LillenTetsu Uma I received American Narrow Gauge Railroads by George Hilton as a graduation present from one of my college professors before I became interested in narrow gauge modeling. It is facinating and I highly recommend it. It is available on Google books at http://books.google.com/books?id=7POj8GvF4sIC Anyways, I have a few question. How detailed are the Blackstone engines in comparison to say a PCM Big boy or other high quality models? Also, is it easy to fit the plow on them? And last, do anyone know a place where the plows are available, I haven't been able to find any yet. This is the model that I'm currently considering ordering. http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/678-310100S Modeling the Chicago area is an interesting proposition I have been thinking along those lines before. Obviously this is a bit away from Chicago but it might just be "close enough". Thanks for that idea. Magnus
Tetsu Uma I received American Narrow Gauge Railroads by George Hilton as a graduation present from one of my college professors before I became interested in narrow gauge modeling. It is facinating and I highly recommend it. It is available on Google books at http://books.google.com/books?id=7POj8GvF4sIC
I received American Narrow Gauge Railroads by George Hilton as a graduation present from one of my college professors before I became interested in narrow gauge modeling. It is facinating and I highly recommend it. It is available on Google books at http://books.google.com/books?id=7POj8GvF4sIC
Anyways, I have a few question. How detailed are the Blackstone engines in comparison to say a PCM Big boy or other high quality models?
Also, is it easy to fit the plow on them? And last, do anyone know a place where the plows are available, I haven't been able to find any yet.
This is the model that I'm currently considering ordering.
http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/678-310100S
Modeling the Chicago area is an interesting proposition I have been thinking along those lines before. Obviously this is a bit away from Chicago but it might just be "close enough". Thanks for that idea.
Magnus
I haven't seen either the PCM Big Boy or the Blackstone Mudhen up close but they both look pretty detailed to me. I am not a rivet counter, however and I am sure other may have standards higher than my own. I did see that Blackstone appears to be offering at least one Mudhen with a plow already installed: http://www.blackstonemodels.com/products/k27art/464_dec.htm
The Upper Peninsula is due north of Chicago and was served by the C&NW (http://www.cnwhs.org/images/map1909.jpg), the Soo line (http://sooline.railfan.net/resources/maps/index.html), and the Duluth, South Shore, and Atlantic Railway (http://dssa.habitant.org/). The C&NW and Soo lines both ran to Chicago so you could have a U-P link with Chicago roads.
I can keep an eye out for a used copy of American Narrow Gauge Railroads if you want. (I saw an excellent used copy at a show last month from Railroadbooks.biz http://www.railroadbooks.biz.) What I like about the book (besides a listing of just about every narrow gauge railroad in the US broken down by state) is how it explained the (mostly flawed) theories about Narrow Gauge (including lower tare weight and cheaper road bed, etc.) that caused much of the world (due to British influence) to be stuck with narrow gauge to this day.