Ok so it looks as though i should really plan this out befor jumping in. So i need a list of articles, books and maybe some really good DVDs to watch to help me out. Also i live in Decatur IL and would like to know if we have a club that i can go and pick there brains also. I am 39 and ready to be 12 again.
Now, you don´t want to be 12 again, don´t you. After all you are about to enter into a real man´s hobby, where you can develop and hone a great number of skills...
Kalmbach Publishing, our host here, offers a lot of reading material for beginners and a vast amount of information can be found in the internet as well.
Look at this page for some good advice!
In case you have more specific questions - just voice them in a proper manner here and you will get the answers you are looking for!
Ideas, off the top of my head.
See if you can find articles on the www.
I got 10 years of MR magazine for free through my local Kijiji, they have been great for ideas.
Go to the library, sign out some books
Don't be afraid to ask questions. Somebody somewhere will have an answer.
Go buy a 6 - 8' shelf & use that for testing techniques on layout track, wiring etc. Design a small switching layout & go from there. Something like that can be added to a larger layout down the road.
Gordon
Brought to you by the letters C.P.R. as well as D&H!
K1a - all the way
themattmanI am 39 and ready to be 12 again.
Careful. Don't overdo it. I went from 58 back to 8 just by running my first train in DCC.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Read and ask questions before doing much perminant work. "Doing over" is OK as long as it is because your skills have improved, but not when you did it wrong. You have already found the Forums, go to RESOURCES at the top of this page and find Coming Events, Model RR Groups and Index of Magazines, where you can look for articles in many MRR related magazines.
Good luck,
To the right, find "Search Community". You can do a syntactical search there and find hundreds of threads over the past five or six years that deal with some of your questions. Some of them will be short and to the point, some will have gone on for many days and ended up with sub-topics which occasionally are instructive in themselves.
-Crandell
themattman Ok so it looks as though i should really plan this out befor jumping in. So i need a list of articles, books and maybe some really good DVDs to watch to help me out. Also i live in Decatur IL and would like to know if we have a club that i can go and pick there brains also. I am 39 and ready to be 12 again.
PM me your name and mailing address and I'll happily send you a pile of old Model Railroader and Railroad Model Craftsman magazines, most from the 1970's, some from the 1980's. I'm thinning my collection and don't want to just throw them away or put them in a recycling bin!
Darrell, quiet...for now
I can't help you with the question about a club in your area, but you have one of the best hobby shops right there in Decatur -- First Hobby. They probably know of clubs in your area, so pay them a visit.
Here's their contact information :
http://www.firsthobby.com/store1/Contact.asp?SN=2009111607584755
For reading and research materials, my opinion is that if you take that route you'll never get anything built -- forget the books and start building.
The best written sources on the hobby are the magazines, Model Railroader and Rail Model Craftsman. They are pretty easy to find, up here Walmart has both of them on the magazine rack. The invaluable book is "Track Planning for Realistic Operations" by John Armstrong. You probably have to find that one on the internet. Then there are a long series of hardback photo books with color pictures of prototype railroads. You can find them at good hobby shops or train shows, they are pricey, but invaluable if you want to reproduce a prototype look on your layout.
Train shows are good sources. They have books, back issues of the magazines, working layouts to give you ideas, and all sorts of new and used stuff for sale. Use caution on the new stuff, often the train show price is no better than your local hobby shop's price. Below is one web site that gives dates and locations for shows all over the country.
http://www.littletoytrains.com/
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
For a totaly new person here is what I would do:
1. Find a flat (critical) surface where you can lay a circle of 18" radius track. Why? Let's you see right away why 18" is in absolute minimum and why 30" is far superior. Also let's you see that track allignment is critical and how limiting what will run at that radius is plus how to hook up the wires.
2. Now that you have determoned that watching a train chase it's tail on something that small can get boring break the circle in two halves and add a turnout on one side and a straight track on the other. Why? more experinece and let's you see that horn hook couplers that come as standrad are problematic. Replace with Kadee couplers and never switch to anything else.
3. Start to design a layout based on the space available but start small that can be expanded. Don;t rush. This is a life long hobby.
All of you are being very helpful. As i am reading i would like to know if i should by a set or start with a locomotive and then start buying track. With that said what should i stay away from. assuming that there are good and bad products out there. I am the type that would rather take my time and build right then by cheap and then have to spend more.
Matt,
Anything from Athearn, Proto, Atlas or Kato is a good start.
Proto & Athearn both have "starter" sets that come with a decent enough power pack, decent cars & a good locomotive with your a-typical oval sectional track inside or you could check out yout local hobby shop ( LHS ) & see what they have. Some LHS's have their own starter sets that should include decent to good quality items.
Stay away from Bachman & Lifelike Starter sets, these tend to be really cheap.
Depending on where you live, you could check out local model railroad shows.
Continue to ask questions, gauranteed you'll get a lot of good advice from several different people.
Gord
Matt, i am fairly new as well. I had an American Flyer S guage set when I was a kid and turned it into a layout about 30 years ago, nothing much, just an oval. Then in 2006 I did my first HO layout and got sooooo frustrated that I took it all down. The mistake I made was my track was not perfect. Someone here recently told me that you will thank yourself for years and years if you get your track 100% top notch.
I have been working on my new layout since august...its still fairly simple but I am still fine tuning the track. So, as they say, do not rush it...
I am finding even the smallest imperfection in the track, a small dip, a kink, a rough edge on a joint magnifies itself with the more cars you have, the more locos you try and run etc.
I had my track to where I *thought* it was perfect then I put this little 0-4-0 steam engine on and it would keep derailing. so back to fixing track.
I wish you luck and read, post, ask, read some more! lol
Chuck
http://www.chuckcondron.com/CCLayout/index.html
themattmanAll of you are being very helpful. As i am reading i would like to know if i should by a set or start with a locomotive and then start buying track. With that said what should i stay away from. assuming that there are good and bad products out there. I am the type that would rather take my time and build right then by cheap and then have to spend more.
Both way's work. With a set you get enough snap track to make an oval, a locomotive, a few cars, and a low end power pack. But it's cheaper than buying all that stuff separately. The oval of track now a days is often the fancy stuff with a plastic ballast base molded onto the tie strip. If you look, you can get plain old snap track, just a tie strip without the fancy ballast. When you go on to build a bigger layout you will go with flextrack, which is just rails and ties, no attached ballast, and the oval of track that comes with the set will not mate easily with it. The power pack will be a very simple unit with just a rheostat for speed control. You will want to upgrade to a MRC pack with a transistor throttle. The rolling stock will be perfectly OK. With a set you get something running right now, which is good. You will likely find you want to upgrade the track and the power pack in fairly short order.
Or you can buy a locomotive, some cars, an MRC Tech IV power pack, and flex track. It will cost a bit more, but not all that much more. Flex track works fine but you have to nail it down and you want to be careful not to bend it into curves tighter than 18 inch radius, 'cause if you do most stuff will derail.
Either way will get you a good model railroad.
I'm in the "researching the hobby" phase myself and have been ordering and devouring a number of books and online articles over the last couple weeks. I've got Track Planning for Realistic Operation coming in tomorrow, so I haven't checked that out yet, but I hear nothing but good things. Of the books I've read so far, I liked HO Railroad from Start to Finish - it's far from an authoritative reference on anything, but I found it helpful to see a layout evolve from beginning to end and watch the thinking process behind that, rather than just see the finished product. 101 Track Plans for Model Railroaders is a good, inexpensive book for brainstorming - not enough details to actually explain how to build anything, but lots of ideas.
One thing I've noticed is that a number of the Kalmbach books are freely (and legally) available via Google. Go to books.google.com and search the title, see what comes up. This can give you a good idea of whether a given book will meet your needs and skill level.
I've also noticed that, compared to other technical hobbies I enjoy, model railroading's best resources tend to be in print and not online. Whether that's because of clientele or tradition or something else I couldn't say. There are loads of web pages out there, but few of them go into anywhere close to the detail that the books do. Of course, particular questions are probably best answered via forums like these. But for understanding the basics, you'll want to invest in some reading.
Matt, one thing many here will do is think to much. With that being said, there are many things that play out to what we want in the long run. But, first you got to get started! I started with a Cheap Life Like set, it started the fun. (by the way don't buy one)
Athearn makes DC starter sets for around $140.00. Have some fun and see if this hobby hold your interest. After you see this is your hobby, then start thinking about what you want.
Have fun, I am , Ken
I hate Rust
I would recommend getting an Atlas Trainman set. Available in both HO and N. http://www.atlastrainman.com/ I feel these sets are about the best value out there.
Mike WSOR engineer | HO scale since 1988 | Visit our club www.WCGandyDancers.com
~G4
19 Years old, modeling the Cowlitz, Chehalis, and Cascade Railroad of Western Washington in 1927 in 6X6 feet.