What boggles my mind is that folks have big enough basements to do the ops they do with HO.
Seriously, as others have said, the only difference is the scale. You can get an awful lot of railroad in a moderate space with N.. or get a little railroad with a lot of scenery between your destinations..
The only down side I have experienced trying to use a car card system on my 3x5 layout is reading the little numbers on the cars. I would love some system like the inventory control tags used in stores so I can just wave a wand over a car to get its info.
Chris
Yes, yes & yes.... op sessions are quite viable in N scale. My N scale Allegheny & Cumberland is not one of 'em, but there's all sorts out there. If you type in " Shenandoah Divison " ( just to name one ) in your search engine, you'll get get quite an ongoing detailed description with photos of this private layout in progress. This guy & his friends get together all so often & he shares this experience as well as construction updates. I for one could care less about operations, but I find it quite interesting just the same.
With solid trackwork I don't see why not, but I don't know of others near here that do that. Closest club is about 30 miles away or so. My n-scale layout isn't designed for lots of ops, but after expansion, perhaps.
Edit-- Even with my nearly 60 year old eyes, I haven't resorted to magnifiers for coupling and uncoupling (I do use a toothpick for uncoupling).
SpaceMouse wrote: Okay, I've taken the plunge. I have pre-ordered a couple locos and I have enough rolling stock to get started. I have the track, roadbed, foam--everything but the benchwork ready to go on my layout. I have a plan and I have started working on the scenery, well okay, a diorama that will drop into the layout when it is ready. I even detail painted a structure.So even though I've yet to run a loco, I've taken the plunge. So you can level with me?Can you really do ops in N-scale? I don't mean theoretically, like you've switched a few cars here and there. Do you have or know of an N-scale layout where guys come once a week and run ops?I don't. I know of scads of HO layouts and I've run on them. But the idea of backing those little bitty suckers into a yard with a toothpick and jeweler's glass to build a cut is beyond my comprehension. Can ops be run, or is N-scale the ultimate railfan medium?
Okay, I've taken the plunge. I have pre-ordered a couple locos and I have enough rolling stock to get started. I have the track, roadbed, foam--everything but the benchwork ready to go on my layout. I have a plan and I have started working on the scenery, well okay, a diorama that will drop into the layout when it is ready. I even detail painted a structure.
So even though I've yet to run a loco, I've taken the plunge.
So you can level with me?
Can you really do ops in N-scale? I don't mean theoretically, like you've switched a few cars here and there. Do you have or know of an N-scale layout where guys come once a week and run ops?
I don't.
I know of scads of HO layouts and I've run on them. But the idea of backing those little bitty suckers into a yard with a toothpick and jeweler's glass to build a cut is beyond my comprehension.
Can ops be run, or is N-scale the ultimate railfan medium?
Chip,
I fail to understand why the physical size of the trains would have any effect on operations. Well-built equipment on well-laid track, all checked for gauge and coupler height, will operate well regardless of scale.
David Popp, Lance Mindheim, the Reid Brothers, Jerry Britton, and a few others are MR- and MRP published names that do ops in N, but I know quite a few here and on other boards that do ops in N whose names may be less familiar.
Your question doesn't make a whole lot of sense... Are you fishing for something? Like for us N scalers to throw up our hands and say "Oh, you got me, you're right! N scale's not for serious modelers! Ops is just for HO!"
Again, you can do whatever you want to do with trains regardless of size if you lay your track well and use good equipment. And yes, N scale has lots of very good equipment available (plus, you can always tune equipment yourself, add new couplers and trucks, etc.).
BTW, Jerry Britton, until a recent issue forced him to abandon his plans, had been replicating full-scale PRR 4-track mainline ops plus Harrisburg passenger train ops (that's where locos were switched - electric for steam and diesel) in 1954... in N scale.
Modeling the Rio Grande Southern First District circa 1938-1946 in HOn3.
Hey Chip!
I can't say this from experience, bt the Dream Plan Build Ops DVD was done using David Popp's N scale layout, and it looked like it worked. I hope so, because I want to do it!
Jeff But it's a dry heat!
Chip
Building the Rock Ridge Railroad with the slowest construction crew west of the Pecos.