Philip Hall wrote:Dave,
Like you, my back no longer supports the notion of working upside down under boards, but mine are permanent. I have set track height at 45" (1140mm), so a little higher than yours, but my design is that everything will be on top of the boards. Wiring in channels etc, point controls and rodding ditto, no need to turn them over. The baseboard surface is 15mm Contiboard on a basic plywood frame, very firmly screwed to the walls. A carpenter friend has been fitting out the building and erecting the boards for me and although he says he does not normally work to such limits has achieved a top line within 1mm of dead level all the way around a large square room!
Supporting boards on units as you describe is an excellent way of gaining some storage as well as a solid support structure. I would have used them myself had I not wanted a little more height. Obviously not an option for transportable layouts! I am not quite sure whether the building is holding up the baseboards or the other way around...
Philip
Thanks for that , I am thinking of raising it further , by adding small legs under the baseboards. The baseboards are open frame carrying track boards 100 mm above the base board bottom , so in fact the layout top surface is likely to be 1150mm above the ground, at the very least.
In my case I want the boards to be transportable for exhibitions, so I'll have a set of standalone trestles that can be used In that case
Like you I'm trying to minimise " grubbins" on the underneath. The only real items of concern are turnout operating units , signal operating units etc. One idea is to run a rod to the edge , and mount the servos there , ( and all the wiring etc, I'm using MERG CBUS layout control ) and then cover that with a cosmetic cover. This still leaves the actual point TOUs and cranks for the signals under the layout ( the most complex signal is a three dolly bracket ) , I still have concerns over mechanical complexity , robustness and lost motion, so may still mount the servos directly underneath , I'm building a test baseboard
The other thing , is for various reasons , I'm going diagonally across the room , is a triangular layout , this gives me 18 feet on the hypotenuse, strangely you don't see many such layouts , I wonder why? this format gives me wall space for workbenches and the computer(s) Desk , ( I write embedded software for a living ) , as well as avoiding an opening door , etc , the IKEA cabinets providing the storage