fieryturbo ATLANTIC CENTRAL fieryturbo I've never even seen a steam locomotive in person, but I remember the Metra E and (maybe?) F units in my area in the 1980s-early 90s. I model what I remember. I have no frame of reference for steam. Where do you live? Working steam tourist railroads are all over the place. Like this one where you can watch and ride real steam all day long, nearly every day for most of the year: http://www.strasburgrailroad.com/ But don't go.......you will get hooked....... Sheldon I don't find tourist railroads interesting to model. The trains are artificially clean and shiny because of what they're in service doing. The modeling context of a tourist railroad is just...wierd. Wierd like a train going in a circle in a starter set, it's kind of there to serve itself. In any case, diesels interest me partially because of the technology of large combustion engines, and there's something current I can still relate to them. It's probably aesthetic as well, I don't find anything endearing about hand painted lettering, overhanging rooflines, or wooden cars. I appreciate the suggestion though.
ATLANTIC CENTRAL fieryturbo I've never even seen a steam locomotive in person, but I remember the Metra E and (maybe?) F units in my area in the 1980s-early 90s. I model what I remember. I have no frame of reference for steam. Where do you live? Working steam tourist railroads are all over the place. Like this one where you can watch and ride real steam all day long, nearly every day for most of the year: http://www.strasburgrailroad.com/ But don't go.......you will get hooked....... Sheldon
fieryturbo I've never even seen a steam locomotive in person, but I remember the Metra E and (maybe?) F units in my area in the 1980s-early 90s. I model what I remember. I have no frame of reference for steam.
I've never even seen a steam locomotive in person, but I remember the Metra E and (maybe?) F units in my area in the 1980s-early 90s. I model what I remember. I have no frame of reference for steam.
Where do you live? Working steam tourist railroads are all over the place.
Like this one where you can watch and ride real steam all day long, nearly every day for most of the year:
http://www.strasburgrailroad.com/
But don't go.......you will get hooked.......
Sheldon
??????
I was NOT suggesting that you model a tourist railroad - I was suggesting you go vist one and see a real steam loco in action.
As for "artificially clean", I think not. All historical documentation suggests that in most every era passenger trains and their locos were kept pretty clean and well maintained.
The trains at Strasburg are clean, but it is a working railroad that also moves freight (with steam) and it runs every day in the warmer months - it is impossible to keep everything perfect - it is very "real life circa 1915".
Tourist lines run passenger trains........for the most part.......
RRR_BethBr Fair comment though, however when I look at the local scene why do so many of us who have never been to the States model the North American prototype? It is more understandable, perhaps, being part of the British Commonwealth why there are those here who model the UK prototypes. Straying from topic a bit - but as a life-long USA modeler in HO, I just got my first piece of UK motive power, a Hornby 00 LNER A3 4-6-2 (yes, Flying Scotsman). It really puts into perspective how much *smaller* the UK loading gauge is/was. The Scotsman, in 1:76 (00), is still my smallest Pacific when put next to my HO (1:87) locos from the USoA. Pretty impressive the speed and range they got out of these trains when you compare them to their US counterparts.
Fair comment though, however when I look at the local scene why do so many of us who have never been to the States model the North American prototype? It is more understandable, perhaps, being part of the British Commonwealth why there are those here who model the UK prototypes.
Straying from topic a bit - but as a life-long USA modeler in HO, I just got my first piece of UK motive power, a Hornby 00 LNER A3 4-6-2 (yes, Flying Scotsman). It really puts into perspective how much *smaller* the UK loading gauge is/was. The Scotsman, in 1:76 (00), is still my smallest Pacific when put next to my HO (1:87) locos from the USoA. Pretty impressive the speed and range they got out of these trains when you compare them to their US counterparts.
I can only speak for myself to this phenomenon. I like the brutish looks and the power that was resident in N. American steam (Canada and USA). The British steam is very clean, crisp, and they ran like Swiss watches...still do. Their grades were comparatively lighter and their trailing tonnages were as well. If we model British steam, we don't get the higher snow-capped mountains in the backdrop, nor the long and high viaducts (I'm not saying there are none in the British Isles). I like the feedwater heaters and water pumps, the flying air pumps, the massive cylinders on a Mallet's front engine, etc.
Julian
Modeling Pre-WP merger UP (1974-81)
I model 1915 Nevada mining railroads so everything I model is based on early photographs. All truss rods and 4-6-0's.
Hi Atlantic Central
In the UK I think it was 1965 the last steam loco ran.
I saw more scrap ones heading to Barry island scrap yard than working ones.
Some of the ones I saw heading for scrap now look better than they ever did in revenue service and run on one of the many preserved lines.
I moved to West Aus in 1972 and Oh rats!! just missed the last steam train to run in revenue service.
I must have had a lucky childhood I got my first propper trainset when I was four Yo, the local wreck of a switcher was steam not sure it was suposed to wheeze clatter and squeek the way it did.
Many places in the world where still running 80 year old locos at the end of steam
So its posible some real old timers where still around to be seen at the end of steam.
Don't know about the actual percentage of Historical modelers but they will always be around Bachmann still do the super early set with the stage coach passanger cars.
So there must be some historical modelers out there I can't see it being made as long as it has if its not being used and still bought.
regards John
Born in the mid 80's. Fell love with steam ever since i was a kid when i got a chance to see the Royal Hudson 4-6-4 that ran from Vancouver to Squamish. So far i got steam from all over the world. Starting with European engines (German DRG 44, DRG 52, British LNER engines), then the North American monsters from streamliners to Yellowstones, then to Asian Steams like the Bachmann SY 2-8-2, QJ 2-10-2, JS 2-8-2 and the JNR C62, D51 and C57..
riogrande5761Since the purpose of the topic was to ask those who model steam to come forward, the "statistics" regarding people not modeling the trains of their youth would be highly skewed I would think.
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
I was born in the late 70s as well, and I model the steam era on our outdoor layout. The layout is based on the D&RGW narrow gauge lines in 1951. Here's a pic:
I also model the early post transition era on the O scale (mid 1950s) and HO scale (1958) layouts. However these are for the most part diesel.
Matt from Anaheim, CA and Bayfield, COClick Here for my model train photo website
My Citrus Belt is firmly entrenched in 1927, decades before my time and exits as a freelanced branch and feeder to the SP and SF of citrus, oil, cement, lumber and structual steel & pipe, all common in the citrus industry.
Dave
I too was born in the '70s and model steam. While I may pick up a couple early diesels in the future, my current roster is all steam and will always be my focus. Don't know why, but I love 'em.
Mike
I was born in the late '70s, and am firmly a steam modeler. Diesel locos hold no interest whatsoever; to me, they're boring boxes that make ugly noises for the most part. And to top it off represent an era when almost all of the original interesting (East Coast) railroads died to be replaced by the likes of Amtrak, Conrail, and a few conglomerates.
So, in my case, I aggressively choose NOT to model the trains I grew up seeing, instead recreating an era that I never knew (probably impossibly romanticized from its reality).
I agree 100% variety in rolling stock with 50 or more different railroads plus the different types of wheel arrangements - 1950s it is. (I would love to use a few Chessie Cat and Rock Island R-Rock cars but I have avoided that so far)
As this thread has been resurrected, I decided to update my observations. Now to be fair, 51 respondents are well below the 3% statistical margin of error but here goes.... Steam,...................................................21. Transition era,....................................... 14. Diesels,.................................................. 2. Dual purpose,......................................... 11. Diesels but before respondents time..............1. Electrics, steam and diesel at a specific point in time, and place..............................1. Wasn’t clear, ...........................................1. John Busby It has been said that basicaly we model the trains of our youth a fact pretty much born out in the model press. Any faults in the analysis are mine, but I think the results show that the above statement is not necessarily so. Cheers, the Bear.
John Busby It has been said that basicaly we model the trains of our youth a fact pretty much born out in the model press.
Cheers, the Bear.
Since the purpose of the topic was to ask those who model steam to come forward, the "statistics" regarding people not modeling the trains of their youth would be highly skewed I would think. (for what it's worth, I fall into the category John Busby reported - while it didn't start out that way, the preponderence of new products being offered for 1965-1985 period has pushed me further back in time so I am now much more interested in modeling the trains of my youth, which was post steam era (born 1959) and first/second generation diesel transition.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
I was born in 1941 and graduated High School in 1959. I model the late 1950's to early 1960's. I lived in New York, just a few miles north of NYC and as a child remember seeing steam locos run along the NYC Hudson River ' Water Level Route'. I know now that many were Hudsons and Niagra's. My aunt used to visit us from NYC a couple of times a year and we would pick her up at the Mt Hope RR station (on the other side of town), just a mile from our house. The train was usually a small consist of maybe 2-3 passenger cars and a small steam loco, which I now believe were 4-6-0's or 2-6-2's. Standing next to a steam engine is quite a thrill to me, even today.
I went on a steam 'excursion' trip in 1966 from Hoboken, NJ to Jim Thorpe, PA and have never forgotten the sound of the steam engine echoing through the mountains at night as we made the return trip.
I guess I really do model from my childhood memories, but I don't follow prototypical motive power. I have many articulated locos (Big Boy, Challenger, Cab Forward, Y6B and some others) just because I love to see them in motion and now hear them with sound, something I never saw as a child but have always been fascinated with. I think there will always be steam models available in the hobby as there is something about a steam engine that a diesel or electric just doesn't compare to.
-Bob
Life is what happens while you are making other plans!
If we are keeping score then add me to the transition area count. I was born in 1959 and never saw a real steam loco in operation until we visited the Nevada Northern a couple of years ago. Jumped from never having seen one in operation to "being the engineer" in just one day.
But, I have fond memories of climbing all over the steam locos that found their way into local parks after they were pulled from service. And I've always been fascinated by old technology, especially with big power. I flew RC airplanes for quite a while and got to specializing in WWII warbirds. Earned enough of a reputation to be invited as a guest to the big WWII airshow in Reading, PA years back. I have two classic cars in my garage, a 69 Lemans vert 455 "sleeper" and 74 455 Trans Am, both restored. Restoring a car is kind of like building a MRR- a lot of time, thought and attention to detail.
There is something about the days before computers and all the technology we have now. Its amazing what was accomplished back then by using a bunch of steel and a little ingenuity. And operating the steam loco at NN is high on my all-time bucket list accomplishments.
My RR runs steam with a few early diesels mixed in. I am not claiming a date, just an era.
Huntington Junction - Freelance based on the B&O and C&O in coal country before the merger... doing it my way. Now working on phase 3. - Walt
For photos and more: http://www.wkhobbies.com/model-railroad/
Well, chalk another one up for steam. I was born in 1949. I really don't remember seeing steam engines during my youth. I just love the sight, sound and smell of a steam locomotive. So, my layout is still in the stage that I on't have a specific time period set, but I know that I will be looking at late steam, maybe late forties to mid fifties to allow a diesel to sneak in if I get the urge. Fortunately, I live just outside St. Louis, where they have a fantastic Transportation Museum that continues to grow every time I visit. There are plenty of steam locos that you can photograph and climb up in to. I love it. They also have a great collection of old automobiles, but the trains are their main thing. If you are ever in the St. Louis area, make sure you stop in.
wdcrvr
John BusbyIt has been said that basicaly we model the trains of our youth a fact pretty much born out in the model press.
John, you might want to consider this.
The last battleship vs battleship fight took place in late 1944. There's a sizeable community of folks who model them in 1:144 scale - radio-controlled self-propelled 'live fire' models which can, and do, shoot at and sink each other.
Full-rigged ships faded into oblivion even earlier. My LHS has an aisle devoted to kits and parts for such nautical models, so somebody must still be building them.
There are far more prop-powered RC aircraft than there are jets, and many are models of types that disappeared from the skies a long time ago.
Just because something isn't in common use doesn't mean there won't be people who associate it with some romanticised time past. All we have to do to assure continued modeling of steam locomotives is to quietly de-emphasize something which is true today, and was even more true when steam was king:
The romance of the rails is a synonym for hard, dirty, dangerous work.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
John Busby I was born 1961 I model trains from the 1960's I just caught the last wag of the steam so steam features on my railroad. It has been said that basicaly we model the trains of our youth a fact pretty much born out in the model press. Give it another twenty years or so and the only steam models that will be avalable ready to run will all be on heritige sites or in museums. Steam modeling will probably be a special interest area of the hobby by then. regards John
I was born 1961
I model trains from the 1960's I just caught the last wag of the steam
so steam features on my railroad.
It has been said that basicaly we model the trains of our youth a fact pretty much born out in the model press.
Give it another twenty years or so and the only steam models that will be avalable ready to run will all be on heritige sites or in museums.
Steam modeling will probably be a special interest area of the hobby by then.
John,
Maybe many people do model the trains of their youth, but several disccussions on this board have shown a significant percentage do not.
I was born in 1957, I never saw a mainline steam locomotive in regular service as a child, I have very little interest in the trains of my "youth" - the late 60's and 70's. Steam was effectively gone here in the US by 1960 - with only a few rare exceptions. I do remember the long lines of steam locos sitting waiting to be scraped here in Baltimore - a steel industry town - well into the early 70's.
I model the time just before my birth - 1954/1955 - with just a little freelance license on a few points that few would even notice or know about.
I run a balanced mix of steam and diesel. I "protolance" with my ATLANTIC CENTRAL which interchanges with the real world B&O, C&O and WESTERN MARYLAND.
If I had to pick an era to model other than the 1950's, I would pick the early part of the 20th century - maybe 1910, or 1920......the trains of my grandparents' youth......
I know modelers younger than myself who model steam.......sure interests will shift with the passing of time, but I believe that has as much to do with the ever increasing eras to choose from as it might have to do with the "trains of our youth".
When I started modeling at age 11 in 1968, modeling the 1990's was not an option - today it is......so sure, more people modeled steam back then.
As long as this hobby continues, I suspect some reasonable percentage of people will be interested in "historical" modeling as opposed to modeling the recent past or current railroading.
Companies like Bachmann continue to sell models of locos from the 1880's - even 40 years ago there were not many people around who could say those were the trains of their youth........
I was born in '50 and unfortunately I can count the number of times I've seen a running steam loco on my fingers - so I didn't grow up with steam. Despite this "deprived" childhood, I model 1910 because my favorite locos are old Consolidations and early Mallets, I like pre-USRA cars and the pre-WW1 time in general.
I model NE PA because of my family roots, camelbacks just came along with the bargain... which goes to show that you can get used to just about anything!
Jim
Since the last time I posted on this thread back in 2014, I've acquired several more steam engines: the BLI NH I-4 4-6-2, a Key NH R-1b 4-8-2, and a Key NH R-1a 4-8-2.
John,Why not run TOFC behind steam? The NH did, starting in 1937 (about a year after the CGW). Of course, they were twin 24' vans on a 50' flat, or twin 26' vans on a 54' flat, but they did haul a lot of TOFC traffic behind steam for a good 10+ years before diesels took over completely.
Paul A. Cutler III
I was born in 1951 and have few recollections of steam. I remember our family traveling from Omaha to Chicago on the Burlington for Christmas in 1959 and we passed a steamer that was parked and remember my mother telling me that steam weren't being run any more. I'm wondering if that was UP's 4023 that was parked. It's still on display in a park in south Omaha. A few summers earlier we made the same trip by car and I believe it was somewhere in Iowa we looked over and there was a short train being pulled by a steamer. I have no idea where we were or what railroad it was.
When I got back into model railroading in the late 1970s, I had no intention of running any steam. I didn't yet have a concept but I just had no interest in running steam because I had almost no memories of it. Then for no particular reason I bought an AHM UP Mikado and I was hooked. I decided I had to have steam on my layout. I've been through two moves since and each time I started a new railroad it has been a fictional transition era railroad. My current layout is a fictional subsidiary of the NYC and it has plenty of steam and diesels. I haven't taken an inventory but I would guess the steam slightly outnumbers the diesels.
Won't tell my age, but my wife and I recently celebrated our 55th anniversary.
Still remember my consternation about a locomotive seen at a grade crossing near Norfolk in 1941 - I was SURE there were two locos approaching (I could see 2 sets of drivers) but only one boiler steamed past. Years later I figured out that I had seen one of N&Ws ubiquitous Ys.
Actually, I don't 'model steam.' I model what was (or might have been) present at one specific place at one specific time - the Upper Kiso Valley in September, 1964. That means catenary motors (1500VDC) and EMU, coal-burning steam, a few brand-new diesel-hydraulics and DMU on the JNR, while the connecting TTT soldiers on with a motley collection of ancient teakettle tank locos and homebuilt (from other people's scrap) articulateds. The two narrow gauge lines run electric mini-locos and 'critters,' the latter having recently replaced wood-burning steam in the highly flammable woods.
Why do I model what I do? Somewhere in my mass of miscellany is a photo of my wife and our toddlers standing in front of Kiso Rintetsu #1 (0-4-2T, Baldwin 1927) at Agematsu, taken in September, 1964. We had a wonderful time. Went back 11 years later and found everything changed - and the changes were not improvements.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - in the Alfred E. Neumann universe)
I came at the very end of steam and missed all of the fun ! I LOVE steam ! I model the N&W in the transition era or whatever steam engine or early diesal that strikes my fance (freelance ) and it is HO for me. Although I do have a an O gauge set and a little N oval for the grand kids.
Later
YGW
I was....until Broadway Limited 400+ dollar locomotives became the only PRR option on the market,. I switched to modern Wheeling and Lake Erie.
(My Model Railroad, My Rules)
These are the opinions of an under 35 , from the east end of, and modeling, the same section of the Wheeling and Lake Erie railway. As well as a freelanced road (Austinville and Dynamite City railroad).
I was born in 1968, and much of my modeling has been in the diesel era. However, as I've gotten older, I've come to appreciate steam power more and more. No, I was not there and cannot remember steam, but I no longer buy any diesels (my son still has two on the layout). I do cheat with some 1960's freight cars because I like the bright color schemes, but on "my" railroad, the steam engines lasted a few years longer than they did in real life. That said, I don't have any piggyback operations, 89' flat cars or long autoracks, and there's no 100 ton open hoppers or hi-cube boxcars. So I guess you could say that I'm "modeling" things as they might have been had diesels come later and the steamers lasted about one decade longer to 1967.
John