 PAGE 55a - NOVEMBER 2006, ©2006 Carl Arendt SPECIAL EDITION All SCRAPBOOK isues are online. Click for Linked Index |
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H O T I D E A S F O R S M A L L R A I L R O A D S The best test of an "inspiring" layout is whether seeing it gives us some great ideas to try out in our own projects. Here are a group of layouts that, in different ways, have given me such inspirations. I hope you find them infectious too! |
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VISIT A MASSIVE INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX One of the things that always gives me inspiration is complex industrial structures, with their varieties of shapes and sizes, masses and textures. Chris Nevard's new layout, Cement Quay, carries on his tradition of producing carefully crafted "big industries." Notice how, in just 66x24in (168x60cm) he's managed to suggest a huge cement plant complex served by large freight locomotives. Operational devices (see plan below) include 42in (107cm) cassettes attached to the two fiddle tracks that exit the scene at left; and the use of two locomotives to handle longer trains despite the short runaround loop. But the centerpiece is the concrete plant itself. This layout is an enlargement of Chris's wonderful Arne Wharf, described in Scrapbook #25. I particularly like his conveyor structures that provide diagonal lines to contrast with the perpendiculars in the main buildings. And of course, the round storage tanks and smokestack (chimney) are excellent for breaking up that "square" look. Chris lives "on the edge of SW London."      |
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THIS UNIQUE LAYOUT IDEA IS AN 'OPEN BOOK'
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HOW MUCH DETAIL IS ENOUGH? For several years we've been following Swiss modeler Daniel Schläfli's development of his On30 (O16.5) 47th Street Yard (see Scrapbooks #22, #25, #35 and #42a).
The question is: at what stage does a layout actually begin to look
like a miniature world? In other words, how much detail is enough? One
answer is found at the point where you are willing to take the layout
to an exhibition and show it off to your fellow modelers and the public
at large!
Daniel faced that opportunity when he agreed to show 47th Street Yard recently at the "13th Convention of American Railroad Fans in Switzerland." In Daniel's words, "This event provided some stimulus and some stress for some progress, although I did not manage to do any significant detailing." In my opinion, he did enough to give this 48x20in (120x50cm) layout a "finished" look--though there's clearly plenty of room for additional details. This is just about the stage I like to bring my layouts up to, so I can relax and spend lots of time adding delightful details! One of the touches I like is Daniel's use of puns (in English!) as the names of his modelled companies: Kramdin Storage, for example. Ben Tryon Mfg. is actually a double pun ... it's named for Daniel's employer, Maillefer, which translates from the French into something like "Bent Iron." Nice! I always find clever names inspiring, and they goad me into making up some good ones for my own model industries!   |
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A GOOD IDEA ALWAYS KEEPS GIVING...  One
mark of a good layout design is its ability to continue to inspire
fresh ideas for adaptation, expansion and improvement. In Scrapbook #53a, Brian Wilson, from Sidney, British Columbia, Canada, unveiled his adaptation of E.L. Moore's Shortline Terminal
to a very small trapezoidal shelf in On30--even squeezing in a piece of a traction line!Well, Brian has added another "wrinkle"-- a bit of dual-gauge shunting in a spur leading to a new industry called Arendt's Scrapyard. Notice that there are two ways he can engineer this spur, shown in blue on the plan above. He can make it just On18 (O scale on 9mm gauge) or make it dual gauged, depending on how he constructs the turnout. So he built both versions to see which one he preferred! (The photos above show the two alternative pieces of trackage.) Guess which one he selected!? Check out his website! Now this amazing small layout has inspired yet another idea! Notice how close together the new spur and the back of the engine house are sited. It wouldn't take much construction to dual-gauge the nearer track in the enginehouse and bring it out through an opening in the shed's rear wall, connecting with the spur from the scrapyard. Hm. And that development leads to thoughts about perhaps a dual-gauge turntable (with four rails, not three, for balance)! And so it goes. Well designed layouts continually inspire ideas for changing and improving them. In fact, that's one of the tests I use to decide on the merits of a new design. |
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UNUSUAL SMALL LAYOUT -- BOTH ENDS ARE VISIBLE!
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FIND AN UNUSUAL HOME FOR YOUR LINE
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| GRATEFULLY GRAB A GOOD GADGET For better or worse, a good gadget (also called a gizmo or a gimmick) can inspire the design of an entire layout! A good example is Gilbert Gribi's micro layout, Draversaz, in Scrapbook #45a. It is literally designed around an elevator (lift) that raises narrow-gauge trains to new levels. It was during an e-mail conversation about this layout that Shortliner Jack Trollope from the Scottish Highlands threw a claymore into the discussion. He sent photographs (reproduced here) of a prototype elevator that he had constructed. Though this version is just a foot long (30cm), it certainly could be longer to hold more rolling stock. I offer Jack's inventive work here to offer inspiration for anyone who'd like to build a layout with space-saving vertical transportation. Please send information and photographs if you do!
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STAGECRAFT SETS OFF A SMALL LAYOUT
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ARTISTRY IN BALANCING MASSES AND SIGHT LINES Illustrating several of the inspiration sources mentioned earlier is Mariahöhe built by two Dutch modelers, Henk Wust and Derk Huisman.
In just 12 feet, they have managed to showcase all the rail
transportation activities of a section of Germany in the 1960s. At the
left, Henk's module presents a quarry, rock crusher and cement factory
(more large, inspiring industrial structures!) served by an HOe (HOn30)
railway. Derk's HO module on the right shows part of the town and the
station at
Mariahöhe East, where the finished products are shipped on normal
(standard) gauge and the rail system connects with the DB (German
national railway), represented by the fiddle yard offstage to the
right. Track in front of the cement factory is dual gauge as shown on
the plan (below).
There's a lot of inspiration here. The scenery is designed and built with a painter's eye for composition, color and texture. In the Layout Tour photos below, notice how many of them look like paintings rather than model shots. Studying the carefully composed scenes and sight lines gives me a lot of ideas for scenery! Similarly, the layout's purpose--the focus of all this construction--is made very clear: the line handles goods traffic between different companies and the related passenger flow to and from the town of Mariahöhe. Another important element is the use of various levels, often only slightly different, for both track and buildings. This technique lends much visual interest to the layout and highlights the activities of the trains, especially in the narrow-gauge workings at the left end. And a final element concerns the level of detail here. The layout appears to be highly detailed, and yet it actually is not. These modelers have a knack for including just the most important and telling details, which convinces our eyes that we are viewing a very realistic scene. Leaving out details can be a key factor to focus our attention on what is most important in the scene. (Compare George Sellios's similar comments in the December 2006 Model Railroader magazine -- he's "reducing visual overload" by removing details from his fabled Franklin & South Manchester RR!) And so I'll leave you to tour this excellent and inspiring layout. Many thanks to Rail Magazine, in the Netherlands, for providing both information and permission to reproduce the track plan from the October 2006 issue. And a special thanks to Bart Bakker, from Utrecht, Netherlands, for sharing the wonderful photos he shot recently at Mariahöhe's first exhibition.  TAKE A TOUR OF MARIAHÖHE FROM LEFT TO RIGHT
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One
layout design that inspires me (and several of my correspondents)
models both ends of a shortline rather than building one station and
running to a hidden fiddle yard. So a complete light railway can be
displayed!
Two sources of inspiration are illustrated here by France's Bernard Fabron.
One is the use of unusual containers to house a model railway-- Bernard
has adapted an old television set to house an On18 (O9) layout. Seems
like a good use for the cabinet after the picture tube burns out--and
with the increasing popularity of flat screen TVs, there may be a lot
of these around soon, so take note! (For other containerized layout
ideas, see Scrapbooks 
