Puckdropper wrote:
I'm thinking about putting an HO Scale railroad in the garden when I
plant it this spring. I'm posting here because I need advice on what
I can lay track ON that would be sturdy and not harm my tomatoes,
strawberries, watermelon, carrots, green beans (or whatever else I
plant.)

At the moment, my main question is how to securely mount the track. I
plan on soldering every joint so electric connectivity isn't a
problem. The track is about 1" wide with plastic "ties" between the
rails. Normally, track is mounted by putting a nail through the center
of the tie in to a board or with glue. However, a 1/2" nail like I
use wouldn't be sufficient to hold track in place on dirt/weed block.

Also, HO scale track is somewhat fragile. Any ideas on how to prevent
having it stepped on? (I'm sure many gardeners have come across a
similar problem.)

If there's a better newsgroup for this, I don't think my ISP carries
it... There's no rec.models.railroads.garden like there is
rec.models.railroads.ho

--- Short introduction to model railroad scales in general. (For the
curious.) ---

Model railroads are railroads built to resemble the full scale
railroads that I'm sure everyone has seen or at least crossed their
tracks. They're built to different sizes (each with their advantages
and disadvantages) called /scales/ and they usually have letter names.
O scale (1:48 proportion) was one of the original so when trains came
out that were roughly half of O scale (1:87) it was called HO for
"Half O."


You might want to look at Garden Railways Magazine:
http://www.trains.com/maghomepage/ma...p?idMagazine=5

Personally, I think that HO is far too small to be built on even firmly
packed ground. I think you'll find that you'll never get the ground flat
enough unless you pre-mount the track on some very wide pieces of
plywood, and do a reasonably good job of grading an even wider path.

You'll find some people talk about G-scale or G-gauge, but there really
is no such thing. Gauge refers to the distance between the rails, and
scale refers to the ratio to full-size. These days garden railroads are
often built on what was once the obsolete 1-gauge rails, but the scale
of rolling stock varies. you'll find 1:20.3, 1:22.5, 1:24, 1:29 and 1:32
but not a big selection in any of them. If you're going for accuracy of
full-size railroads, 1:32 would be correct, but there's more available
in 1:29, which with 1-gauge track would be more like a narrow-gauge
railroad in real life.

I just can't see HO as being practical for a real garden railroad.
Possibly as part of a patio railroad, but not out on the actual earth.
But maybe someone else out there has made it work.

--
Warren H.

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response -- unless you count my dog who desperately wants
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