Author Bio
Tony Koester has written 10+ books on Model Railroading for Kalmbach. Tony spent a quarter of a century designing, building, and operating (with his friends) the Allegheny Midland, a freelanced coal-hauling HO railroad. He is now hard at work completing a multi-deck HO layout that accurately depicts the Nickel Plate Road's St. Louis Division as it appeared in 1954. Tony has been the editor of
Model Railroad Planning, a special annual issue of
Model Railroader, since its inception in 1995. He is a contributing editor to
Model Railroader and writes the popular "Trains of Thought" column and numerous feature articles.
Table of Contents
Introduction
A matured approach to layout design
Chapter 1: Defining the purpose
No sense making a big commitment unless you really need to
Chapter 2: A mature technology
Multideck railroads have been in operation for decades
Chapter 3: Key design considerations
Benchwork height and depth, getting between decks, backdrops, and more
Chapter 4: Then and now on the Nickel Plate
Comparing aspirations with realizations at the two-deck mark
Chapter 5: When stuck with lemons...
Multidecks are about compromises, so make the most of them
Chapter 6: The aesthetics
Ensuring that crew members, visitors, and you are comfortable
Chapter 7: Operating a multideck railroad
There will be twice as many crew members in the same aisles
Chapter 8: Multideck photo gallery
Scenes on railroads discussed in this book
Reviews
In the new 112-page Multideck Design for Model Railroads, well-known author Tony Koester lays down his thoughtful ideas on how to double space on your layout. A one-surface model railroad, no matter how large it is, can be more impressive and at the same time double your model railroad's footage by adding another deck. As author Koester relates, reports from experienced designers, builders and users of multideck model railroads will “cheer you on, offer sage advice or throw a bucket of cold water on your aspirations.”
Koester, having had two decades of experience with his own multideck HO pike, presents in easy-to-understand text and numerous color photographs, the essentials of constructing this type of model layout. He suggests you define why you want this type of model railroad, explains that the concept is sound, helps you decide benchwork height and depth, compares what you want in this type of design and how it might play out, explains compromises, aesthetics, operation of a multideck layout and ends up displaying various photos of different multideck pikes.
Because building this type of layout can be demanding, having all the main components of this type of construction and operation clearly defined ahead of time, can save hours upon hours of work and many headaches. Thus this comprehensive publication is an essential stepping stone to a workable multideck layout.
—Don Heimburger, Heimburger House Publishing Co.