Hi Ed, My track work is finished and a week or so ago I put down a basic scenery shell so that the layout looks "finished". I usually have a mini operating session (just by myself) about twice a month, which lasts about 30 minutes. It is just moving the cars I havearoundon the layout. Most of my time set aside for modeling is spent on building the layout. Right now I am working on structures. I suspect that will be my main focus for the coming years.
I think what you are referring to is layout maintenance. I have an occasional truck that needs adjusting, but the track appears to be fairly stable. The larger the layout, and the more equipment you run on it, the larger your maintenance chores. Two or three of us here in Houston used to operate on this guy's HO-scale layout about twice a month. The purpose of the operating sessions was to discover "bugs". After the end of the first operating session in which I participated, the owner had 20+ new items on his to-do list. This gradually got down to about 5 or so. Since he handlaid his track, there was the occasional point rail that became unsoldered. Also, since he had his layout in the garage, occasionally his track gauge needed adjusting due to temperature fluctuations. Last week I operated on a rather large HO-scale layout that's been operated on for years and has many operating sessions throughout the year. We had several couplers that fell off, a steam engine that randomly caused shorts (even while standing still!), a diesel engine that didn't like running for long distances (did OK switching), and several cars that didn't track well. I suspect there is always things like that that need to be done. Just the normal wear and tear. I helped build the benchwork for a friend of mine who switched from N to HO. He was very careful in laying the track (all pre-fabbed). He bought the better brands of HO equipment, all R-T-R. We operated his two-bedroom layout about once or twice a month and we very seldom had any problems (as a matter of fact, the only ones I remember were with the Digitrax system and with one or two of the throttles). I think if you build your trackwork very carefully, make sure your engines are running well, and keep your couplers in good shape (and all matching some uniform height standard), you can significantly reduce your need for continuous maintenance after operating sessions. Just my thoughts, - Peter. On 03/25/2011 8:16 pm, Edward Davis wrote: > I have a question for those who have a home layout or anybody that's > interested. > How much time do you spend running trains ( operating ) compared to building > structures, sceniking (sp), or working on locos and rolling stock? I love > running trains but there always seems to be something that needs to be done on > the layout that interferes with operating. Is this typical? Just curious. > > Ed Davis > Stockton -- Peter Vanvliet ([email protected], or [email protected]) Houston, Texas "It is easy to give up; anyone can do that..." http://pmrr.org/ (my model railroad - RSS feed <http://pmrr.org/rss.xml>) http://fourthray.com/ (my company) http://houstonsgaugers.org/ (model railroad club) -- [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: [email protected] [email protected] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [email protected] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
