...how do you go about doing it?
Conditions:
- Assume this is a budget build and the cheapest options are preferred.
- Assume a parcel exists with no major topographical challenges.
Starter questions:
- What are you going to use for an engine?
- What materials are you going to use for rail?
- What are you going to name your railroad?
I think this is a very doable project and a lot more fun than model railroading. Especially if your plot is 10+ acres and has trees / rocks / etc. to move. Just want to feel it out for now.
>What are you going to name your railroad?
The Totally Fabulous Unbelievably Gay Express
You begin by studying the many hobby railroad venues and learning how it's successfully done. You don't just randomly pull ideas out of your arse because the hobby is older than anyone living.
You identify how long it needs to last and how close or not it needs to mimic the real deal. You decide if you want actual rails or something different. Your engine depends on your resources and expected load. The name doesn't matter except to the owner and that question is moronic.
>I think this is a very doable project
Then get your ass to studying because while doable it is not spoonfeedable. Decide if you just want to talk fantasy or actually build the thing. You have a fair chance of finding an existing one or parts for sale after checking the right venues, clubs etc so do that. PrepHole is not one.
>Decide if you just want to talk fantasy
are you new here.
This 100%
When my dad retired he got bored. When he hit his 70s he connected with large scale train people and they embraced him because he could build shit well. He had a background with decades of carpentry. He made a ton of fricking cash off of those nerds but it wasn’t easy money because they were extremely picky. Building a train car for them was worth like 5-10 grand but it had to be just right. The cheaper ones were the freight cars in back because they just were decorative but the engines would generally carry people. They could easily run 5 figures and the materials were often not all that much. They did take awhile to build but a big part of that was that they were being built by someone with the knees and back of 70+ year old man who had done carpentry and construction since he was like 12 or 13 years old
They 100% know what they’re doing though. I helped him deliver them a few times and they’re autism levels of obsessive about how everything is done, which is pretty par for the course for train nerds I suppose. The downside for op is that none of it was done cheap at all; those dudes bled cash. After 4-5 years of working with them my dad literally bought a porsche
>they’re autism levels of obsessive about how everything is done
can confirm, my dad was a trian buf since he was 6. he died at the age of 74.
when I was selling his stuff on ebay I had tons of trouble because he would modify the trains he bought to be more "authentic". he only stopped playing with trains about 2 years before he died when dementia took his mind from him.
I would probably build the rails out of green treat and then attach angle iron to the tops. With this system you can piecemeal the wood and then just curve the metal to get a smooth track
I'd use a salvaged electric motor from a treadmill or something as the engine and then I might do steel frames for the cars but meh
>angle iron
>curve the metal
iron
the metal
You definitely can curve angle iron. It will just require some shrinking or stretching of one of the legs. Not a super easy, and will require a roll bender and proper dies or a torch and heat, but still not impossible.
Build a dirt track and some go-karts instead. Then you'll be the cool uncle instead of the creepy uncle.
what makes one cool and other creepy
.
..
why isn't the gokart inadequately sized
>why isn't the gokart inadequately sized
because cool uncle don't screw up
I'd probably just do what way out west does. Your workload isn't worth the modern design choices the real railways made like crowned I beam rails, or even angle iron like anon says.
Unistrut and four 24v truck starter motors.
Another DORK hobby
Like HAM radio
Retired machinists more than likely
Take caboose boys man card.
Thats cringey, painful to see any male pussy whipped like that.
>Take caboose boys man card.
>Thats cringey, painful to see any male pussy whipped like that.
How much do you wager the kid she is carrying isn't his?
he's just playing with his family
>sorry sweetheart, you can’t be the fun train conductor in the steam engine because anonymous virgins will call me a cuck and a pussy
H4 timber sleepers, H3.2 wooden rails, simple wood bogeys and large conical/tapered wheels sistered to larger wooden discs to keep them on the track.
Getting metal involved is pointless, all-wood setups worked fine for minecarts and various backyard/playground rail setups
If you've got an existing railway track in your backyard consider extending it off from there. Just make sure to keep the track switched to its original route to avoid trains derailing into your trailer home.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLlyD5gnqylArkIr49Rax3A8gTs3mvoCAU
Chinese labor.
>What are you going to use for an engine
I'd go electric, to help save the planet.
1. buy tesla
2. can no longer afford backyard railroad project
everyone wins
1. buy commercially available track. it's literally under backyard train. there is NO FRICKING reason to reinvent the wheel, or scale, or tracks.
2. recognize there is a fricking good reason train wheels are shaped the way they are
alternatively if you're truly a cheap ass darkie
1. frick the tracks build wagon cars from trailers made for a garden tractor, decorate the garden tractor as the engine.
>. there is NO FRICKING reason to reinvent the...tracks.
fricking cost? lol. idiot.
There is no quality poorgay method for this. Get a quad and some trailers or something instead.
Often the best thing to do with bad ideas is discard them. Everything about backyard railroading is online so there no need to ask here.
you can very very very easily build track from steel angle and cutting timber sleepers to save like 9/10th cost of track.
Sure, and end up as the latest Darwin Award recipient.
>steel angle
not how railroads work
it works fine, you're not running 100 ton locomotives on it
Spend 15 k on a yard train
Spend 2 years installing
Ride around yard waving at everyone like you’re in a patade
2 days get bored, never ride again
Make wife weedeat around it all
I like feet.
>Assume this is a budget build and the cheapest options are preferred
Just steal a train