Is there a consensus on how to secure buildings to layout?

@PaulG posted:

Prior to wiring my various buildings that I have set on my layout, I am wondering how to secure the buildings to the layout.  Should they even be secured?

Not in my opinion.

I could simply set them where I want them and place ground cover (i.e. grass, gravel, etc.) around the buildings so that they do not move.

Exactly!

I certainly don't want to "hot glue" them to the layout so that they could not be easily moved should I decide at some point to rearrange them (doubtful).

Correct again.

Anyway, I would be most interested to hear how different people have approached this.  Thanks!

We just allowed the Matt Medium from the ground cover around each and every building, hold the building in place. Another thought, if you happen to bump the building while cleaning track, there is no damage.

I have to ask in humor, ....is your layout prone to earthquakes or Hurricanes?......one time I bumped my head on mine, and rung in a solid 6.7....😆

Pat

I never thought there was a need to secure structures to my layout.

A somewhat related issue, which is more of a scenic issue, is blending the edges of buildings into the scenery in an effort to make them seamless.

Here is an example:

If my memory is correct, the reddish brown clay colored granules between the edge of the play and green turf is Woodland Scenics Fine Ballast of that color.

I will comment further about this in the Structures and Scenery Directory. Arnold

I love your scene Arnold! And you illustrate another point - is it necessary to only use 0 scale structures on our layouts? Your barn is - if I recall - an HO Revell kit from the 1960's and it fits your scene perfectly!

While I do glue down figures-people and ground cover, I let gravity do the work on the buildings.

I let the diluted Elmer's that glues the surrounding scenery hold the building in place.  If I need to move/remove it for some reason, I just spray the base with water , let it soak and then remove.

I use roadbed material for a foundation. Then I can remove the buildings while working on the scenery and plaster or ground cover right up to the foundation. The structure then sits seamlessly into the scene.  It’s difficult doing scenery around buildings without damaging them.

To add to the commentary, I'm a big proponent of not securing buildings to the scenery. In this example, the Lionel oil pump drops into an opening which secures it from moving and conceals the mechanism. The work house simply sits on the layout. This approach allows the flexibility to repair, upgrade, or switch out the building.

@Don Winslow posted:

I love your scene Arnold! And you illustrate another point - is it necessary to only use 0 scale structures on our layouts? Your barn is - if I recall - an HO Revell kit from the 1960's and it fits your scene perfectly!

You may be correct, Don, about the barn, but I always thought my barn was O Scale Plasticville. Here it is:

Concerning HO and O Scale structures, I will comment on that in another thread in this directory. Arnold

@Don Winslow posted:

To add to the commentary, I'm a big proponent of not securing buildings to the scenery. In this example, the Lionel oil pump drops into an opening which secures it from moving and conceals the mechanism. The work house simply sits on the layout. This approach allows the flexibility to repair, upgrade, or switch out the building.

Don, your above photo is marvelous, spectacular, as good as it gets, IMO. Bravo!

I suppose it would depend on the nature of the structure being placed.  Plasticville?  Gravity is fine.

A scratchbuilt wood structure, well, I guess it would depend.  I suppose if I built something that was tippy (e.g., a narrow storefront placed against a wall to create a 3D effect on a backdrop), I might attach a piece of wood to the inside of the structure, along the base, maybe about 1" in width and then screw the inside piece of wood to the table top.  This would be invisible once the roof was in place.

But me?  I've always used gravity.

Steven J. Serenska

I prefer to have structures removable from the layout, so I don’t fasten them down. But I do use ground cover, wood strips, sidewalks or platforms to lock them precisely into position so that they don’t move and there is no gap between the ground cover and the foundation. These pictures show two buildings and the table surfaces that surround them. Sometimes I just use ground cover applied around the edges of the building. Sometimes I glue thin wood strips to the table to position the foundation edges and then apply ground cover to the strips. Sometimes I glue a piece of sidewalk or wood platform to the table so that it sits against the foundation. I don’t plan on revising either of my layouts but, if I do, I want to be able to remove the buildings without damage and reuse them. I don’t see why it’s necessary to secure buildings to the layout.

MELGAR

WOW!!!!  Great replies... and so fast!  I knew I could rely on this forum!  It's the best.  It does appear that simply setting buildings on the layout and placing ground cover around them is definitely the consensus... This is what I was leaning to but I wanted to hear from others.  The photos that you guys supplied are great and make me want to go down to the basement and get working.  I'll supply some photos of my layout as I progress.  Thanks again for all the great comments!

I just set my buildings in place using no adhesives.  I hide seams using scenic material such as ground foam, lichen, etc.   Using no adhesives, makes for easy removal for urban/rural renewal projects ... LOL!   Rarely, as I'm working on the layout, I may bump a building out of place .... no worries ... I just slide it back to its original position and hide the seam with ground cover, if needed at all.  I use glue for people figures, trees, poles, and very small items such as bicycles & motorcycles.  

In this city scene, I just set the buildings in place.  As I look at this photo now, the Kiddie City Toys can use some weathering, especially the sidewalk.  However, we have all been in older city retail districts which are kept pretty much spotless from curb to roof.  

Here is the side of a JAHNS building by MTH.  The building is illuminated.  After connecting the wiring all I did was set the building in place then added ground foam around the foundation.  The picnic table is almost covered in leafs.  This is a scene where the Sasquatch is about to change the situation of a robbery... LOL!  

The log cabin scene.  I used stacks of chopped firewood and ground foam to hide the seams.  

Another urban scene at Our Lady Of Locomotion Church.  I'm still not satisfied with the way I did things here and plan to change out the stone walls which are made by Dept. 56.  The original Dept 56 had a white base to replicate snow.  I painted the base with Floquil Concrete color.  The iron stantions also had some patches of snow which I also painted with the same concrete color paint.  The motorcycle is glued into place.  

Looking down Patsburg Ave. I used various flowers and sprinkled green grass alongside the house foundation and roadway.  The roadway is cut up roofing shingels.  For forced perspective I used a 1947 Renault ( 1:43 scale ) at the far end of the street.  The station is by Atlas O.

The cabin scene up close.

@trumptrain posted:

I just set my buildings in place using no adhesives.  I hide seams using scenic material such as ground foam, lichen, etc.   Using no adhesives, makes for easy removal for urban/rural renewal projects ... LOL!   Rarely, as I'm working on the layout, I may bump a building out of place .... no worries ... I just slide it back to its original position and hide the seam with ground cover, if needed at all.  I use glue for people figures, trees, poles, and very small items such as bicycles & motorcycles.

Here is the side of a JAHNS building by MTH.  The building is illuminated.  After connecting the wiring all I did was set the building in place then added ground foam around the foundation.  The picnic table is almost covered in leafs. This is a scene where the Sasquatch is about to change the situation of a robbery... LOL!  

HA! (BIGFOOT to the rescue)  Beautiful sets, scenes and Surprises. I always have to look for the "Easter Eggs" in your shots.  Well Done. Always entertaining

@Miggy posted:

HA! (BIGFOOT to the rescue)  Beautiful sets, scenes and Surprises. I always have to look for the "Easter Eggs" in your shots.  Well Done. Always entertaining

Thank you so much for your kind words Frank!!  It is always fun to plant the " Easter eggs"!   Glad to hear you find them

I see no reason to fasten down a building.  I see several reasons not too fasten them down.

One is it makes it easier to replace a burned out light. Two is I often switch out buildings to change the scene, etc. to make the layout more interesting after awhile, often years.  I did this often for 20 years when the layout was portable and down only 2-3 months a year.  Three is many of my buildings are Pasticville and are not even glued together.  Four is it would take more work to install and to uninstall.

If I wanted to mount them I would use a couple of pieces of two sided tape from Walmart.

Charlie

I would say the consensus is not to secure them and use landscaping to hold them in place. If alignment is critical, you could use a pin or dowel in the table with a hole in the base of the building to accept the pin. I have done this with small scenery items that won't stay put, like walls. With buildings, it's nice to retain a little flexibility so they can be repositioned as the layout evolves.

If you're prone to having man cave brawls in the train room during/after football games, cat & dog melees, overly active visits by the grandkids, or live adjacent to a geologic fault line with frequent tremors, there's one technique to help with stability you might try...

Get some small neodymium magnets...say <1/4" dia. in size.  Glue a couple flush with the floor bottom of your structure.  Drive a flathead steel screw or nail flush with the train/town board surface at the matching locations of your magnets.  There ya go!...plenty of holding power.   

You can find the magnets online, or many hobby shops carry them.  Our LHS has quite a turnover in these super magnets.   They're useful to a several branches of hobbies.  Not at all expensive in the small sizes for your sort of situaton.

Just a thought...

KD

Having been involved in disassembling too many layouts for estates that had no interest or to sell the house, and then having the layout being donated to the local NMRA, I've found that the vast majority of those modelers glued their structures into place almost with an industrial sense of security.  Doing that basically rendered the structures as dumpster candidates upon layout disassembly, so gluing stuff down is not recommended.

All of my structures, kit built and scratchbuilt alike, are mounted on 1/8" Masonite and then that Masonite with the scenery surrounding the building is placed on the layout and the surrounding scenery holds everything in place.  Everything can be removed.

Patrick, Our Lady of Lomomotion Church?

Priceless!

I don't use adhesives for structures, but for figures I like to use rubber cement. It keeps the figures standing, I can still move them without damaging them, and the rubber cement can be easily removed if I want to do that. Arnold

Surrounding scenery? yes, building? NO!

I made a base for this Ameritown building and glued a couple of pieces of wood to the inside of the building to align it on the base. Good thing too because a light burned out and I had to take it off the layout to repair. I also put a small terminal block on the base board to connect the lights. Much better than climbing under the layout too.

A model base is a great addition to just about any structure.  Usually not part of the kit.

I'm building this diorama now. Started on 1/4" luann. Easy to fill in the base to the surrounding area after it's on the layout.

One useful trick is to cut the borders of masonite building bases in irregular shapes, rather than rectangles. Straight lines always seem to remain visible under the ground cover. Random curves tend to disappear.

Such a timely repeat timely discussion.

For, my next project on my layout is to rough in the streets and building into my downtown.
I was very attentive to to the thread.

all the reasons not to tie down are thought provoking.

one thought not discussed as yet, the Nationwide adjuster would love to read this thread, so I recommend everyone to delete immediately if everyone agrees to the assignment.  

Stand back for this message will self destruct in 5 seconds.

One last thought to add.  I have attached my portals with pins.  I could not decide to glue in or remain movable for later... so right now they will be pinned into the scene.

I truly enjoy everything that I read on our Forum.  
Hopefully everyone has restored power an water by now.  Ours is!

I appreciate all the linemen in our country as well!!! Thank goodness for their talent and hard work.
stay safe!

For shadowboxes we offer a thin profile magnetic and metallic strip. The product is used in the sign industry for quick changeout of signage. Both 1" wide strips have adhesive transfer tape on the back. The idea is that the metal strip goes on the (clean and flat) train table  and the magnetic strip gets applied to the bottom of the shadowbox. In addition to providing a way to secure the shadowboxes to the layout table, the method also allows the model railroader to change the background scene by rearranging buildings from time to time.

Short of gluing at the edges, many buildings do not provide a simple practical means to hold them to a layout with anything other than gravity. For permanent layouts, I think that is fine.

However, I also do modular railroading, and having buildings and accessories attached to the scenery greatly speeds up the layout assembly/disassembly process. I have semi-permanently attached some buildings to scenery panels. Long plastic wire ties are very useful for this. I install a tie down beam inside the building if one is not already present, drive some nails into the foam at the inside corners of the building to act as indexing pins (leave them protruding above by 1/4") and bore a couple of holes through my 2" pink foam scenery base. Thread the ties through the holes and synch things down. The buildings stay put despite all the handling the scenery panel gets. They are easy to remove as well: Just cut the plastic wire tie and they come right off.

Chris

LVHR

Great topic & responses !!!

Thank you to all contributors !!!

@lehighline posted:

Short of gluing at the edges, many buildings do not provide a simple practical means to hold them to a layout with anything other than gravity. For permanent layouts, I think that is fine.

However, I also do modular railroading, and having buildings and accessories attached to the scenery greatly speeds up the layout assembly/disassembly process. I have semi-permanently attached some buildings to scenery panels. Long plastic wire ties are very useful for this. I install a tie down beam inside the building if one is not already present, drive some nails into the foam at the inside corners of the building to act as indexing pins (leave them protruding above by 1/4") and bore a couple of holes through my 2" pink foam scenery base. Thread the ties through the holes and synch things down. The buildings stay put despite all the handling the scenery panel gets. They are easy to remove as well: Just cut the plastic wire tie and they come right off.

Chris

LVHR

Hi Chris,

When you use the zip ties, where is the head?  Inside the building?

John

John,

I cut a recess area in the underside of the foam sheet. I let the head stay in there and snip off the excess tie strip.

Chris

LVHR

Gravity and the wires going through the table top are all the hold my buildings in place, even on my old rolling under bed layout.  Never had issues with town moving.

@PaulG posted:

Is there a consensus on how to secure buildings to layout?

When has there ever been a consensus on anything here.

I have never fastened a building to the layout

@RSJB18 posted:

Surrounding scenery? yes, building? NO!

I made a base for this Ameritown building and glued a couple of pieces of wood to the inside of the building to align it on the base. Good thing too because a light burned out and I had to take it off the layout to repair. I also put a small terminal block on the base board to connect the lights. Much better than climbing under the layout too.

I've never seen a need to fasten buildings to the layout.

So, I've never done it.  No problems! 

On my Marklin HO layout I created a portable scenic plot that can be removed if I wish to change up the layout. The gravel piles shown here were created on a carefully cut plywood base which is secured only by gravity.

Many of the structures on my Lionel layout, such as this charming Berkshire Valley kit, are also secured only by gravity. Again, I like the flexibility of changing up a scene from time to time.

I have never secured my buildings to the layout.  If I decide that want to move a building to another location or change something for a holiday I can.  It is good to change things up every so often just to keep it interesting and visitors think you have rebuilt it, people, pets, garbage cans, park benches need a touch of glue hold them in place or up right. 

@Serenska posted:

...
But me?  I've always used gravity.

Steven J. Serenska

Since 1687!

The Vintage Bus Tour Co. had brought a group of railfans for a visit to Hooker Junction where on the DC Central*, the buildings were just set in place:

Looking down into Hooker at an earlier time before the "new" interlocker was installed. The few bits of scenery were just st in place here, also:

*DC Central = Dirty Carpet Central

My personal opinion is that a consensus is never possible.    A compromise is possible in a lot of cases.

The other side of this is that I don't secure buildings to the layout in most cases.    If they are permanently secured they sometimes get in the way of maintenance and cleaning.   

Instead I locate them in place so they can't move sideways with pins.    I generally use small 3/4 inch long nails and usually clip the heads off.    Most buildings have open bottoms or some sort of opening.    I figure out where I want to locate the building and mark at least two corners.    I then measure from the these corners to the opening inside the building.    I then locate the nails underneath on the layout where the opening in the bottom of the building will be.     Then I can place the building on the layout on the locating pins.    I can scenic around the building and still be able to lift it off if needed.

You can use the same technique with a permanent foundation, just use longer pins so they are above the height of the foundation.    You make the foundation permanent but leave the building removable.

At MTH i would secure buildings with a block of wood in opposite corners, glued to the corner of the building on the inside and predrill and secure with a drywall screw from the underside, its good if the layout needs to be tilted or road transported like the York layout.