I am going to be moving out of state this year and would like any suggestions on how to package HO scale engines, cars, and buildings for the move. If there are any types of packaging materials that maybe better than others please suggest. I am going to be moving from the midwest to the southeast. So the better everything can be packaged for the move the better. Thank-you.
I moved from NYC to St Louis in 2016 by U-haul, this was my method:
If the rolling stock didn't have its original box, it got wrapped in tissue paper and then bubble wrap (small bubbles), and then that went into a plastic "Really Useful Box" A4 / 4.5 or 9 quart sizes. Three 4q or 1 4q and one 9q fit in a standard "small" moving box (often called a book box size). I then used old newspaper, or bubble wrap to secure the boxes inside the cardboard box.
If the model was still in its original box, the box got a heavy wrap of bubble wrap, and were placed in the moving box with the window side of the box facing inward. With lots of padding where needed. These were book boxes too - 90% of the boxes were to make loading the truck easier. If you are using a moving company, I would strongly recommend color coding the boxes - I used black, red, blue, or white duct tape fully encircling the boxes for heavy, fragile, clothing, and crushable.
Kits got padding and tetrised as best as possible.
Completed structures were wrapped with tissue paper and bubble wrap, then inserted into boxes with pink foam insulation as an internal defense against crushing, I then created an environmental disaster by running perfectly good printer paper through a paper shredder and used that as packing material around the models. I did the same for the china cabinet full of my parents and grandparents antiques.
It *might* have been overkill, but everything that went on the truck in one piece came off it in the same condition. (an antique dresser fell off the dolly while being loaded in NYC, but I didn't do it, so....)