 Hi, I'm Michelle Patterson, June's What's Neat starts right now. The What's Neat show is sponsored by Lombard Hobbies, your value hobby shop for over 40 years of modelers helping modelers. Big inventory, value pricing, fast shipping and great service. Additional support is provided by Walthers Trains, everything you need to build a great model railroad. Check out their website at walthers.com and buy American limited models. The relentless pursuit of accuracy. Check out their website at americanlimitedmodels.com and thank you for helping us support the best hobby in the world. This is What's Neat for June 2021. I'm your host Ken Patterson and this month we do have a good show in that it's been asked on the podcast in readers comments over and over again. Hey Ken, why don't you share with us your home layout because we only see bits and pieces of it on any various show. So that's what I've decided to do this month in that I haven't been able to do interviews in the last 14 months due to COVID. So it was just as easy to interview myself and walk you through my entire home layout going back to 2014 to present day. So I show you all the different areas in St. Louis that I modeled one to one off of satellite images just to get everything absolutely as accurate as I could because I model on this layout for the run by effect. So it's a really neat presentation this month Ken Patterson's home layout. Also this month I'd like to thank very much Wothers out of Milwaukee Wisconsin for sponsoring the What's Neat show. They've sent me some brand new turnouts that are in their new line of code 83 and code 100 nickel silver turnouts and these are absolutely beautiful. I've got a number 10 right here and I've been studying this tonight in that I've noticed that these have got solid rails to the points to the frog which makes great conductivity with no hinge points. They also come with scale spikes and beautiful wood grain in the ties. They've got a power feed wire so you can power up your frog on this turnout and they've also got mounting holes right next to the rail so you can literally spike this turnout down when you mount it to your layout. So these are going to be available again in code 83 and code 100. These DCC friendly turnouts will be available in number fours, fives, six, eights, tens and soon there'll be two curved turnouts available in the Wothers catalog. So check it out at the Wothers website at Wothers.com. I also pulled out my Wothers catalog the 2021 catalog which is one of the best tools in my shop that I use all the time and I look these up and sure enough they're all listed as new products in the 2021 catalog. So check it out and then order yours from Lombard Hobbies in Lombard Illinois. Thank you very much Lombard for sponsoring the What's Neat Show. Also I'd like to say thank you very much to Robert Steers. That is American Limited Models and the San Juan Model Company. The reason I bring up Robert is that you can watch podcast number 154 and be introduced to Robert in that he was on that show and he shared with us some of their HO scale and O scale models that they're coming out with. Now it's really exciting that they're coming out with a lot of modern equipment and things that the modelers are going to love in the next couple of years and we will have exclusive announcements on the What's Neat podcast and the What's Neat show in order to share all of this great information with you in the best hobby in the world. And so with that let's continue on with the rest of this June 2021 What's Neat. Hello this is Michael Gross and you're watching What's Neat with Ken Patterson. This layout is currently I want to say this layout's nine or ten years old now and what it is it's a platform not a design that you can look in a book and read necessarily how to build because the way I built my layout was it had to fit a need it had to help me make a living it had to help me shoot ad photos and it had to be a presentation of prototypical accuracy where various scenes and bridges on this layout are in fact actual one-to-one scenes that I picked here around St. Louis to model the layout after. I learned a lot of what I learned before I built this layout from the Midwest Valley modelers layout that was a modular club where I had done about 35 train shows with that layout and over that period of time over 10 years of working with that layout I learned something that was very important that instilled and followed me all the way through to the home layout that I've built today and that is to build the layout modular by doing it that way you can take the sections outside you can take the sections out replace them with other sections of various eras and various seasons so if I pulled out this river section I could either have a fall scene or maybe ice it over and do another module that matches this table size and do a winter scene so with that type of concept that would eliminate complete tear downs as often it is I kind of got bored with my layouts in my lifetime about every four to five years I wanted to see something different and by building it this way instead of ripping out the entire layout one by fours plaster and everything all I had to do is take these sections off of the tabletops that they are on top of slide them out and replace them with new sections everything's made out of foam everything's wrapped in oak so that looks like a piece of furniture I followed this construction and continuity through the entire 157 feet loop that runs around the perimeter of my studio so that while I'm working on various projects for the model industry I can enjoy the occasional run by of a train on my layout while I'm working and just kind of you know get inspired by what it is that we all enjoy so in this video I really want to present to you how it is I designed and built my layout and that's where we're going to go next one of the first modules or dioramas on my layout that I want to talk to is kim's wick this is kim's wick missouri which is about seven miles south of where I live on the de soto sub the main line that runs behind my house here this is an old missouri pacific bridge so the consists it's running across it right now is in fact politically correct and accurate for an era this scene I could have never built to the accuracy and the degree of of measuring everything and getting it right I really relied heavily on google earth I took a section a page of google earth I traced on top of it what would fit into my layout room accordingly so that I could create this section that would curve and arch around the door allowing access of a free swinging door here and this section I literally took laser meters and I walked everything I measured the distance of the peers I measured the height of the water to the bridge which was 29 feet and I also relied some another tool that I started using a lot was these handheld gps units that would give me elevations so that as I would walk along various sections within three feet of accuracy is what they were at the time which is pretty darn accurate for us for model building it allowed me to know where I was elevation wise which I could then re-verify with the laser meter by bouncing measurements off the pavement and the girder bottoms and I was able to measure this entire structure and then scratch build it to fit right in the location that I needed for my layout this module has been used for various ads it was really a starting point to show me how hard it would be to model one to one whereas I've got another seven different bridges on this layout that were built the same way using these devices and using google earth to pull off the final results this is a almost four foot wide area on my layout where I built this lift out section that's completely oak wrapped foam the whole thing is self-contained it's held in place by door hinges so when I pull out the pins when I take off the little rail joiners the same thing over here I've got door hinges I pull out the pins I let the rail joiner slide off and I have one power plug on this side now the whole unit will lift up clean the whole thing is completely wrapped in oak bottom side top side is scenery foam cut to shape put in place now this can go anywhere I need it to go I have complete access in and out of the basement simply put it right back in when you're finished door hinges allow everything to line up smooth and tight slide your rail joiners back in and then put your pins right back in this is a very foolproof way to do a lift out section in my opinion it's 10 years old right now it has not warped and I've had no issues with any type of foam shrinkage on this section of scenery at all so I suggest this is a good way to make a lift out section that's not hinged just a lift out convenient way to give access in and out of the layout room this is another bridge this is bridges on the old Frisco line currently the Burlington northern Santa Fe railroad and this bridge was just down the hill from my old high school where I used to go to school so that after school a lot of the kids kind of use this area as a melting place to come meet hang out after school on the way home when they walked and this is just a section that I remember from a childhood memories whereas I thought I really wanted to model this the bridge peers individually are columns the graffiti is matched from the photographs exactly on and the old trestle that used to fall through the scene here is still represented by the old poles and the old columns coming up out of the rockwork so this whole diorama is really one that's also modeled one to one pretty much exact right off of Google earth and so far I'm kind of happy with the results of this one this scene is freelanced this is a BLMA 200 foot truss bridge where I just completed the peers on this one in fact I used my characteristic of texture paint to make the water for the surface and this whole scene is 16 feet long designed to be lifted up taken outside photographed create ads create good videography outside and then drops right back in here on the table surface so this is not prototype this is freelanced but using prototype standards to build the freelance the next section of the layout that I'm going to talk to you about is prototype it's not finished now I don't have the peers completed yet but this is the Merrimack River crossing south of me about four miles where the Merrimack River divulges and comes into the Mississippi River now the Merrimack River is a small river a tributary that actually drains off the south part of St. Louis and the county south of St. Louis they all flow into this river and then go into Mississippi the bridges are in fact about a half a mile from the mouth where it leads into the Mississippi and it's a section that I've always remembered as a child that I wanted to model it's easy to gain access to it and you can also google earth that which I did to create this four foot by eight foot long prototypically measured accurate model of the location it's just not completely finished to the degree of detail that you're used to and I don't know that I'm actually going to finish it because I'm planning on a redesign on this layout in the near future now I want to walk you one more thing this is where these tools were the most important the laser meter and the GPS I used to a degree of being able to triangulate measurements I was able to measure from my deck what I'm trying to explain is this is where I live I've modeled 1200 feet of bluff 1200 feet of mainline measuring the bluff's height with GPS measuring from the tracks to various rock faces with the laser meter bouncing off these measurements standing up on the upper deck and shooting the track and figuring out what the degree of angle was once I got all these measurements written on a piece of paper and I had accurate numbers it was very easy to triangulate the measurements double check your work with the google earth images and start simply carving out foam into what turned out to be the 125 foot cliff that I in fact live on and I've got 1200 feet of mainline I've got various neighbor's homes the backyards are accurate and finished the homes aren't built yet but this is this is where I could not have done this section of layout without the tools that really enabled me to do it and that's GPS and laser meters they're priceless in developing one-to-one scenes even even the trees in the foreground here these trees are measured with the lasers bent off of photographs these are accurate wire models of the trees that actually stand 125 foot tall in the river floodplain below the bluff this is in fact the google earth image that I used I had helicopter images of my home so I was able to use all the various references and then here I am in fact carving out the bluff sections and it's just ditto all way across I got as much visual information as I needed from the air and from what's available online in order to model where it is that I live now every layout needs a storage yard or a staging yard this one's not very fancy I've got an easy control panel that controls blocks in the entire yard so I can shut down all the models so that when I'm programming DCC on the main line I don't accidentally program something else it's on the main line so I like to put in kill switches on everything so that I can shut down the blocks the next thing I want to talk about is the structure of the yard this is not very complicated it's only about 16 inches deep it's wide enough to hold seven or eight tracks and allow me to have seven trains on and a pass through track at the same time it's all straight and level it's all built on top of steel one bar two by fours so what I'm doing is I'm taking metal studs I'm forming them together into a square liquid nailing it all together and what I've got are studs that will not warp they're spread over the long distances so that underneath I've got counter space and workspace so that I can work in my shop this is just a holding yard a staging yard a place to store trains when they're not running I power the layout using a digi tracks throttle system so I've got a main power supply here I've got a five amp digi tracks power supply powering the entire layout and I've also got it set up so I can interface it with my computer right here at the workbench and run the train and do my programming with the coder pro I built a I used a ramp meter from Tony's chain train exchange and I built this box for it to in to house it and it wouldn't enclosure and then I put digi tracks face plates on that so I've got access to the digi tracks local net system and then I've got my four throttles sitting right here in a nice cradle plus I've got a dc power pack all set up and ready in case I want to switch the switch and run the layout on just regular dc throttle I use stop watches to time the trains once in a while so that when I get two trains running at the same time in the layout I can make sure they're running at exactly the same speed the cables for the digi tracks system run through the ceiling they run actually through an umbilical cord on the layout from my desk to the layout and then the wires are run all through the ceiling to all four corners of the layout so I've got equal distribution of power I've got no boosters and so far everything's worked out really good now to pass through my window I had to have a 12 foot long one foot wide section of layout so that it would not be too obtuse and block the view of looking out towards the bluff in the river that's why I live here you want to see it but I created a section that was only four inches high this is completely removable and in fact about to get replaced with a dual gauge set of tracks so I can test run some narrow gauge equipment through here as I've got a narrow gauge account that I service and work for as this section walks on we come into another bridge this bridge is in fact the highway m bridge in pivley missouri it's actually a prototype bridge it's got a four lane road on it and what I liked about it was it had a multitude of construction techniques in it you've got trestle you've got girder of various sizes a creek and a highway it's got all five elements that I think make for an interesting scene the scene diverges off into a corner which I chose to just use to convolute the trains you know you don't necessarily watch the train go through here it goes into the corner comes back the other side is if it's a fresh new scene again then we end up with a freelance bridge section this is not prototype this is freelance using a brass plma bridge also the central valley plastic structure fits in the same spot so it's kind of a generic scene where over the years I've been switch out the bridges just to have the same scene look different I've been able to use this diorama for a lot of different ad photography and we've done live video on it for my what's neat this week segments and this section of course lifts up goes outside like the entire layout does for convenience of the photography to get the real light and backgrounds as you move along further I've got a small little holding yard which is more or less just an interesting place to spot cars the topography is all been carved out of the foam both tracks are laid directly on top of the foam and of course these segments are wrapped in oak and all the blocks are in these yard sections here on the front of the layout so that I can have access to the blocks everything self-contained no wires hang out at the bottom so when this section goes outside and gets photographed all the wires being self-contained in there make it very convenient where again nothing's dangling out the last scene on my layout is an old grain elevator that was in a town called Greenville Illinois and this is in fact the prototype structure that I started many years ago and I mirrored the structure I built it exactly backwards so that it would fit into the space that I had with the roads but it's just a very interesting looking grain elevator that finishes out another section of the layout with enough roads on it that I did a lot of Volvo photography photo shoots on this a few years back where I needed lots of roads the trains weren't important it was all about the vehicles the trains were more or less a background to the road shot so this section works out really well for road photography and videography of vehicles and things like that after the grain elevator module we work ourselves into the laundry area I keep the tracks very discreet on a double-track main line the second track on the main line runs down to a lower hidden staging yard which is yet to be completed but as you go through the laundry room it's very convenient very discreet there's no trains to bend over when you're trying to load the washer and the dryer and I've seen that on a lot of different layouts so I really like the way the cabinetry and the way the train runs through this functional area of the layout so I hope you've enjoyed this quick look at the design of my layout designed from experience designed for use and functionality let me tell you this really works well for me so if you're considering designing a layout consider laying your track directly on top of the foam having foam sit right on top of your tabletops so you can switch out your scenes change the element of your layout just easy as can be it's a great way to do it I suggest that anybody who wants to build a layout design something similar to this I hope you've enjoyed this thank you very much so I want to give an update to what you just saw my home layout video because as you know layouts change all the time there's no such thing as a permanent layout and my layout's the same way mine changes with my lifestyle so as we walk up on the river section here I want to show you the hide pulp mill now this ran on us on a segment of what's neat and I showed you how we built this entire scene and all these things that I described to you that I've been in what's neat videos previously I will give you an index called the WN index where you can look up all the what's neat shows and the subject matter in them including the hide pulp mill here which was a great video that we did that's in case you don't have Daniel around to ask him what video was this in Daniel and he always knew it actually says it right there on the WN index it says it right there in case you don't have Daniel around so as you see this layout has changed I added a lot of three rail to it over time and I added this area on a hill that went all the way up from the main line and this also was in a previous what's neat video now where I'm standing right now is where the Merrimack River diorama used to be that was 4 feet by almost 10 feet long I took that out because it didn't allow us to get to the back corners of the layout and we really didn't utilize those areas plus I wanted to open up some space down here because I actually needed more space as my workload increased I also took out my entire bluff section that used to be over on this side of the basement and the reason I did that was so that I could open up this work table I built an ather and switch yard on it for Chris Palomar is an ather and a few years back and I also use it for storage so it's just allowed me to open up against space and just do things a little bit different around here the bluff was very large it was about a scale 1200 feet long so it was like 12 or 14 feet long it was two feet high and it was almost eight feet deep and it just took too much valuable space in the basement so after about two years after I tore down everything in here I then started to build a narrow gauge layout I got Blackstone models as an account and I fell in love with HON3 I had all the Blackstone models I actually had a figure eight loop layout built here I had built a curved section that came off of the main line on the layout into the center of the room where I had a trestle lightener trestle was built in that section of the area and I also built a BTS log mill facility and a great big dog bone on the layout and that ran right up the center of the room it also was featured in a lot of previous what's neat videos because the construction was a lot of fun and it added a lot of operating to my layout which was a great element that I was missing on this layout because as you know it's just a race track that runs around the room because I model for the run by effect well what happened was I started this thing called a podcast and I needed to open up space in the basement to the point where the narrow gauge and all the layout up the center of the room was taking up so much space that during the prototype modelers meet in 2017 and 18 when we had a lot of guests here to do a show there wasn't any room for people to stand so I actually had to open up space for my professional life to keep promoting the hobby the way I do and I got all the narrow gauge stuff boxed it all up put it in a truck and sent it down the Joshua's house so Joshua's got all my beautiful uh self-standing dioramas that were here as I move along I can tell you that the area in front of the window that I showed previously in my what's neat video I actually had built a turntable scene and changed the track arrangements on that area made it just a little bit wider and then as time went by I also cut out that turntable and changed it the good thing about modeling a layout is that there's no such thing as rules you can change anything you want all the time no layouts ever completely finished but I did want to give you this update on what I've done a brief overview of everything that I've done down here on this layout it's a lot of fun best hobby in the world and with that I'm going to end this segment on Ken Patterson's home layout on what's neat all the products seen on this episode of what's neat are available from Lombard hobbies in Lombard Illinois or order online at Lombard hobby dot com author's trains supporting hobby retailers across the world since 1932 check out their website and learn more at wathers dot com american limited models available at your local hobby shop or online at american limited models dot com