Posted by Fritz Milhaupt Link: Free-Mo web site
on June 15, 2009, 7:09 am, in reply to "Re: Modern Pere Maquette layout"
98.224.216.X
Free-Mo is a loose organization with a basic module spec that emphasizes prototype modeling based on a single-track mainline.
Free-Mo layouts are set up point-to-point, so the geometry of individual modules is considerably more free than that of other systems. Modules can be any length you are able to transport, can vary considerably in width and can curve nearly any amount that you want. This is in contrast to other systems where modules need to conform to tighter standards of length and curvature in order to be set up in a loop.
There is an HO Free-Mo effort starting up in Michigan-- its first display was at the Ann Arbor Model Railroad Club's show in Saline last February.
In addition, there is another group that has formed to build a series of high-quality N scale Free-Mo modules representing scenes from along Chessie's Plymouth Sub in 1978. They use code 55 track and minimal compression to make their scenes as realistic as they can. One team decided that it would be fun to see just how far they could take it by going way overboard by building a series of modules from Trowbridge to the MSU power plant, with land profiles as close to those shown on the USGS maps as they could. It is one of the neatest, but most insane, things I've ever seen. This group doesn't have a public online presence yet.
I have a module depicting the Thornapple River bridge at 48th Street in progress, but I decided not to take it to quite the extreme that the guys modeling East Lansing did.
Details on Free-mo are found at http://www.free-mo.org . There are also photos and details on some recent setups.
Photos of a recent North American-prototype Free-Mo setup in Unna, Germany (where it is called FREMO) are found at http://www.westportterminal.de/meetings/unna2009.html
After 20 years of building and displaying modules set up to be used in large loops, I found the free-form design of Free-Mo to be just what I needed to recharge my interest in building modules.
-fm
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