Model Railroading and Trains – Helping you with turnouts/switches and tips for a better layout

Layout Construction

You can see that I’ve started prepping the straight tracks for the yard. For more information about how I added PC board ties go to the page Bulletproofing the Straight Yard Tracks. Also, back a few months I finished building the water extension and painted it. The actual water effects […]

Prepping the Yard Tracks and Water Update

July 10, 2025 in Layout Construction by admin

UPDATE – December 2019 In addition to the National N Scale Convention, the NMRA National Convention that our division, the Northern Utah Division of the NMRA, hosted in 2019 has also come and gone. Many years of planning we did have fun and many, many people expressed the same enthusiastic […]

Custom Turnout Orders Update

December 18, 2019 in Layout Construction / Trains / Turnouts by admin

In an effort to organize, and get under control, some of my personal time, I cannot promise any new orders for track work to be worked on before July 1, 2018. I have a number of orders I am a little behind on which I will finish as soon as […]

Custom Turnout Orders

January 23, 2018 in Layout Construction / Turnouts tagged handlaid turnouts / Train Layout by admin

Newsletter Column Index December 2017 This time of year is full of traditions. Many model railroader’s stories begin with the memory of a train around the Christmas tree. I have a special Christmas train with Santa on it that we set up nearly every year. It doesn’t always run great […]

Newsletter 12/17

December 11, 2017 in Layout Construction / Promontory Post tagged christmas train / traditions by admin

Newsletter Column Index October 2017 What’s on your workbench? Sometimes it seems I have too many projects. I’ve said before that the AP Program has helped me focus to be able to get projects completed. I’m at the point where I need to do scenery on my HO layout. In […]

Newsletter 10/17

October 17, 2017 in Layout Construction / Promontory Post tagged live steam / Train Layout by admin

Below is a “guest post” by my son. His last step to earn his Eagle Scout rank is doing his Eagle Scout Service Project. For my eagle project I am making track for a park in Saratoga Springs called Shay Park. Utah Live Steamers, a train group in Utah, currently […]

Eagle Service Project

September 9, 2017 in Layout Construction / Trains tagged boy scouts / Eagle Project / Train Layout / trains by admin

Newsletter Column Index June 2017 What are you doing to have fun with model railroading? Chances are, as long as it isn’t armchair modeling, it might qualify for some aspect of the AP. You should all know by now, for years I had many projects “mostly done” and just needed […]

Newsletter 6/17

June 7, 2017 in Layout Construction / Promontory Post tagged AP / model railroad / model trains / Train Layout by admin

Newsletter Column Index April 2017 What is on your workbench? If you are like me, you might have more projects started than you care to admit. Working on AP requirements helped me to focus and with setting some goals and personal deadlines I have now completed more projects than ever! Not […]

Newsletter 4/17

April 5, 2017 in Layout Construction / Promontory Post / Tips / Trains by admin

My Timesaver: I’ve uploaded a new page showing my efforts so far at constructing my own Timesaver based on the original by John Allen. After 12 and a half years I’m finally building my own. A few more weeks and I should have it done. Everything from constructing the base […]

Sneak Peak of My Timesaver

March 8, 2013 in Deep Thoughts / Layout Construction / Tips / Trains / Turnouts by admin

We had a fun time last night with the kids coming to trick-or-treat. As is the tradition for the last nine years except one (because of foul weather) we have opened up our backyard to the neighborhood kids to ride our train in the backyard. It is a fun […]

Daily Herald Write-Up and new Video

November 1, 2012 in Deep Thoughts / Layout Construction / Layout Tour / Trains by admin

I’ve added a few galleries with pictures I’ve taken at recent layout tours I’ve been on. Look for this page to be updated as I go on layout tours in the area. You can go to the Layout Tours page and see the galleries OR it is better to go […]

Layout Tour Pictures Added to Website

April 29, 2012 in Deep Thoughts / Layout Construction / Layout Tour by admin

I started a new thread about working towards Master Model Railroader. The first post is up. The next one should be soon. It’s about getting my Golden Spike Award. There’s quite a bit involved but I’m going to break it down step by step.

NMRA Master Model Railroader

April 4, 2012 in Deep Thoughts / Layout Construction tagged Master Model Railroader / model trains / NMRA by admin

I recently attended a layout open house and there’s one thing in particular I wanted to share about what I observed. It was an awesome layout filling a good portion of a small basement. I could go on about a number of cool things but the one thing I want […]

The Perfect Model Train Layout?

March 29, 2012 in Deep Thoughts / Layout Construction tagged model railroad / Train Layout / trains by admin

This website was originally meant just as a place for my products for sale. My intent however, was to always have a section with tips and hints about model trains to help others with their own model railroad layout construction. At the right there are a couple links to outside […]

Model Train Layout Construction

February 27, 2012 in Deep Thoughts / Layout Construction / Tips / Turnouts tagged handlaid turnouts / handmade track / Handmaid Turnouts / model railroad / trains by admin