Swiss N gauge in the garage.

Ever since I visited Switzerland on a school trip back in 1981 I have wanted to model the country. The cost of European stock always put me off along with a lack of space. As most of you know my main love is the electrified WCML and I have built numerous WCML themed layouts over the years my last one being Wemblesden Park. This layout has now been retired from the exhibition circuit and is currently in the process of being stripped down and rebuilt in the loft. The origins of the Swiss layout go back to lockdown when I was looking for somewhere to run my British N gauge stock. With the cost of second hand track reaching stupid money on eBay and my lack of employment I bought some discounted N gauge curved track and set about designing a small roundy roundy test track incorporating a couple of helix's. This then evolved into the Swiss themed layout that I documented on YouTube. Last year I finally returned to full time employment and started buying Swiss rolling stock for the ever changing layout. What started out as a lockdown project ended up being cut in half and altered to form the basis of a new exhibition layout and I was close to completing all the trackwork.

Moving forward to the start of this year we finally got our finances sorted out with regards to the house so I can now think about what I want to do long term with regards to my modelling. My mrs said I should build my dream layout as I work hard enough so last month I started ripping out stuff in the garage and putting in the baseboard framework. The layout will be 16' x 8' U shape with the main 16'x4' mountain section down one side of the garage. The opposite wall will have a narrower section with a return loop at one end. The track plan will be a basic dog bone design with a lower and upper return loop.





At the moment I have started designing the lower station and return loop. The plan is to use all the electronics off Wemblesden so the layout will be totally automated with block control and the stations will be used as on scene storage for the trains.









Yesterday I put in my new workbench



Here's some of the stock I have bought over the past 12 months











And finally here is the helix I built for the old layout. Thankfully I was able to remove it in one piece so I can reuse it



Posties just delivered a couple of gaugemaster controllers I bought the other day so I'm off now to test some locos.

This is an amazing project. I look forward to more posts and pictures.

Cheers,
Claus

Looking good Dave 👍

What make of track are you using, don't recognize it?


Ed

Hi Ed its Peco code 80 flexitrack.

Ah, must be the concrete sleeper version, which I must admit I've never used.

It was the light grey sleepers in some of the pictures that made me ask.



Ed