans online Find a colleague who wants to build one too so you have someone to encourage you (I learned these and the reasons they work on Jareks Hobby Club website )
hi everyone ,if anyone else trying to find out how to build a model railroad layout try Pycanta Model Railroaders Protocol (just google it ) ? Ive heard some amazing things about it and my co-worker got great success with it.
I agree with Coxy’s Railroading.. and once the contractor begins the customer will be calling you back.. thanks for sharing and keep up the great work.. Lance
Track plan 3 seemed to answer all his desires.. to echo hippy jason.. it was very interesting to watch your revisions trying to meet the expectations of the prospective client. Thank you for sharing this video. Tom
A very insightful vid which led me to question my own layout planning. For a while there, I was worried that the layout I'm building would get me into trouble with the layout planning police. 28" curves simply won't fit on my layout and the vast majority of my trains are and always will be passenger ones. But apparently, I fall under the "amateurs are idiots who don't care about important things" clause, so I hope to get away with a fine, or, if I'm lucky, a firm "Don't ever do that again!" 😉
From what I have learned and read over the years, all of your suggestions make really good sense to me. I would love to see a layout you designed with your proper recommendations.
hey ,if anyone else wants to learn about how to build a model railroad layout and scenery try Pycanta Model Railroaders Protocol ( search on google ) ? Ive heard some incredible things about it and my work buddy got amazing success with it.
I’ve run 80’(-ish) hi-cube cars on 22 inch radius. The overhang doesn’t look great but they never derailed. I would say 24” is a comfortable minimum radius for anything over 60’ lengths. 28” should not present any problems. Even large steam locomotives will easily navigate 28 and look decent doing so. 36” seems a bit extreme to me. I know it would look great, but curve aesthetics is the first place to trim in order to fit things into a space.
I'm glad you've had success with your chosen minimum radius, but some cars and locomotives do require larger curves than what you have indicated. I recently did a design for a customer who had a lot of passenger cars that simply would not run on anything less than 32: radius.
It's almost universal in this hobby to want more layout than our space will accommodate. The problems come when a customer is unable to make up his mind about what is most important to him and what can be omitted.
I don’t have space for a staging yard either☹️ so I fiddle about. Great video Peter! Perhaps your client will be kind enough to send you a picture of the completed layout down the road.
I thought the final version with the freight yard looked like a very fun layout to operate and made great use of the space. Agree with you re: staging, it needs some kind of an interchange with the outside world. Either way, I enjoyed hearing your thought process as you designed to the space and givens/druthers of the customer.
You’re kidding - small and narrow - here in the U.K. it is a massive space - I am lucky as I have a 17ft by 8ft garage and that is considered as large over here!
Yes, I know. I lived in England for many years. There are model railway clubs that don't have this much space. When I call a space "tight" I'm referring to how much railroad the customer wants to squeeze in. What might be considered a very generous space for a small branch-line layout could still be extremely tight for a main line with longer trains and bigger curves that eat up proportionately more space. I currently have a 50'x30' basement which is plenty for what I want to do with it, but if I wanted to get an O-scale main line in the space, that too would be a little tight.
There are several components to diy railroad layouts. One place I found that successfully combines these is the Jareks Hobby Club (google it if you're interested) definately the most helpful blueprint i've heard of. look at the amazing information .
There are a few components to building a railroad layout. One resource I discovered which successfully combines these is the Jareks Hobby Club (check it out on google) definately the most helpful guide i've heard of. look at all the awesome information .
In my early days as a subcontractor, I’d be right next to my boss listening to the deal ! We did commercial and residential HVAC ! But as I got older, I started building layouts, and selling them to folks !!! Building model planes, cars, rockets, boats, as well as Train layouts ! Now this is where I got some folks to say all right go ahead and at least get it going ! And once asked for a down payment to get the supplies ! I would go ahead and build the bench work ! Then I would proceed to build a track plan to see whether or not they approve of it and in most cases once I got the benchwork up, a lot of customers would actually say that’s good enough ! I can get it from here and continue the work on their own ! But at least I still made money ! And there were quite a few layouts that are out here in the state of Texas with my signature on the bottom of the layouts there’s a four by eights a 3 x 6 2 x 8 2 x 4 as well as a 5 x 4 all with my hand written signature and a number ! 🌊🐺
Hello I want to build an N Scale layout and I have two major questions 1 - is there a kit or a plan for building a Helcoil for N Scale 2 - what is the rise and run for up hill slopes Thanks James
bummer, It was looking good too. I had something very similar. With a town I was working Hi line in the back switching up front. Just do to the way the layout is shaped and it is an add on section to the old Layout was unable to make it work effectively and have the large staging yard staging yard in another location. What I thought a great design but I need/wanted a proper larger staging yard to remove the Huge Helix from operations. So the stagin yard is now in that location, granted it is 21 to 22 feet of benchan work that would of made a great town in prime real estate. So you win some you loose some.
I was wondering if you charge separately for people to use your designs/quotes/proposals? You actually own the copyright so someone taking your work and having someone else do the build without you releasing it for that purpose is technically classified as stealing your IP.
that first one ,done as single track w passing sidings and a iron mine up top and ore dock and car ferry...with the later oil and propane in the back with a tank barge...change the power plant to ore processing and high level conveyor belt it out to the ore dock bins on the rh side of the interchange with car ferry trackage....use shay power or perhaps something like GN y class electricsen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Y-1#/media/File:Great_Northern_electric_locomotive_Y-1_1927.JPG and shorty ore cars and other things like that and short pass cars so you could put a small station in and some kind of ped overpass to a pair of fast steamer docks right and left of the yard at the front.....and do 3.5 to 5 percent grades of hard rock country.... and with that nice tunnel under the mine lower loop staging yard. with a little benchwork artistry and thought to wiring the straight storage shelf tracks could be made to slide right out for easy access to the storage yard of active stock. putting in a 2 level switchback up to the mine is a thing to use too for operations..and if you really wanted you could break that off and have it be a narrow gauge mine railway and have it crossover the main above the tunnel entrance and bring that back some for hillside ore reload bins as part of the backdrop..and a set out and pick up tracks for empties and loads either side of the ore reload bin and a boxcab switcher...have fun.
I wish people who want to run prototypically (not toyishly) would not have 'continuals/roundy rounds' , and instead go for 'point to point' designs only, with an interchange track/s to show connection to the outside world/other RRs...
Wow It sounds like you were pass a project from someone else whom could see there were price or difficult customer problems sad as you brillant in design and build I do hope you got paid for the plans you did???? best wishes Ken
This is not the customer you want. I would avoid him also your next project get a deposit for your work and time. It now seems like he has your design he had no intention of you executing the build and is trying to be cheap. This can be an expensive hobby...good video
Do not worry. Layout designs are always done as separate jobs, and are billed in advance. Once the customer has paid me for the design, it is his to do with whatever he wants to - even if he wants to take it to another builder. I do however offer discounts for building a layout I designed (see my website for details): superiormodelrailroads.com
Sounds like he has no idea of what his is doing or just doesn't know anything about how trains work. In always learn something about working with layouts designs when you prest them....thanks a lot for sharing....Jack
All my layout designs are done as their own jobs and billed separately. There is no requirement for any of my layout design customers to employ me to build the layout for them.
I'm sorry, you call this a cramped space for HO? HAHAHA come on man, how rich are you? Average people tend to have spaces that are only 10 x 8' or less.
@@mpeterll With all due respect, the reason I clicked on your video is that I read the title in the first place. My comment was referring to what you "actually" said in the video.
I explore a track planning concept called " DUMP THE SQUARE " Please take one corner of the room and is turned into a triangle , with nothing in it at first . then draw your trial trackplans using the space remaining , then by magic the railroad space seems to actually expand . It is bizzare but that is what seems to occur and it is weird , but it seems to function and in some ways alters your perception ! You can fill the triange with stuff later and even put spurs into them and even use 2 triangles ! ⛑⛑⛑⚙⚙❓❓❓
I really liked the subject of this video: You designing a layout from scratch, the design challenges you faced, and the problem solving techniques you used. Seeing the layout develop over it's multiple revisions along with your accompanying explanations was very interesting to watch unfold, and educational to boot. More videos just like this, please. :)
I have a whole play-list with videos just like this one.
I wish you had also built the layout because I like the work you put into the planning! I would hire you in a heartbeat! Good job! The customer's loss!
Its amazing how you got so much running into that small space. Gratz.
This was a great video. It was very interesting on how you worked with and addressed customer changes. Being in the metal finishing business for over 30 years I can definitely feel your pain.
Good to be back and learn from you ❤
Peter, this was very informative and I appreciated your explaining the back and forth with the client - and our logical in trying to propose a workable layout. Thanks. - Dean from Minnesota USA
Thank-you for noticing that. Even if the customer doesn't really know what he wants, it's still his railroad and his desires are what drives the layout design. Although I might try to talk a customer out of wanting an ore dock, a coal mine and the Empire State Building in the middle of the Tehachapi loop, if that's really what his heart is set on, so be it.
There are several suggestions for building a railroad layout yourself
Find a suitable set of plans online
Find a colleague who wants to build one too so you have someone to encourage you
(I learned these and the reasons they work on Jareks Hobby Club website )
I have the same problem, I always want more than is realistic but am unwilling to compromise this far. This puts things into perspective.
Beautiful work
I liked both plans actually. looks like you put alot of thought into it.
hi everyone ,if anyone else trying to find out how to build a model railroad layout try Pycanta Model Railroaders Protocol (just google it ) ? Ive heard some amazing things about it and my co-worker got great success with it.
I agree with Coxy’s Railroading.. and once the contractor begins the customer will be calling you back.. thanks for sharing and keep up the great work.. Lance
Very nicely designed! I Like the over all look. Thanks for sharing Happy Modelling! Hans ....
Excellent video, very informative. Thanks for sharing. I suspect the client may regret his choice
Track plan 3 seemed to answer all his desires.. to echo hippy jason.. it was very interesting to watch your revisions trying to meet the expectations of the prospective client. Thank you for sharing this video. Tom
A very insightful vid which led me to question my own layout planning.
For a while there, I was worried that the layout I'm building would get me into trouble with the layout planning police. 28" curves simply won't fit on my layout and the vast majority of my trains are and always will be passenger ones.
But apparently, I fall under the "amateurs are idiots who don't care about important things" clause, so I hope to get away with a fine, or, if I'm lucky, a firm "Don't ever do that again!" 😉
From what I have learned and read over the years, all of your suggestions make really good sense to me. I would love to see a layout you designed with your proper recommendations.
hey ,if anyone else wants to learn about how to build a model railroad layout and scenery try Pycanta Model Railroaders Protocol ( search on google ) ? Ive heard some incredible things about it and my work buddy got amazing success with it.
I don't envy your job, but you really do a nice job on a crazy small space.
I’ve run 80’(-ish) hi-cube cars on 22 inch radius. The overhang doesn’t look great but they never derailed. I would say 24” is a comfortable minimum radius for anything over 60’ lengths. 28” should not present any problems. Even large steam locomotives will easily navigate 28 and look decent doing so. 36” seems a bit extreme to me. I know it would look great, but curve aesthetics is the first place to trim in order to fit things into a space.
I'm glad you've had success with your chosen minimum radius, but some cars and locomotives do require larger curves than what you have indicated. I recently did a design for a customer who had a lot of passenger cars that simply would not run on anything less than 32: radius.
I liked your design with the yard. Some people are never satusfied
It's almost universal in this hobby to want more layout than our space will accommodate. The problems come when a customer is unable to make up his mind about what is most important to him and what can be omitted.
Thats a great layout, i would have fun with that.
I don’t have space for a staging yard either☹️ so I fiddle about. Great video Peter! Perhaps your client will be kind enough to send you a picture of the completed layout down the road.
Thank You !
I thought the final version with the freight yard looked like a very fun layout to operate and made great use of the space.
Agree with you re: staging, it needs some kind of an interchange with the outside world. Either way, I enjoyed hearing your thought process as you designed to the space and givens/druthers of the customer.
You’re kidding - small and narrow - here in the U.K. it is a massive space - I am lucky as I have a 17ft by 8ft garage and that is considered as large over here!
Yes, I know. I lived in England for many years. There are model railway clubs that don't have this much space. When I call a space "tight" I'm referring to how much railroad the customer wants to squeeze in. What might be considered a very generous space for a small branch-line layout could still be extremely tight for a main line with longer trains and bigger curves that eat up proportionately more space. I currently have a 50'x30' basement which is plenty for what I want to do with it, but if I wanted to get an O-scale main line in the space, that too would be a little tight.
Way cool how do u do it u r very good at your job and your work how do u do it u r so smart
This customer sounds like trouble to me. I think you dodged a bullet.
I'm studying diy railroad layouts and discovered a fantastic website at Jareks hobby club (check it out on google)👍
There are several components to diy railroad layouts. One place I found that successfully combines these is the Jareks Hobby Club (google it if you're interested) definately the most helpful blueprint i've heard of. look at the amazing information .
There are a few components to building a railroad layout. One resource I discovered which successfully combines these is the Jareks Hobby Club (check it out on google) definately the most helpful guide i've heard of. look at all the awesome information .
I have spent months investigating how to build a railroad layout and found a fantastic resource at Jareks hobby club (check it out on google)
Pretty sure all of the above accounts are scam bots of some sort.
Ok now you do excellent work as we all have seen. What was the sticker price for the layout if you don’t mind me asking?
You stood so still i thought ye green screened your head onto a PICTURE of ye self!
THANK YOU DETAIL PLANNING OF LAYOUT
FROM AUSTRALIA
In my early days as a subcontractor, I’d be right next to my boss listening to the deal !
We did commercial and residential HVAC !
But as I got older, I started building layouts, and selling them to folks !!! Building model planes, cars, rockets, boats, as well as Train layouts ! Now this is where I got some folks to say all right go ahead and at least get it going ! And once asked for a down payment to get the supplies ! I would go ahead and build the bench work ! Then I would proceed to build a track plan to see whether or not they approve of it and in most cases once I got the benchwork up, a lot of customers would actually say that’s good enough ! I can get it from here and continue the work on their own ! But at least I still made money ! And there were quite a few layouts that are out here in the state of Texas with my signature on the bottom of the layouts there’s a four by eights a 3 x 6 2 x 8 2 x 4 as well as a 5 x 4 all with my hand written signature and a number !
🌊🐺
And yes I know it sucks when you don’t get the job ! Especially one that’s fun to do ! 🌊🐺
Yay customers haha. Thanks for the video at least
Great video , space is longer than mine but my space is wider
Really interesting, you sound like you have had your work cut out there!
I would suggest adding a hefty surcharge when in 3 or so months, he calls back asking for you to take over the job.
I still would not work for that customer. He would just find another way to screw him.
very nice layout design, its a shame what you didn't get the contract. Lots of work for no contract
I hope you got to bill for your time spent planning! Tough game otherwise.
out of curiosity, how much would this cost in USD?
I am back I found you. I have had 3 heart attacks and 3 strokes
nice track plan! what is the layout size?
Hello
I want to build an N Scale layout and I have two major questions
1 - is there a kit or a plan for building a Helcoil for N Scale
2 - what is the rise and run for up hill slopes
Thanks
James
bummer, It was looking good too. I had something very similar. With a town I was working Hi line in the back switching up front. Just do to the way the layout is shaped and it is an add on section to the old Layout was unable to make it work effectively and have the large staging yard staging yard in another location. What I thought a great design but I need/wanted a proper larger staging yard to remove the Huge Helix from operations. So the stagin yard is now in that location, granted it is 21 to 22 feet of benchan work that would of made a great town in prime real estate. So you win some you loose some.
What kind of planning program do you use?
What are the dimensions of the layout, width and depth?
I was wondering if you charge separately for people to use your designs/quotes/proposals? You actually own the copyright so someone taking your work and having someone else do the build without you releasing it for that purpose is technically classified as stealing your IP.
How does that saying go? ‘I can only please one person a day. Today’s not your day and tomorrow’s not looking too good either’. :-)
that first one ,done as single track w passing sidings and a iron mine up top and ore dock and car ferry...with the later oil and propane in the back with a tank barge...change the power plant to ore processing and high level conveyor belt it out to the ore dock bins on the rh side of the interchange with car ferry trackage....use shay power or perhaps something like GN y class electricsen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Y-1#/media/File:Great_Northern_electric_locomotive_Y-1_1927.JPG and shorty ore cars and other things like that and short pass cars so you could put a small station in and some kind of ped overpass to a pair of fast steamer docks right and left of the yard at the front.....and do 3.5 to 5 percent grades of hard rock country.... and with that nice tunnel under the mine lower loop staging yard.
with a little benchwork artistry and thought to wiring the straight storage shelf tracks could be made to slide right out for easy access to the storage yard of active stock.
putting in a 2 level switchback up to the mine is a thing to use too for operations..and if you really wanted you could break that off and have it be a narrow gauge mine railway and have it crossover the main above the tunnel entrance and bring that back some for hillside ore reload bins as part of the backdrop..and a set out and pick up tracks for empties and loads either side of the ore reload bin and a boxcab switcher...have fun.
I wish people who want to run prototypically (not toyishly) would not have 'continuals/roundy rounds' , and instead go for 'point to point' designs only, with an interchange track/s to show connection to the outside world/other RRs...
Wow It sounds like you were pass a project from someone else whom could see there were price or difficult customer problems sad as you brillant in design and build I do hope you got paid for the plans you did???? best wishes Ken
This is not the customer you want. I would avoid him also your next project get a deposit for your work and time. It now seems like he has your design he had no intention of you executing the build and is trying to be cheap. This can be an expensive hobby...good video
Do not worry. Layout designs are always done as separate jobs, and are billed in advance. Once the customer has paid me for the design, it is his to do with whatever he wants to - even if he wants to take it to another builder.
I do however offer discounts for building a layout I designed (see my website for details): superiormodelrailroads.com
Is it just me, or does Peter sound like Alistair Cooke?....'Postcards from America'? Anyone? Bueller?
How can I contact you concerning your services. I'm interested in one of the track plans you have designed.
The best way to contact me is through my website: superiormodelrailroads.com
Thank-you for your interest.
Sounds like he has no idea of what his is doing or just doesn't know anything about how trains work. In always learn something about working with layouts designs when you prest them....thanks a lot for sharing....Jack
Great video . hope you like mine diesel dave's
Are you available for a quote.
You can contact me any time through my web-site (link in the description above).
I think you dodged a bullet too. You should charge a fee for designing these layouts, if you’re not, otherwise you waist a lot of time for nothing.
All my layout designs are done as their own jobs and billed separately. There is no requirement for any of my layout design customers to employ me to build the layout for them.
is he a robot
I'm sorry, you call this a cramped space for HO? HAHAHA come on man, how rich are you? Average people tend to have spaces that are only 10 x 8' or less.
Please read the description.
@@mpeterll With all due respect, the reason I clicked on your video is that I read the title in the first place. My comment was referring to what you "actually" said in the video.
I explore a track planning concept called " DUMP THE SQUARE " Please take one corner of the room and is turned into a triangle , with nothing in it at first . then draw your trial trackplans using the space remaining , then by magic the railroad space seems to actually expand . It is bizzare but that is what seems to occur and it is weird , but it seems to function and in some ways alters your perception ! You can fill the triange with stuff later and even put spurs into them and even use 2 triangles ! ⛑⛑⛑⚙⚙❓❓❓