Rupert's Insights

Garden Railway

From 2007 to 2014 I very much enjoyed a garden railway at the house where we used to live before moving to a residential condominium. Following is the article in Garden Railways Magazine from October 2013 when my railway was featured as the cover story.

Garden Railways Magazine Article

Lessons Learned

Some lessons I have learned from many years of model railroading. If I knew then what I know now, I would:

Start with a very simple, not overly ambitious layout with a handful of sidings and at least one run-around track. The mistake many of us make when we get started in this hobby is to bite off more than we can chew. This causes one to get bogged down and sometimes lose interest because there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight. There is much more to it than first meets the eye. The primary focus of your first layout should be the wiring, trackwork and control system so you are able to build something that works. This is your “get the trains running” layout. This way you will have greater confidence when to build your next, somewhat more ambitious, layout.

If possible, get to know someone who has experience in the hobby and ask if they can mentor you. I would be pleased to do this for anyone starting out.

After having learned the basics to the point where you are more comfortable, it’s time to start on a new layout – but don’t make the next one the empire that will be a lifetime of work. Again, you will get bogged down and won’t finish. Use this second layout to hone the skills you have learned and avoid the mistakes you made with the first layout. This would also be an opportunity to explore various scenery techniques and a somewhat more elaborate track plan.
Purchase a DCC system and at least one DCC locomotive with sound and some decent quality cars that have Kadee couplers installed at the factory. Later on you can explore installing your own DCC modules in a DC locomotive and add Kadee couplers to cars that don’t have them but this isn’t something you should be fussing with as a newbie.
Purchase or subscribe to one or more model railroad publications. They all have very good writers who provide a great deal of useful information and generally have topics that are suited to beginner, intermediate and experienced modelers. You will hear people vociferously talking up or down various publications. Ignore these comments and try them all for yourself. I have subscribed to all of the following for many years.

Most editions of the following contain a lot of useful information but, as with any publication, from time to time the articles just happen to be mainly about things that don't currently interest me -- but, chances are in a year or three I'll be going back and digging out the articles because my interests have changed.

Model Railroader Magazine (“MR”) has more articles for beginner and intermediate modelers than some others; they have an outstanding video library for which they charge extra to see everything but it’s not expensive and it contains a treasure trove of information; they also publish an archive containing every one of their magazines published since the 1930's as well as a huge number of track plans you can download – even simpler ones that provide a beginner with some good ideas.

Railroad Model Craftsman (“MRC”) has more articles for intermediate and advanced modelers than some others. It is also of very high quality.

Model Railroad Hobbyist (“MRH”) in an online-only magazine, the base version of which is completely free and contains many times the information in each edition than either of the above publications. There is an expanded version called “Running Extra” which costs only $US19.99 per year but it is well worth it. MRH is as professionally written as the others but with much more content; all past issues are available for download in PDF form. It has a fantastic website with extensive forums and blogs and, for an additional charge, Trainmasters TV which has outstanding videos tailored mainly to the intermediate and advanced modeler. It is free to create a user name and password to use the website and I know they don't share your information or send you emails you don't want.

Echo Valley Railroad Guild

The Echo Valley Railroad Guild Inc. ("the Guild" and "EVRG") was formed in the late 1970's by seven members of the Regina Model Railroad Club who wanted to take their club activities in a different direction. The Guild was incorporated in 1984 under the Non-profit Corporations Act of Saskatchewan.

The Guild's first layout was constructed in a basement room at former Benson School in 1982 and operated there until 1997 when it was announced that the school would be demolished. All was not lost as space was secured at Davin School where a new layout was constructed comprising both HO scale (Southern BC Canadian Pacific Crowsnest Pass route in the 1950's) and HOn3 scale (Kaslo Slocan narrow gauge). Sadly, in 2014 the Regina Public School Board informed the club that it needed to vacate as the space was needed for storage - even though the layout was visited by hundreds of residents and school students each year during open houses and school tours, the bureaucrats were able to find a way to end it all through their vision of building community through storage.

The Guild continued to exist as a legal entity and its modelling and community outreach activities continued through several portable layouts built by various member of the Guild in various scales including N, On30 and G. However, the majority of the Guild's 15 or so members were not part of these groups. After a period of introspection, in 2015 the decision was made to explore the Free-mo modular concept. Eight members embarked on a journey to build modules of varying length. As of January 2019 we have almost 100 feet of modules including two loops. See separate post to learn more about Free-mo – look for it under Labels/Free-mo at right-hand side of page.

Here is a shot of my Canadian Pacific grain train passing through my Free-mo module "Aspen":

Free-mo Model Railroading

Free-mo is a concept designed to allow modelers to build modules that can be part of a modular layout. If the module is built to comply with Free-mo standards, even a 4-foot long module could be part of layout which is over 1,000 feet long. The published standards specify the physical properties of module ends, height, electrical connections between modules and the electronic control system to run HO scale model trains.

The modeler is free to be as creative as he or she wants when it comes to the makeup of each module. A module can be very short (2 feet) or very long (100 feet). It can be straight or curved. It can be comprised of one section or many.

If the reader is interested in learning more about Free-mo, the official standards are found at Free-mo.org.

Here is a photograph of the August 2018 Free-mo setup at Big Valley, Alberta. This annual event is hosted by the Calgary Free-mo group Calgary Free-mo. The goal was to set a north American record in 2018 as it was the 15th annual Big Valley Free-mo event. This goal was easily met with 1,126 feet of modules.