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This thread has caused me to write, rewrite and edit. Gone are the days you could buy a bunch of blue box rolling stock inside a hobby shop for 10.00 Get over it. There is always ebay. That wonderful ebay service that was only 10 years or so in existance has allowed me to acquire items supposidely discontinued or OOP forever. Also gone are the days where you actually had time to cook breakfast with the family in the morning, take a full hour for lunch and actually make dinner fresh from stractch and get in the TV show before bed during the workday. Everything today is instant, microwave and virtually disposible. They built cars 30 years ago and they last forever. Today's cars are expected to wear out within 10 years forcing you in a endless cycle of car payments and finance charges to the lucky seller and his factory. (I buy used with one time cash payments and beat the system that way) I still support the hobby shop.. but I dont go there as often anymore. I still spend as much money but come home with a smaller bag and fewer items. So I must choose carefully what I purchase. The days of 24/7 availiblity of many items are gone. Factories demand advance reservations for a copy of that Limited Run item before the deadline. Kinda hard to be buying engines without ever seeing or hearing one in person at the hobby shop now isnt it? Yes I did order the Reading T-1 (Who hasnt?) simply because the company that is making it is similar to BLI but with a different sound decoder. And no one ever made this engine in plastic RTR before. If said engine does not perform.. I put it up on ebay. Someone else will snap it up quickly enough. So are we now in the age of the "Disposable trains?" I think so. Wait until China gains the financial moxie to pay thier workers 20.00 an hour in the factory and outsource THIER needs to another third world nation such as Ethopia or Vietnam. Our stuff coming from there will get REALLY expensive and bite those who thought they could save money by outsourcing in the ***. I wrestle with utility bills that climb higher with incessant offers from the same companies to buy more services and pay more money per month. Fighting costs that climb such as gasoline makes me think twice about going to the store unless I have a second or third errand that can be accomodated in that area as well for one trip. PFM and Brass is just as good as DCC and Onboard QSI sound. It is a matter of "Driving" the trains somewhat differently. I think those who use DC control with Cab-block signalling to control trains on thier layouts are in good shape. With QSI they can have the cake and eat it too. DCC on the other hand.. they can make trains do things that our granddaddies can only dream of. So .. are you running DCC for it's simplicy or trying to keep up with the Joneses at the club? When I was younger.. trains were sold in Kaybee next to the Atari video games and model kits. That was like.. 30 years ago. Now.. trains are non-exisitant in Kaybee and if anywhere outside a REAL hobby shop are likely to be really questionable in quality. Children today will enjoy trains in the future.. but they will definately need that college education to support the hobby with that nice paycheck... er.. salary. The rest of us buy and trade with the internet to literally find the lowest price possible for a item. So.. I think this is a time of war between those who wi***o sell trains verus the factory (Maker of trains) and the shoppers... (You and me) as pawns. Only that we can now turn to ebay or other sources to bypass the full MSRP or work an end run around that limited run 6 month's after it's sold out release.
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