060 vs 072; regret the reach for scenery or regret not going 072, First Layout

Looks good - you might want to consider adding a few sidings at a couple of locations on the layout, especially the industry area. It will also help as storage for your engines and rolling stock so you don't have to continually take them on/off the layout when you want to use them.

Depending on what track system you plan on using, most have a little flex and wiggle room so that the sections can be made to physically connect when you actually lay the track out, even if the track plan shows them slightly off.

Thank you. Yes you are right few sidings or a yard would be great.  I’m just not sure how I can add them without removing too much space for scenery/buildings.

I modified the 060 vs 072 plans and added some buildings and roads just for an idea of some scenery.  Major question is 072 makes the reach 39" while the 060 keeps it a 3 foot reach to center. So regret not having 072 curves but having a 39" reach to center or have 36" reach and 060 curves.

When calculating reach you need to keep in mind that, although you may be able to physically reach to 39", can you really do any significant work at that length ? Will standing on a chair extend your reach ?

Another consideration would be that, if the table will be strong enough to hold your weight and there are small areas where you can put a knee on and you are physically capable of climbing up, then 39" may not be out of the question. You can also buy a top-side creeper which will increase your reach.

My guesstimate is that only 10%-20% of engines need O-72 to run on and most loco's fall into the O-48 to O-60 category or smaller. That's not to say that all engines don't look better on larger diameter curves, but if we're talking minimum curve, then O-60 should be enough for just about all but the biggest iron.

I'm a big proponent of having at least one O-72 (or wider) loop.  Even if you don't have any equipment that requires O-72, passenger trains look way better, and you never know when a friend might want to run his new Big Boy.

It looks like you're going to need several access hatches anyway, so why not bit the bullet and go big?

Hello. The first rule is "Plan, Plan, Plan". It delays the build, but helps avoid design mistakes.

There's a lot of debate about "around the walls" vs. "Island" type layouts.

Around the walls layouts allow for the best access and better viewing because you can only see part of the layout within your field of view. It also allows for wider curves. It comes at the expense of depth -- usually 24" to 32" is about the maximum for your benchwork. You also need a duck-under or lift-out bridge section to access the interior of the room/layout. I'm currently working on several 12'x12' designs for an anticipated relocation in a few months. This one has 42" radius (O-84) minimum on the curves and will handle any piece of equipment I currently have. The lift-out is at the lower left.

The "Island" type yields a bit more space for accessories, but creates a reach problem if placed against a wall or an aisle problem if placed in the middle of the room. It also limits your curves to the width of the table less six to eight inches. Here's an earlier concept I had worked on several years ago. It's 10'8" x 7' and the buildings were placed in the interior in such a way as to prevent seeing through to the other side of the layout when viewing from track level. It featured 36" radius (O-72) curves.

Hope this helps.

Most folks are fixated on minimum radius...my recommendation is to go as big as possible no matter what kind of layout you have, as long as you can still fit most of what you want on your layout.  Trains not only look better they run better too.  My 1st 3-rail layout had 054 (27" diameter) curves, now I have a 2-rail layout and the curves are 81 and 90".  I could have gone a bit bigger but I wanted a long yard and sidings.

I'll never again do a layout without O72 or larger curves.  It's OK to have some tighter curves on some loops as well, but at least one should have a minimum of all O72.

That's IMO of course, but I predict you will regret it if you go smaller.

IMO.  Your curves can never be to big.  The bigger the better.  When deciding between an island or an around the wall layout consider making the largest curves possible your target  then aim for that target.

I promise you will never regret having wide spacious curves.  072", an absolute minimum.

I agree with the go as large a curve diameter as possible. When I started building my layout, I thought I would never need anything larger than 42 inch as that was the minimum for the larger passenger cars. Then I found myself buying a Burlington Zephyr that needed 72 inch curves. Fortunately I was able to fiddle around and managed to get in the larger loop. I now can run 3 trains on separate loops, or I can run almost everything through all 3 loops. All squeezed into a 9x13 space.

Of course then I decided it would be much easier to be able to leave passenger trains on the rails requiring some sort of staging yard or siding. With a 5 car passenger train being plus or minus 10 feet long, this has become a stopping point for me because I do not have the room to add this length of track. This is where an under table yard could have been a real solution to my space issues - if I would have thought about it at the very start. As it is, I can keep a couple of short consists on the sidings and just add a 2 or 3 coaches when I want to run a particular road name.

Lastly make sure you add the extra yards or sidings to hold your rolling stock and engines.  Looks to me you have enough room to fit in a lower level yard (at the front left) if you put in a turnout around the top right and run the decreasing slope yard track to the left and then under the mainline. You probably would need to gain an inch or so of height on the main at its top left location to gain enough clearance to keep the grade around 3% or less. After that you could work in a decent sized yard.

As Matt said - plan, plan, plan ... then I will add figure on changing it again because you will decide there are better ways to run your layout than you originally thought.

Have fun - Jeff

I've yet to meet anyone who regrets going O-72 or bigger.

But I've seen lots of folks regret not having at least one O-72 "loop" and can't run a large engine that they otherwise want to.

As mentioned above, even the "small" stuff looks better on wide curves.

As others have said, I never have regretted having O-72 and O-82 at the two ends of my dog-bone-like layout.

I think the O72 curves have the majority vote by a wide margin.  I don't think there will even be a recount needed.

@Sparty1225 posted:

Modifying my first post with some changes to the plan options.

Hard to know what you have, all I see in the picture is this.

Haha I was thinking the same, majority is definitely for 072!

So are you trying to stick with the general track pattern shown in the plan?

If so, I have to assume we are only talking about the large oval in the top section as being either O60 or O72, correct?.  The curves making up the lower sections can't possibly be since O60 is 5 feet diameter and O72 is 6 feet (and the largest dimension of the table is only 11 feet), so there is no way those curves can be making up the lower paths that come back up to the 90 degree crossings.

If so, that might be fine, as long as you don't ever accidentally take large engines through the switches towards the smaller diameter curves.

You mention the kids and being excited about scenery.  So does the larger curve ability mean more here, or the ability to maybe have more room for scenery/building creativity?  Most of us here agree to go with O72, but that's pretty much from a hardware capability point of view most of us have lived through.  If you won't care about the large engines, maybe you should stay smaller to have more working space for the creative scenery and structure designs?

-Dave

In a general way island layouts have more room for scenery/buildings at the cost of tighter curves and access/reach problems. Around-the-walls layouts can have broader curves and no access problems at the expense of less scenery and buildings. I am happy with an around-the-walls "shelf" pike because I am more interested in operating a miniature railroad than I am in creating a miniature World. For me scenery and structures are the stage in support of the actors, the trains. I suspect for the OP and his two young daughters the miniature World is the attraction and the trains will add animation.

I do think access is a real problem whether the reach is 36" or 39", most especially for the two young model railroaders.

Several pics of my......somewhat spartan Pike. Looking West:

My helper occupying the futon.

The Southeast corner:

The Southwest corner:

The Northeast corner:

I think Lew hit the nail on the head.