Garden Railway Forum

My garden railway uses LGB track with playmobil RC locos, some of which I've modified to make them less 'toy-like'.

What I am doing is building a model village/landscape in G scale with trains running through it. I am probably as interested in the buildings and village as I am in the railway part of it.

I modelled 009 in my teenage years, and I want to include a small 009 layout, which will be set up as a ride-on miniature railway inside the model village. Does that make sense? I mean that I would have the LGB figures (people) riding on this, as if it was a miniature railway in the village. I would either scratch build the carriages, or modify some of the Eggerbahn 009 carriages so the figures would sit on top of them. It would probably be set up as if it was a ride for children.

Anyway, my question is this: can I run this 009 railway off battery power, so I don't have to run mains power down to the end of my garden for a 12v controller? I don't really understand about amps and stuff, so perhaps someone could help me with this.

I would have the 009 layout on a small board which would be landscaped and would slot into the village. I would only put it in the garden when I wanted to run it.

Thanks - this is a great forum!

Good news! You CAN use batteries.

Bad News! I personally don't know what kind of battery would be best, but I 'm sure someone will be along shortly to sort it out for you. Good luck

*I used to run OO scale model engines with the leftover flat chemical batteries from polaroid film packs.

The easiest way (I know, 'cos I've done it!) is a quick search on eBay under "Collectables / Trains Railway Models" for a Battery Controller

Your search should turn up things like this;

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Airfix-Battery-Tw ... 1e61b6f759

Shop around - I got mine (a Lima version) much cheaper!!

the easy way is to use a 9V battery it would run the train for ages at a steady speed so providing its on a loop you can connect and forget while it goes round.

Thanks so much for all the replies., asnd the ebay auction link.

I searched on ebay and also found two that look like you can vary the speed, which is ideally what I would like to do.

Thanks a lot, I never knew these existed!

Sir Clothem Cap:53360 wrote:the easy way is to use a 9V battery  it would run the train for ages at a steady speed so providing its on a loop you can connect and forget while it goes round.

Yes, I can concur with the above because I did exactly the same as you want to do for the MPLR when we had the Moreton Model Railway Club! It worked lovely for about 3 weeks prior to the Open Day and the battery was in the 'clubhouse' which we connected when we wanted to run the trains. So, with a garden full of 16mm members and various friends and family, I decide to show off my little bit of handiwork and connect the battery. Only for some reason there was a short and I managed to set fire to the clubhouse and also weld my finger to the battery wire! We now have a nice little cafe there instead and a 'garden'!

But, it looked good while it lasted!

That's brilliant! What a great photo, too...

Marvelous,  I am currently putting together a portable setup to represent 7.25 inch gauge railway in approx 1/12th scale as an added attractin to the Little Morecambe Steam Railway which is 15inch 1/12th scale.
The setup is based on an old Wrenn Castle Class OO gauge Loco and kitbuilt LMS 4-4-0 kindly given to me a while back by SLRMidge.
 8)

if 45mm were classed as standard gauge what gauge would 00 end up as? 15" ??

Nope I think it would be about 20.72 inch gauge. (originally said 3 feet )

Heres a pic of the 7.25 inch line in development.

James-Buzz:53425 wrote:if 45mm were classed as standard gauge what gauge would 00 end up as?    15" ??

Not far off, by my reckoning.

Yes I was thinking (for some reason unkown to my feeble brain) that the question had been what would 32mm represent lol

In fact OO would be about 20.72 inch gauge.

Love the pic! They look really good, I laways had trouble keeping the passengers on once it was moving. I think the blu-tack was too old!