Model Railway Forum

A lovely set up there. I used to dream of using a large building dedicated for trains, but I have to say that these days, the thought of all that track cleaning... Umm. Love it though.

That is a lovely layout and space. And a space heater as well .
Jim.

I have made a start on laying ballast to the track and adding some scenic material around the layout edges.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/16113522@ ... 412493020/

Once the ballast is fully dry, the tracks will be weathered so the amount of grey colour will reduce.

Very nice layout and extremely envious of the "train room"!!

IanLMS wrote: ↑Thu Feb 14, 2019 10:01 am Very nice layout and extremely envious of the "train room"!!

I agree

The plus side of having such a large room is obviously space, but the downside, and despite having a log burner, is that on real cold days, it takes hours to get the room to around 13c which is a comfortable temperature to work in. I think I may lay some carpet at the layout end in order to try and insulate the floor because the concrete remains cold all day. Not good on the feet

One of my previous layouts was in an old 12' x 8' brick shed and was terrible in the winter. I roughly boarded out the ceiling, put insulation above, carpeted the floor and put plaster board up the walls with polystyrene sheet behind. It helped and kept fairly warm with help for a heater. However, your barn is probably a little on the large side for that type of work!

Currently 11c outside and 9c in the barn. Not a bad split but when the OAT is zero or below, I then find getting the barn above 8c becomes difficult. The timber roof cladding is helping keep heat in but I need to look at the floor and maybe lay a slightly raised timber floor around the layout and insulate that. There is an element of heat loss through the walls (breeze block) but is helped by outside timber cladding.

The overall volume of air inside is the main culprit though.

put in a false ceiling or a shed within a shed

I thought about the false ceiling option when I was first making the changes to the building but came to the conclusion, a false ceiling would only generate more "clutter space above" so decided against it.

I think overall, the heating issue is not a problem. Today for example, the temperature rose inside to around 12-13c which is comfortable. I will however look at raising the floor level around the layout to around 3.5" and insulate that area so that at least when working on the layout, I won't be standing on cold concrete. I make a raised floor with timber and then lay either carpet or carpet tiles.