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[quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by Paul3 I just went to one of the biggest train dealers around at http://www.trainworld.com/orderform.htm, and look right at the top of the form... It says, "Please complete the order form and mail it, with check or money order" [/quote] OK perhaps I need read more carefully then. But I find it highly suscicious that most places just have spots to type your credit card in. [quote]QUOTE: I'm afraid you'll have to shop around. Or special order it from a Horizon dealer. From what I saw on Athearn's website, another run of SD40-2 kits are due out this Spring, so I'd start hunting ASAP. They are being made, but as you know, they just aren't as profitable for a retailer to keep in stock. I'm positive someone will order it for you, but to carry it? (shrug) I can't blame a retailer for trying to stock more expensive merchandise if he can sell it. I've worked in small business retail for 17 years, and it's hard enough to compete as it is. A store would have to sell twice as many kits as RTR to see the same profit... So if a retailer can sell a dozen $90 RTR SD40-2's vs. even 18 $56 kits, a retailer (and any other kind of successfull small business owner) is going to want to sell those RTR's. It just makes business sense...[/quote] While I must admit that the SD40-2 was the most convenient example. Horizon discontinued alot of locomotives that I need to model given my GN 1969 time frame,because of their 'Wide Bodiedness" Its 6 scale inches. thats .083" one hight of code 83 rail. Is it really that big of an issiue? of course, they will be replaced with the appropriet RPP shell when they get done upgrading them. But if the GP35 is any indication. They will be RTR. which we all agree on, is more expensive. Plust the fact that the scant undecs that they make will have to be dissasembled and if they use glue, that could be a rail problem. [quote]QUOTE: Maybe an SHO? Anyways, that was kind of my point. You aren't going to find too many (if any) "average" products in any hobby magazine. They are all going to highlight the best and brightest over the cheap and mundane. Why be surprised or disappointed in MR for doing the same thing?[/quote] First off what is an SHO???? This hobby, if we are still calling it that, is supposed to be an escape for a man or a women to escape the daily grind. A chance to bond with the kids, And maybe be a convienient tool for entertaining neighbors and freinds. The fact that they show off the best and the brightest isn't what bothers me. Its the fact that the tone that they take is, "If your ego is big eneugh, sexually defficient in some way, and have deep eneugh pockets, You to can experiene the joys of this latest Class X whatchagidget. Its only $399.95 I have a sizable library of magazines going back to the 70s before I was born. In a mid 1980s issiue of MR is an Article on how to detail and upgrade Bachmann's NYC Niagra and have it be the rival of brass. I am willing to bet that it still costs less than $249.99 that the BLI Niagra is listed for at Walthers. When I get the chance.I have several monogram big boys I have purchased with the intention of motorizing them. I have called Bowser and they will let me puchase just their big boy mechanism for $125.00 So my big boys will cost each as follows. Bowswer Big Boy Mechanism. $125 Bowser Big Boy Tender electrification kit. $24.95 Revell-Monogram/Con-Cor Big Boy Kit. $24.99 Digitrax DH 141 Decoder. $19.95 Or Soundtraxx Sound Decoder for UP 4-6-6-4 3985 $75.00 That gives me a nicely detailed Big Boy at the following Prices. DC. $174.94 DCC$194.89 DCCwSound $249.94 Athearn's Genisis Big Boy will be $449.98 and Precicion Craft Model's Big Boy is going to be $749.99 As I have shown. A person can build their own and come out ahead. I realise that just for the 6 that I have at my current budget Im looking at 7 months of cutting expenses to the bone and saving until I can purchase what I need to build just one. But to get Athearn's I would have to wait 18 months and both you and I know they are going to be out of stock by then. However my point is, the current climate that is in place. Everyone wants to shame and ridicule me because Its like Im not even playing the game. Is it jealousy against people who have craftsman skills??? Its just nuts. [quote]QUOTE: [quote]QUOTE: Everyone from Phil Walthers, Terry Thompson, and Tony Keoster, To Johny train geek at the counter in Nowhere wyoming hobby shop says High teck high featured new stuff makes you a "true" model railroader, anything less, your just playing with toys. Oh and for christ sakes, Dont you dare build something by yourself. Thats just unmodelrailroadly. If you get caught scratchbuilding Tony Keoster is going to lead the Model Rairlaod police swat team on your workbench himself.[/quote] I don't suppose you have a quote to back you up on that? Or are you just projecting your angst on others without reason? Also, you do realize how silly you sound going off on Tony K. for being anti-scratch building, don't you? He was the editor of Railroad Model Craftsman for years, for pete's sake.[/quote] No I do have proof, in writing and you have probably read it to and I will post it here verbatem shortly. On the grounds that Tony Keoster was a former editor of RMC. That maybe so, but he doesn't walk the walk any more. Through is Trains of Thought column, he has openly admitted that any locomotives and rolling stock that were on his AM that can be used on his new NKP venture. Instead of repainting them himself in the finest of RMC tradition. What did he do? Sent them off to some place in Michigan to be repainted and have Sound Decoders installed. How uncraftsman like of a former editor of a magazine that is about nothing but craftsmanship. (Yes I subscribe) Here are Tony Keosters Comment that generated the angst ridden comment that I left quoted for context above. They are from the April 2006 Issiue of MR. Its his Monthly Trains of Thought Column and is titled "Good Enugh" in the 21st Century. I will rewrite it verbatem then add comments afterward. [quote]QUOTE: "During a recent discussion about the design and theme for a new HO model railroad, the topic of "good eneugh" -a benchmark of the state of the art created by Allen McClelland for his orginal HO scale Virginian & Ohio- came up. What will it take we wondered for a model railroad to be considered good eneugh in the 21st Century? Here are my top ten attributes in no particular order. 1.Prototype BasedL Many, perhaps most new model railraods either embrace a specific prototype or, if freelanced, are prototype based. This trend is partly the result of manufacturors and importers producing accurate, well detailed, models, making the tast of modeling one railroad much easier. The wealth of information in magasines, books, videos, the internet, and from railroad historical societies is also a factor, as is the increaced ease of sharing information. Freelacning isn't going out of style. Several excellent "rivet-counting" modelers have recently decided to build freelanced model railroads. Nor is "free-style" freelancing passe; the free spritis among us are unlikely to be swayed by any rationaliuzation that inhibites their options. 2: Sound:The layouts I managed to see during the National Model Rairlaod association's 2005 convention in Cincinnati all featured locomotives with sound. The next step will be to add background sounds. Chirping birds. clanking industries, roaring traffic, barking dogs, - and several firms have products of this type. 3. DCC Like sound many of us either are using digital command control, or we're offering excuses as to why we don't have it yet. Radio cabs are also gaining popularity. Conventional DC control will be around forever, but the advantages of DCC are clear. 4 Fineness of Detail: The days when clunky window mullions, handrails and grab irons 6 scale inches in diameter, and trees that look like bottle brushes were accetable, are thankfully behind us. Scale-size HO couplers are becoming a defacto standard. Smaller flanges and narrow whell treads are coming to. such as "code 88" (.088 wide) HO Wheels. 5. Realisitc operation: if our railroads don't operate as realistically as they look, we're giving up alot of value we already paid for. 6. Staging: Almost everyone now seems to understand that trains should appear to come from and go to places beyond the layout. Now the debate is centered on wheather to use passive staging traks or active fiddle trackswere trains are remade during, rather than before, an operating session. 7. Backwards Engineering: Pick your operating goals first. Then design the railraod to achieve them. Thats why multilevel layouts have become so common. Now we need to do a better job of planning our layout illumination up front. 8. Edit your goals. Just because your new home has a gymnasium size basement doesn't mean you should model all of your favorite railroads. Pick one and do it well. 9. Slow Down! Retired professional rairlaoder Jack Ozanich urges fellow modelers to take the time to enjoy rairlaoding in miniature. We still run too fast. And arguments that we dont have time to, say dictate and copy train orders are largely based on our lack of understandingof and appreciation for how the pros did their jobs. 10. Pay Attention: see what others are doing. If everyone in your circle is using brand x DCC, for example, thats a huge knowledge base that you'll be wise to tap ino. Model rairlaod operators from coast to coast understand four cycle waybills in car cards, but we seem to be reinventing this wheel with hard to decipher new systems offering few tangible benifits. That said, If you do come up with a really great new idea, be sure to share it with the rest of us. After all we'd still be running silent locomotives using car batteries of someone with a better idea hadn't stepped forward."[/quote] While Mr. Keoster rightfully makes several good points. Especially towards the end. The tone of his article is clearly comes off as If you aren't modeling some prototype railroad down to every last door hinge, running DCC with sound. Your layout is not "good eneugh" to even be a model railraod. However, Look at all those nice expensive new items that make it easy for you to get back up to snuff. And I have to disagree with the "good eneugh" philosphy being a measure of the state of the art. The "good eneugh" mentality as described by Allen McClelland himself in the V&O Afton Division finalle video by Pentrex was that if you can create one harmonous "big picture" then that was good eneugh and you need not sweat about the tiny details ad nausaum. [/quote] There's something called capitalism. We live in it. When you make something for sale, you charge what the market will bear. You raise the price until the sales slack off, then lower the price until the sales recover. If you sell too low, you're leaving money on the table. If you sell to high, no one will buy it and your out of business. If that's greed, well, that's the American way and has been for hundreds of years. BTW, what you see as "greed" may be seen as survival for some of these companies. It's not like any of them are Fortune 500's. Atlas is still family owned, and so is Bowser, Kadee, and Accurail, IIRC. Even the biggest names in the hobby, Walthers & Kalmbach, are still pipsqueaks when it comes to corporate America.[/quote] That very well may be true. But fact is. I simply can't afford to pay what they are asking. And I am not going to. But now I have a problem because noboday makes anything I can afford. Bachmann's GP30 and 35s are avaialable in that price range I can somewhat handle. But everyone here says the decoders that are in them are terrible so I have to tack on another $20.00 to change out the decoder. And thats if I decide I can even afford DCC to begin with. [quote]QUOTE: And I'm sure your LHS appreciates your loyalty...but then why are they giving you the business for not buying the latest and greatest? [/quote] The owner does appreciate my continued choice of doing business there. However this particluar LHS that does 85% of its business in Lionel trains. And HO, & N scale are all along the back wall, with the hobby supplikes like paints glue and decals at the back ends of the isle counters. Because of this the two guys he has working behind the counter are total Lional-TCM Junkies. and think the HO and N scale people should be to just because those features are now available to thos of us in that scale. Those two have made me leave the store without a purchase several times. [quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by jfugate It's possible to shop online safely and use a credit card. Just get a separate credit card for online use only (do NOT use your bank account debit card) and if anything fishy ever happens with it, dispute the charge, report the card stolen, and have them issue you a new card. Easy as you please. People can take your money order and "run", never sending you any goods -- and good luck disputing it. Money orders are almost as bad as sending cash. Little or no recourse if you are ever cheated. [/quote] Reading all that it sounds like a good reason to just not have a credit card. When I get the items I reserved with Train World on it. I am getting rid of the one that I have. Its just nothing but a giant credit score eating death trap waiting to spring its ugly net on me. Im not going to let that happen. Also since I am very skeptical of technology. I refuse to have a debit card. My bank doesn't make me have it and I do not want it. James
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