NGRC 2018 Layout Tour
Well Friday June 8th finally came and the big event. Our layout was on the Friday tour June 8th, 2018 from 8am to 1pm for the Natonal Garden Railroad Convention for 2018 in Atlanta. We have been working hard for this event ever since we started our layout, 3 1/2 years ago. The plan was…
Video of Train Layout from Locomotive perspective
Here is a short video of the my layout from the Locomotive perspective going through all of the major sections. Still a lot of work to do to get ready for the National Garden Railway Convention in Atlanta, June 2018 http://www.ngrc2018.com but it is coming together.
Getting Ready for National Garden Railway Convention 2018
The National Garden Railway Convention is coming to Atlanta and my layout is on the tour. If you are in town, you can see my layout on Friday, June 8th 8AM-1PM. It has been a long process…. over 3 1/2 years getting the layout ready. We haven’t even had the official opening yet ! That…
Challenges of Electricty Outdoors
AS I built the track, it was raised on Hardiboard and had no dirt. I ran the wires as needed to feed the power sectors of the track. There are about 100 different sectors for the track layout and each of these had individual wires to feed the voltage to the track. The wires feed…
3D Printing
I recently received an Ultimaker 3 Extended 3D printer. My plan is to print unique buildings and accessories for my Garden Model Railroad. I have all of my children and son in laws that can 3D program to help modify or create structures that I can print. We still have a long way to go…
Landscape Walls and Fill Dirt Completed
It is finally coming together. Over the past 6 weeks we have installed a landscape retaining wall around the raised portion of the track and then filled in to the track level with gravel and dirt. The track now looks a part of the landscape with easy access from the edges. There was a…
Train Heaven – MINIATUR WUNDERLAND HAMBURG
The fun about building trains is that you can learn so much from everyone else. I recently had the opportunity to goto Germany to visit my daughter and son-in-law and we took a side trip to Hamburg to visit a massive model train layout. The place is called is Miniatur Wunderland. http://www.miniatur-wunderland.com It is located…
Lightening Strike just before Simon’s Birthday Party
Well it had to happen but did have to happen 2 weeks before my grandson’s 5th birthday? On 7/2/17 we had a large electrical storm and lightening struck my next door neighbors yard. He lost TVs and other components. My house electrical was protected by my whole house surge protector but any networked component got…
Building a Drawbrige
Oringally building the g-scale drawbrige was planned for much later in the project as I knew this would be complicated and would have to be built from scratch. No vendors that I found offer a drawbrige. But working on the layout, the bridge was in a main path and during the work on the mountains,…