Modeling an HO Scale Railroad Using Trainz:
Where the Ruler is King!

By John D'Angelo


A single baseboard route in HO scale.

Over the years I have created a number of different routes for Trainz and have also detailed special scenes. This version of an HO scale layout has been made to fit within the requirements of a basement room and, as you can see, the track plan fits inside a single Trainz baseboard. The square boarder around the track plan is the line made by a single baseboard as shown in TrainzMap. The key to making a Trainz route to scale is to make use of the ruler that is in Surveyor.

When you create a route in Surveyor, and you choose a new route, you will be given options regarding what scale you would like to model in. Every popular model railroading scale is available: Real Scale, S Scale, TT Scale, Z Scale, #1 Scale, � Scale, G Scale, HO Scale, N Scale, OO Scale and O Scale.


Scale Choice Menu.

When you work in any scale the relationship of objects and track to the baseboard do not change. If your track runs from one edge of the baseboard to the other, it will also do this in O scale or N scale. Everything will continue to be in proportion to the baseboard. What will change is the overall size of the baseboard in relation to real life, and a most important tool for working in scale is the ruler.

I used the ruler to illustrate below the difference between the length of a single baseboard in O Scale and HO Scale. I also used the Imperial working units (feet) since we really do not use the Metric system in the US that much for measuring distance.





Using the ruler to show the distance, you can see that the baseboard length in O Scale is 49.5 feet, and the baseboard in HO Scale is 27.3 feet. The baseboards were measured using the rulers option.


The rulers option.

There are three choices for the rulers option: Place a ruler, move a ruler and remove a ruler. The ruler can be used to detail dimensions on any route, and it can also be kept on the route until operation starts. For example, here is a screen shot of my test layout, showing where the edges would be in real life. The ruler shows that the layout would be 13� x 21.4�, which would fit inside my basement.



Since the standard baseboard in Trainz is larger than this, you have a decision to make on how to treat the unused area on the baseboard. I use three methods to fill in the outside area. I can make hills, seascapes or plain black textures. For this model I chose to use a seascape and hills to fill in those areas.


The layout filled in.

In this picture I used water to fill in the extra area. In real life the layout would have ended just past the lighthouse and the center area would have been open for walk-in access. The main thing is that I was able to use the ruler to make a properly sized area for my layout.

1 | 2 | Next >>

Article and screen shots �2006 John D'Angelo. All rights reserved.

More Articles:

[Visit the VR Reading Room]