Hello guys. I am new here so I wanted to say hello. I just turned 50 today. I am just getting back into the model railroad hobby after being absent for about 35 years. When I was young, maybe starting at around 7 years old or so, my grand parents started me off with a small Lionel set. That set grew and grew until I had a very large collection by the time I started high school. I must have had around 8 engines, 2 complete passenger trains and a large amount of freight cars. I used to really love that 027 stuff. I did have quite a few automatic switches, 2 transformers and lots of track. Every summer when I would go and visit Grandma she would take me to a magical place in Tucson, AZ where she lived called Arizona Trains. Man going to Arizona Trains was a magical place for me. They used to have a very large 027 gauge layout featured that must have been about 50 feet long and had very large radius curves and all landscaped of course. I used to dream of having a layout like that one day. Finally my Grandma had a contractor make the double outdoor shed my layout room after my Grandpa passed. I had two 4'x8' plywood topped tables next to each other with about 2 feet between them and another approximately 3'x8' attached to the left peice at the bottom. Kind of hard to describe, but something like this.. Each dot approximately represents on square foot.
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Kind of a P shape if you can picture it.
I wanted to have at least 2 mainlines running the full layout, but could not beacause in the lower end that (as I recall) was about 3 feet and it just wouldn't work. I tried using trestles to make one of the lines go over the other at the base of the "P" but I never was very happy with it. The grades were too steep and my track work was terrible and the track was terrible to begin with. With all that space I still couldn't put my dream layout together. I started to see how, as they used to put it, un-authentic my toy trains really were with the super sharp turns, 3 rail track with (as I recall) about 6 ties to each 90 degree turn. Then one summer on a visit to Arizon Trains after admiring the HO scale train items and thinking how much more realsitic they looked and how much more I could do with the layout space I had been given I made a big mistake. I asked Grandma if we could sell all my Lionel stuff and get into HO scale. Needless to say that was something I regretted bringing up. Those Lionel trains were something that my Grandpa had gotten for me and it really hurt her feelings and I never brought that up again. I did start to lose interest in the hobby and by the time I was a freshmen in high school I had a whole new hobby.. Girls and cars! Those old trains stayed packed in their boxes.
Fast forward to today. I just turned 50 today:(:( I have been into flying RC planes for years. Good vision is a very distant memory now. Having always loved trains I am now back in the hobby and I am really enjoying it. I have a room in my home that I use for my model ship building so I have made it may train room. I have an around the room 3 mainline around the room set up that is coming along nicely. I would really like to share some pictures with you guys when I figure out where to put them. My girlfriend got me the ESU LokProgrammer 53452 and decoder tester 53900 for my birthday. I am currently using a Bachmann EZ Command to run the trains. I am looking forward upgrading to the ESU CabControl system 50310 I think it is.
I have been reading the posts here and see I have a lot more reading to do to catch up. I am learning a lot from your posts on here. I have a ton of questions and I will probably post in the DCC section soon and look forward to hearing from you guys. I know this was a long hello post but that's my story.
Paul in Houston
Hi and
You will find that your first few posts are moderated and won't appear immediately, but that will soon pass.
Do you still have your old trains?
I personally model in HO scale, with some of my old rolling stock and structures from my teenage years. I kept all the trains in boxes for 40 years, dragging them from home to home. I ended up trashing the old brass track and converting a few locos to dummies or sound dummies, but the rolling stock is still running and a few of the structures have been restored.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Welcome to the forum. We're a pretty diverse and respectable buncha people here, and we enjoy learning about newcomers' history and interest in rekindling their hobby enjoyment. So, fire away any time you please.
Welcome!
York1 John
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Thank you for sharing your story. I hope your stick around until the moderation delays end, then join in the conversations.
I joined these forums almost three years ago, and I have enjoyed them and learned a lot.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
to the Forum
Imgur.com works well enough for pics. You have to follow directions in the pinned post in the General forum.
I'm not sure I've seen much discussion of the ESU controller, though we have plenty of ESU fans.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
Welcome Paul,
Thanks for sharing your history! I found it interesting. I am in N scale with hopes of one day putting together a small HO switching layout but right now I'm enjoying my N. What ever the scale we can all learn something new from each other. Looking forward to hearing more from you!
Ralph
SuperTigerHello guys. I am new here so I wanted to say hello.
Hi Paul! Congratulations on starting your first thread!!
Your history is interesting. I went through a similar experience with O scale trains. My mother had saved my brothers' Marx stuff and she asked me if I wanted it so I said "sure!". I had not been allowed to touch the stuff when I was young and they burned out the motor before I was old enough to use it.
I managed to find a couple of engines for cheap and soon had an extremely crude layout set up in the garage. Unfortunately, I found the toy like performance to be a total turnoff so I boxed everything up thinking that perhaps someday I might get into HO. That day came sooner than I thought. My wife bought me Bachmann's Hogwarts Express for X-mas that year and I have never looked back.
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
Thanks for the warm welcome guys. I got my imgur account set up and got some layout pictures uploaded. The room right now is a total disaster. I stood up on my stool and got some top down pictures.
https://imgur.com/gallery/nE5MplR
I obviously have tons of work to do. I am getting better with my track work as I go along. The side of the room that has the blinds (window side) will have a lot more going on. I will have my hills/mountains on that portion of the layout along with an aditional 2 lines running. I am one of those builders that has an idea or picture in his head and just goes with it. I am not one of the guys that is able to do a cad drawing and go from there. I wish I was that type of builder. Even when I have a machining project, I work from an idea or picture in my head.
Welcome to the forum!!!
I see your avatar is a picture of the Texas flag, very cool! I'm a fan of several roads in the Lone Star State!
1. Santa Fe
2. Southern Pacific
3. Missouri-Kansas-Texas Lines
4. Missouri Pacific Lines
5. Kancas City Southern
6. Chicago Burlington & Quincy
7. Rock Island
8. Frisco (SL-SF)
9. Cotton Belt (SSW)
10. Texas & Pacific
11. Colorado & Southern
12. Fort Worth & Denver
I currently model two time periods, Transition Era (1940-1963) and Present Day (1980-2007).
I like to work from pictures as well, it helps to look up a specific type of locomotive and see photos of different types cars behind it.
Show us pics of your layout at some point, I'd love to see it!
ATSFGuy, did you see the link in my last post? Did it not work? I was hoping you guys could see the crude state of my layout. I am kind of all over the place it seems with what I am going to run on the layout. I like all the UP stuff and in fact Big Boy just came through Houston weekend before last but I couldn't take off from work to go see it so Saturday after I got out of work, we got the dogs loaded up and headed north to Pelestine, TX. We did see 4014 that night at around midnight and caught up with the train at about 7:50am before it left for the next town. I can't put into words how nice that deep base steam whistle sounded! That was something I won't forget. Like I was saying, I do like the UP stuff. I like the Big Boys, the Challengers, the 800 series, etc. I like the UP passenger car fleet they maintain. I think E8/E9 locomotives are beautiful and am looking forward to building up a fleet of those to go with my rickety old UP ebay finds passenger cars. Strange thing lately on Ebay.. There are always some UP Proto 2000 E8/9 A units, but I have not seen any B units in a couple of months.. Not sure why that is.
I also like SP because that was where my Grandpa worked for his whole life (while not over seas in war.) So far I have collected about 8 or so of the SP Sunset Limited passenger cars found on Ebay. I sure would like to have an AC9 to pull that set with. I am not sure I could bring myself to paint a brass AC9 though if I did plunk down to dough to get one.
So many trains to buy and so little money.
I sure hope the link works so you can see my layout in it's current state.
MisterBeasley, that collection has been gone a very long time unfortunately. I sure wish I still had it today.. Tight turns and all. As frustrating as the 027 trains were to me at the time, It sure would be nice to see some of those old Lionel trains run through the living room in all their unprototypical glory.
Welcome to the forums and welcome back to the hobby (and happy birthday)! I got involved after an absence of 20-something years. I don't have room for a layout so I joined a club and that has been very beneficial -- I can run trains right away. :) Might be an idea for you as well, you'll get help with the tough stuff and the opportunity to roll your rolling stock right away.
SuperTigerThe room right now is a total disaster.
Hi Paul,
You should see my workbench!!!
Your layout looks like a work in progress!