General Discussion (Model Railroader)

YES! YES!!

TOO MUCH N SCALE! TOO MUCH N SCALE!!

Just kidding.

Good modeling is good modeling, in whatever scale one is working. To me, N scale is just too small. From some of the photos in this thread, it clearly isn't for others. I'll stick with HO, where I can achieve moderately good results, and just continue to enjoy the products of those who have mastered the intricacies of working in Nano Scale. So saturate away! As long as it's model railroading, I don't really care what the scale is.

MAbruce wrote:

Dave Vollmer wrote: My apologies for the repeat post, but as I've been told, I'm now an unofficial MR Forums N Scale Advocate. Not that I have a problem with your advocate title, and have always thought your work is top notch, but I fear the line of N-scale overload has been crossed.  Out of concern for oversaturating all that is N-scale, maybe it's time to give it a little rest?

It appears that my post may not have been clearly understood.  I would never suggest that Dave (or anyone) switch scales or stop sharing work - unless they really wanted to.   It's just that I had been noticing a lot of N-centric topics lately, and I feared that our fellow modelers in other scales might be getting a bit weary of it.

I also may not have been in the best of moods yesterday because our beloved PATS lost a heartbreaker of a Super Bowl.  And now that Dave has admitted to being a Giants fan, well, I might just have to put a contract out on him or something... 

Honesty Dave, your Giants played well.  Congratulations.

Now off to therapy...   

Bruce, my condolences on your Pats!

But if I may...  I would say that for every N scale thread here there's maybe 10-20 more HO threads.  If N scale is roughly 20% of the hobby (per CNJ831, I think), then we're still under-represesnted here thread-wise.  But no matter; plenty of other forums have N-scale specific sub-forums.

I stay here mainly because it's a good way to keep abreast of everything going on in all scales, and from noob to collector to dabbler to hardcore prototyper.  But I also feel if I'm going to take from this site (i.e., the info about what's going on outside N scale) I ought to give back.

If an HO guy is really getting tired of all these N scale threads, I'm not going to lose sleep.  After all, here and in the pages of MR, it's just assumed that you're HO unless otherwise specified.  Sometimes that gets exhausting for the non-HO modeler.

I feel bad for the S, Z, and O people here because they get even less coverage.  But, I'm sure they have their own forums, and I know they have their own publications.

I heard elsewhere (and I can't confirm its truth) that the reduced N scale coverage at MR is due to MR conceding the field to N Scale Magazine and N Scale Railroading.  It sounds somewhat plausible.  Either that, or the more cynical reason; the big advertisers in MR make their money in HO, so that's what MR pushes.  Could be.  Who knows.

Things are alive and well in N scale.  However, if all anyone were exposed to were this forum and this magazine, one would get an incorrect picture of the vitality of N scale right now.  The same could be said for any scale besides HO.

Dave-

Wow, your N-scale layout makes me want to start on a little 21"x21" N scale layout I'm planning.

keep up the good work. Its very hard to tell that your layout is only the size of a door! good job! 

Dave- those are some great pics! I'm not a steam guy but I like seeing the smoke, it makes the pics more alive.

Mike- Your pics look great too! I would love to see a trackplan.

BTW- since I am also an N-scaler, I would love to see more in the forums.

Craig 

Dave Vollmer wrote:

We catch up to M1 #6811 again at Jack's Run (below):

Yeah, the smoke is the clincher.

How do you create the photographic smoke?

Thanks...!

The smoke is using the airbrush function in Paint Shop Pro 7.

Dave,

Really nice! Truly inspiring work, a joy to behold. What curve radius are you using on that layout?

your photos are really impressive! Thanks for posting them!

Always enjoy your pics, DV.

...and from what I've seen at shows in the Mid-Atlantic region, N-Scale is still very much alive and well, thank you.

No matter how you slice it, unless you have a vast room to work with in a larger scale, you can't beat N scale for it's scenery to train ratio.  I shot this last weekend, and in my opinion, it's perfectly do-able in N on even an average size layout...

Look for more threads on N scale, not less.  The range and quality of products available grows every day, and there's a lot of people of all ages finding the benefits of working in N.  No longer must we skulk about in the shadows.

I'm N with the N crowd!

Lee 

As space constraints and the stress of moving often (I'm active-duty Air Force) made HO less and less practical, I looked at N with envy in terms of size.  But I was never quite sure I could do what I wanted to do convincingly in N.  But then around 2000 or so, MR ran a few really nice layout features in N scale.  Lance Mindheim and the late David Haines had shown me N scale layouts that looked better than most of the HO ones I'd seen.  Then I stumbled across Jerry Britton's reproduction of 1954-era Pennsylvania Railroad 4-track mainline operations.  I was sold.

So, in March 2002 I switched scales and never looked back.

The debate rages every few weeks about when the "golden age" of model railroading was.  I'm convinced that in N scale, the golden age is NOW.

Atlas, Kato, Athearn, IRC, ConCor, and Bachmann Spectrum are hitting the market reularly with new and exciting locomotives that perform (for the most part) on-par with HO, and there are a wealth of small manufacturers making proto-specific cars and structures.  Even for us kitbashers, we've never had such a choice of materials in N.

Add to that our two dedicated publications, and N scale is doing just fine these days.

A big boost came along when the prototype modelers started taking N scale seriously.  Now I can build a highly-detailed and accurate metal brass, wood, and zinc exact model of a PRR/TTX F30d or a cast-resin and brass PRR X31a or B60b...  The possibilities in N are growing every day.

The best decision I ever made in model railroading (after asking for a train set for my 8th birthday) was to switch to N.

Cool!  My 2000th post!  I need a life...