What Will You Do When You Finally Finish Your Layout…Quit the Hobby?

I have a small 4x12 layout in a spare bedroom. I started it 6 years ago. I can run 2 trains through mountains, along streams, through town, and next to a gold mine. It still isn't done. Most people would think it is, though.

 

My basement is huge. I could easily have built a "magazine quality" layout in the space I have. it would have required thousands of dollars, years of time, and a huge loss of living space.

 

From what I can tell of the "finished layout", now time to tear it down attitude, the layout was invading living space, and so large that it became an obsession to complete it, usually in a self imposed time frame and a desire to be published. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. I've gotten to where I can almost tell what layouts are built for publication and which are built for personal enjoyment looking at the pictures of feature articles in the train magazines. Again, nothing wrong with that. Enjoy the hobby in whatever way you want to. It's all good.   

I agree.  Mot of the commentary has so much "finality" in it, one has to think that the only way to finish a layout is to be "laid out".

I plan to finish major parts by the time I am 70. Currently I am 62. I do not want to be hauling plywood and all that stuff around as I get older. A Major rebuild is in the plans right now for the next 2 or three years.

In my opinion, if you think your layout is "done", you must be doing something wrong!

 

A model RR in most cases is never done.    There is always something to improve, to change, to add more detail to.    Then you need to tweak the operating scheme and add an industry or 2.   Change the train schedule.   It just seems there is always something that comes to mind that I want to improve.

 

As for taking up "living space".    This is my hobby; the model Railroad IS living space.   It is first class living space that I enjoy.

That's the stage I'm going thru right now. I'm debating whether to tear it all down & start over.

Good morning, when the time comes, I will dismantle my existing layout and start on a new layout.

Hopefully I don't make the same mistakes so there is room for new mistakes!!!!!

 

I have discussed taking my table top style layout down and building a Island style layout, but I have been told I am not starting on a new layout until my wife gets her kitchen remolded.

This remolded is slated for spring 2015.

 

Mark Strittmatter

TCA #14-69917

Indiana PA.

 

 

Bob,

 

Re: "only way to finish a layout is to be laid out".  Now that is pretty extreme but it is also very true.

 

But if you think about it, it's not such a bad thing to be doing on the way out.

 

Ed

Mine is Finished........... NOW I run Trains every day!!!

 

FREDSTRAINS

I am now planning my main layout rebuild.   Meanwhile, I have a portable O gauge 4'X8', a Zscale in my desk drawer, and an N layout about 4' X 8', and G gauge on the shelves in case I want to try an outdoor layout again.

 

I don't think that the point is to finish a layout, but to enjoy the experience.    Its not the destination, but the journey that is important.  

    Go for it Spence………… you'll have Fun   LOL  sorry Spence the Devil made me do it.

All,

The less time we spend on the internet would help to get the layout done. HA!

Or on these blogs. Hence, I am in the same boat… So here I go.

 

Dan

Mine will never be finished. When I move (hopefully in a couple years), I will still have things that I wish I could have done to it.

 

But the next one will be better!

A layout is never "finished". It may have the appearance of being finished, but there is always something you can add, replace, re-do, enhance, upgrade..... It's NEVER ending, especially with all the new products that come available as far as scenery and details.

My plan was a simple layout with indoor-outdoor grass carpet and simple structures. Then my son came up with an interesting track plan and I decided to go for that and trying my hand at scenery. Each area I complete seems to be better than the previous one (there are so many mistakes to learn from...) so I've gotten in deeper and deeper and I'm demanding more of myself. That has slowed down progress and the scenicking, freight yard and other projects are in their fourth year.

 

I actually look forward to finishing because I really enjoy running the trains (another reason progress is slow!), but I suspect that when the layout is done I will want to re-do some of the earlier work.

 

 

 "I'm debating whether to tear it all down & start over."

 

Spence, you will know when the time it right to start over. If renovating what you have will not produce the results you want, then it is indeed time to start over.

 

Good luck with whatever you decide.

This is very true, but the forum provides me with constant ideas and reason for layout changes as well as exposing all of my mistakes. Probably not likely, but without it I might run out of ideas and actually finish something someday.

 

However, not being finished does not stop trains from running. The first thing I did after setting up my recently acquired Mianne benchwork was lay track and power it up, took less than a week. Now the rest can wait and be done anytime with trains running all the while (except for maybe a minor track revision every now and then).

 

 

YOU forgot "ONE THING"....."REPAIR"!!!..........LOL 

(Fredstrains), thanks for the pictures of your layout, it's really neat...its a WOW.

(trainFun) Your layout is really neat to, it's a WOW.

Maybe whether you are finished or not depends on what your definition of "finished" is.  I consider my layout finished, because there is simply no work that I routinely go to do on it.  But I do stay open to new brainstorms, and there is pleasure in making many small "improvements", as I like to call them.  Many of these have been of the variety displayed in the "Layout Vignettes" threads. 

Right about that Fred..... REPAIRS! Of various types

Yep that's pretty much what I do. limited to a 8' x 5' space it's pretty easy to complete a display. My current one has been up since this past January and may stay up another year, only because I've figured out I may be able to add three more loops to the existing 9. Usually they only last about 6 months. In the past 8 years I've had about 15 different displays.

I started my 28' x 16' layout about 10 years ago. That's when I began constructing the room!!!! The table work was put up 9 years ago and each winter season a little bit more gets finished. Got 3 loops running and need to complete the last one this season. When I do that then the lighting starts. If I finally complete everything in 2015, there are always improvement and changes to be made so why should I quit a fun hobby? When they finally lock me in the box  hopefully there will be another part of my life to remember me with. I believe that the layout will live on with my oldest son Douglas as the new caretaker.

I will never finish my layout.  By definition there is always something more to do.

The reason many people remain in this hobby in the first place is because it is a never-ending endeavor.  It is endemic that model railroading inherently is a "process" instead of an end game in itself.   But for those who don't see it that way, keep in mind that your train layout, while "finished," will still require maintenance to keep it running even if you lack the creativity or enthusiasm to take it to another level.

Yup, the title is right. My layout is done so I quit.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

yeah, um......NOT! I will just run trains and enjoy what I have built and tweak things. I like what I have built.

 

My layout has been done for a few years now.I still have interest in the hobby.I just display new stuff on shelves and run carpet layouts in my living room from time to time.

Dan

When I "kick the bucket". Hopefully I will have removed all the layout clutter before that kick-off so I can run trains. At my age time is of the essence.

 

As was stated earlier,finished,I will never be finished,that's what makes this hobby so much fun

I meant to comment yesterday, but got sidetracked (no pun intended).

 

This question, assuming that it was asked seriously, is very, very odd. First, why would

one "quit" something that they presumably like and have spent much time and money

achieving? Secondly, this hobby is not defined by operating layouts. Many of us devote

much more time to the equipment than to the "stage". I do. I have a layout that is,

theoretically, nicer than many, but in fact tends to become a parking lot for loco and

rolling stock projects that I have done - and there they sit while I'm at the workbench

messing with the latest one... really, only my Main 1 (as I call it) track is typically free -

to test the last victim of my madness.

 

I wish that I wasn't this way. I have waybills and car cards just waiting to be filled out

for operating sessions - which I have had, but not for years. I really wish that I could

be more layout oriented. Many projects get done but remain unappreciated by anyone, parked on a siding.

 

Maybe after I get to that NYC K-5 Pacific project...yeah, after that's done...

What will I do?..Run trains. 

Run trains and drink, then drink somemore. and somemore.

Guys,

 

That is why I love this hobby! Because no matter what I do there is always another day that I can tweak it just right (therefore as long as I draw breath, it's never finished) or introduce it to another kid and their Mom or Dad who will ask me to play trains just a bit more......as long as I can do this, I will be happy, they appear to be as well!

 

It's a hobby that any age can enjoy!

 

Mike Maurice