Oh, man. Jim, I have something I need to show you. I'm at work in a virtual meeting right now, listening to blah blah, but I'll post it a little later. I just turned 60. "Hi, I'm Matt (Hi Matt)..."
-Matt
Returning to model railroading after 40 years and taking unconscionable liberties with the SP&S, Northern Pacific and Great Northern roads in the '40s and '50s.
Wait, it's not just me? I didn't know there was a support group for this!
You could say I'm a little ahead of the curve though. I went through my old boxes of stuff that I had been toting around forever (at least 10 moves with my own stuff). I finally parted ways with a handfull of buildings that I've had since I was 8 or 9 (I'm 45 now). Great memories associated with them, but man they were in rough shape! My old Life-Like, Tyco, and Bachmann rolling stock from back then is also in rough shape, doesn't fit my layout at all, and isn't going anywhere!
Hello everyone, I'm Mike.....
Mike
My train problem is no hobby time to get my layout working so I can get most of those "hoarded" trains on the layout.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
Well, I always threw away the "junk".
Trucks that don't roll well, generally speaking, I just threw away when they were replaced by better freight car trucks.
Wreck damaged equipment: My father had commented when I was a child that HO trains were basically throw away trains (as compared to the Lionel that he had owned that actually lasted forever), so when they broke beyond a simple repair, I just did not keep them. I will repair whatever I can up to a certain point, but then will also strip for spare parts (generally Kadee couplers and good Genesis level or better trucks).
I have no old parts laying around except a few wheelsets and maybe one set of Walthers passenger car trucks and selected brand new replacement parts from Tangent and Exactrail for their rolling stock. Oh, I have one complete set of yellow handrails for the next time I own an Athearn SD45T-2 Kodachrome unit (this is because many Athearn units have some handrail issues).
I just don't keep old stuff or even freight cars that I'm not using regularly or don't want to use regularly. If I don't need it, I sell it for whatever I can get. At the last train show my used, reasonably-priced books sold exceptionally well.
I do invest in new or better quality replacement detail parts for my engines when something falls off and gets lost, so I have some small parts like correct size lift rings and metal fuel fills coming in the mail.
However, I'm not hoarding anything. All the engines and rolling stock are either on the layout or two shelves above the layout, and everything gets run. The best locos are on a high shelf that the cat can't get to, whenever they are not running.
John
I guess getting my layout itself reasonably close to completion has caused me to kind of clean up some stuff. Getting it ready to be on last falls National Narrow Gauge convention's layout tour was a lot of incentive to get the layout reasonably done. Didn't have many through as we were a ways out from Hickory but it got me going with it.
I have been gradually getting things organized and getting rid of some stuff but the scrapbox was something that had been never really cleaned up. Mind you I have tons of car and loco projects to do and still a few things to scratchbuild on the layout plus a lot of detailing. (and stuff to build for the club) I have been trying to get stuff better organized where I can find things too. My wife found this little gem over at the Habitat thrift store for $5 and I got my detailing parts organized. Just roll it in by my workbench when I need it.
The problem with almost never throwing anything away lies in that word "almost." It is better to either always keep or always throw. That word almost is why you can spend fruitless hours looking for that oddball something that you know you once had and now need but in fact you actually did throw it away.
Throwing something away is the surest way to guarantee that you'll find a need for it half a year (or longer) later.
Somebody mentioned Art Curren, the master at kit mingling [he felt the British term kit-bashing sounded violent]. I attended his estate sale and can testify he kept little tidbits. I bought a plastic bag of bits from various uses he had made of the old LifeLike Mt Vernon Mfg Co kit which was one of his favorites. I always intended to incorporate those bits into my own kitbashes as a way of honoring his memory.
I'm also reminded that even bits of the low end Tyco diesels made their way into Art Curren structures as vents or electrical cabinets.
Dave Nelson
drgwcs, that's a beautiful thing. The retail rack makes me think I should buy all those things. By stark contrast, look at this little shoebox, which I've been dragging around for half a century. Note that it has a cardboard "work surface" that you can pull out from the bottom using the handy tab. Also note the paper clip sticking through the top at the far end -- that will come to play in a moment. This was the scratchbuilder's kit that I made. I re-rediscovered it a few months ago and was astonished, not only by all the clever functionality it has but also how utterly unnecessary and useless it proved to be. Basically it became a junk box. Let's have a look inside, shall we?Inside the lid is a pocket for ORDER FORMS. Inside this pocket there is still an order form for Terminal Hobby Shop of Milwaukee, Wisconsin ("It's easy to order from Terminal Hobby Shop!"). The top portion of the inside of the box contains a tray with cardboard dividers, resembling a tackle-box tray. Here be strips of wood, scraps of sandpaper, a syringe, a tube of glue, a box of barrells, crossing signs, windows and other details and parts, and more. If you slide the paper-clip south, you can open a sort of reverse or "top-fastened" Rolodex of suppliers in my town, which at this time was a small, fish-and-timber town where the coffee smelled worse than the harbor. Here we see the Rolodex in action. North End Hobby Center, Seattle Rail Supply, Webster Supply Inc. Address, phone numbers, and hours of operation. Everything you needed (all of them long gone, of course).In the crypt: scraps of bass (some of it nice clapboard siding!) and balsa, reposing undisturbed since the Carter administration in bins separated by dividers -- big stuff, small stuff, long stuff. There's even a pocket along the side for thick card stock. Note the sturdy cardboard gussets that hold the top tray in place.
Some surprises from within: the side pocket held envelopes full of corporate logos cut out of magazines. The top tray held an unassembled (or broken?) gravity gas pump and a roll of roof shakes. I completely forgot about this boat hull, which I shaped by hand from balsa.It's time to jettison this stuff, but it's kind of a late 20th-century marvel, too, demonstrating how kids (some kids) thought before digital technologies. Back then, I was unintimidated -- we could do anything! (Having wired my layout, I'm starting to get some of that healthy attitude back.)As goofy as this little sarcophagus is, I am very proud of some of the stuff my friend Cam and I built with our scraps. Here are two views of my engine house -- we each scratchbuilt one from some photo we saw somewhere. The cans of paint I cut from wires out of a clothes hanger we swiped out of somebody's closet. The posters I painted on the wall myself.
And here (I've posted this before), is a boat dock that actually existed on Bainbridge Island, which we built from sketches I made while he rowed gently against the tide to keep our dinghy in one spot against the tide coming out of the bay. It's never yet had a place on a layout. But I'm keeping it. What's another half century to a model railroader?
Matt that is a pretty neat time capsule you have there. Over time I have bought a few lots- The styrene and a lot of other sheet material I bought in a file box full of stuff for $10. The stripwood I got as a lot along with a bunch of other stuff for a very reasonable price- It has brought me a lot of fun scratchbuilding. One whole town has come out of it. Along with it were two cigar boxes of old paper sided car kits- I am sure I am at least the third or 4th owner......little time capsule.
dknelson The problem with almost never throwing anything away lies in that word "almost." It is better to either always keep or always throw. That word almost is why you can spend fruitless hours looking for that oddball something that you know you once had and now need but in fact you actually did throw it away. Throwing something away is the surest way to guarantee that you'll find a need for it half a year (or longer) later. Dave Nelson
Finding stuff- that is the problem...... that is why I am trying to get stuff better organized. That way people especially family does not think I am any crazier than I already am. When I did the stripwood bucket a couple of years ago I was out on the porch drilling holes in the bucket lid with a paddle bit to put the stripwood in. Our youngest (at the time 13) walked out- saw me with the drill- watched for a second with quite a look on his face then turned around into the kitchen. He then told mom "Dad's lost it- he's out on the porch drilling holes in a bucket!" My wife and I were rolling on the floor laughing.......
dknelsonThrowing something away is the surest way to guarantee that you'll find a need for it half a year (or longer) later.
I couldn't agree more!
A long time ago I decided to put metal wheels on all of my freight cars. Foolishly I threw the plastic wheelsets away. Now I have a bunch of Athearn BB cars that I want to sell. Apparently I'm going to have to let the metal wheels go with them because I can't change them back to plastic wheels.
I used to keep every scrap of plastic or metal regardless of size. I ended up with two BB boxes 3/4s full of stuff. It took me a while to realize that I was wasting my time searching through them because things were rarely the exact size. I kept the brass tubes and tossed the rest.
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
dknelson Throwing something away is the surest way to guarantee that you'll find a need for it half a year (or longer) later. Dave Nelson
Yes, I also have the ''I need to save this'' problem also. I have some boxs that just say "junk'' or ''track side junk''.
I do save stuff that will come in handy at a later date, I think maybe after i'm .
I just pulled open some plastic sliding drawers.
Lights from my slot car days.
Caps to solvent bottles. ''Hello, my name is Robert.'' ''Hello Robert, welcome to the group.''
Brass "sows" from detail parts.
Little cast metal men that were to be a part of a logging Railroad.
It's fun to ''root'' though the boxs from time to time.
The above pictures are just grains of sand in a Desert.
I know that I can use those fiber ties for some thing later.
@crossthedog, that little shoe box reminds my of the ''old days'' when a man would have his tools and some materials in a handmade by himself, wooded box and travel/walk from town to town and make repaires for people that had broken items, and make some money or traded for a meal. That box of yours is a ''collectors item''.
I started this little center-cab diesel project over 20 years ago.
-Photograph by Kevin Parson
I think I have worked on it as recently as 2017. It sure will be a neat locomotive if I ever get it done.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
Since it appears that I have inadvertantly started a model railroad hoarding support group- perhaps this might be of help.
Believe it or not, I still have 2 Blue Box Athearn SD40-2's that I bought when I was building my first "permanent" layout. One is in blue/yellow Warbonnet colors. The other was a Bicentennial model. The Santa Fe model got repainted in MoPac colors when I started on my current layout. The Bicentennial model is in its original box. I guess one day, I'll remotor it with a modern can motor and put it back into service.
Marlon
See pictures of the Clinton-Golden Valley RR
Medina1128 Believe it or not, I still have 2 Blue Box Athearn SD40-2's that I bought when I was building my first "permanent" layout. One is in blue/yellow Warbonnet colors. The other was a Bicentennial model. The Santa Fe model got repainted in MoPac colors when I started on my current layout. The Bicentennial model is in its original box. I guess one day, I'll remotor it with a modern can motor and put it back into service.
There are probably a ton of the old Blue Box in service still. One of them qualifies as runner up for oldest project repaired from the scrapbox for me. I had a custom painted Rio Grande Blue Box SD-9- the type with metal trucks and the wide hood but the paint was very nice. It was up at the club I belonged to in Oklahoma when a former member broke in and stole a bunch of stuff. We eventually caught the guy and most of the stuff was recovered. I had this engine and a shay that were damaged. The trucks and several driveline parts were broken. Never found the parts for the older trucks. All that happened about 89 or so. The SD9's seemed to be pretty rare in the swap meets I went to. Fast forward to 2 years ago- I found a donor engine for 20 at a Lindy's Trains location outside of Charlotte. The sad thing is that I still saved the extra parts........... Hi I'm Jim (Hi Jim) and I have a train problem.
I have lots of stuff I bought over thirty years ago that never saw the light of my train room, either in my old house or my current one. Some of them I had forgotten about and discovered recently. I found an Athearn BB Trainmaster still in its original box. I'm considering adding a decoder and painting it for my current fictional road. The prize is a craftsman 300 ton Fairbanks Morse coaling tower which I bought about 40 years ago. I intended to build it right after I bought it but never got around to it on my old layout and on my current one, I got a Walthers plastic kit for my main engine servicing facility. There really isn't an appropriate place for it unless I use it to replace the Walthers coaling tower which I like. I might get around to building it someday and will then have to decide whether to replace the Walters tower or build a diorama for it.
hon30critter dknelson Throwing something away is the surest way to guarantee that you'll find a need for it half a year (or longer) later. I couldn't agree more! A long time ago I decided to put metal wheels on all of my freight cars. Foolishly I threw the plastic wheelsets away. Now I have a bunch of Athearn BB cars that I want to sell. Apparently I'm going to have to let the metal wheels go with them because I can't change them back to plastic wheels. I used to keep every scrap of plastic or metal regardless of size. I ended up with two BB boxes 3/4s full of stuff. It took me a while to realize that I was wasting my time searching through them because things were rarely the exact size. I kept the brass tubes and tossed the rest. Dave
dknelson Throwing something away is the surest way to guarantee that you'll find a need for it half a year (or longer) later.
I used to save hornhook couplers. Anyone who does that needs an intervention. I finally persuaded myself to discard them.
The first engine I chose for myself (at what I think was Caboose Hobbies -- what was the store in the basement of West 43rd or thereabouts?) was a Tyco GP20 painted for the Reading. (I was planning on an RS3, similar to the ones I loved seeing on the Erie Northern Branch trains, and similar to the CNJ RSDs I got to run on my fourth birthday... but it had a jewel rather than a bulb for a headlight... strange, the things that 'matter' when you're 6).
This came with a glassine envelope with a full set of metal handrails. I was paranoid as a kid that these would be damaged if I put them on, so I carefully stored them in a box.
Around age 15 I rediscovered the railings, and... decided not to put them on yet.
Around 1997 I consolidated a bunch of stuff after a move, and reunited the engine with the glassine envelope (they were in two wildly different locations by then!) and... decided not to put them on quite yet.
I am looking at the envelope with the railings, which I recovered a couple of months ago from storage. I know where the engine is. It is not time to put them on quite yet.
John-NYBWI used to save hornhook couplers
Throwing away money. Some non-interventioned people are buying them off ebay:
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2380057.m570.l1313&_nkw=horn+hook+couplers&_sacat=0
maxmanThrowing away money. Some non-interventioned people are buying them off ebay:
maxman John-NYBW I used to save hornhook couplers Throwing away money. Some non-interventioned people are buying them off ebay: https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2380057.m570.l1313&_nkw=horn+hook+couplers&_sacat=0
John-NYBW I used to save hornhook couplers
WOW!!! One guy is asking $8 for a ten pack plust $6 shipping. That comes out to $1.40 per coupler.
Of course asking price says nothing about the selling price which is the true gauge of value. I guess this is an example of "One man's trash is another man's treasure". Since most rolling stock now days come with knuckle couplers, I guess the guys who still prefer hornhooks need a source.
Should I count the O scale wooden circus car kits that came with my original , used, pre-war train that my parents purchased in the late 40's for me,, while I was still too young to remember.. Over the years I would take a shot at finishing them, but with no directions, experience nor proper tools, I didn't get far.
My current long awaited project is a dedicated train room. Afeter a fire in 1996, which descimated my Lionel collection, my wife and I were headed up the stairs and she pointed to a studded up 13x22 space and said "that's the train room." Needless to say I didn't argue. Unfortunately I was so busy with work to get started. Got rid of the milk cows, but had difficulty knowing what to do with "free" time. Ever since she had designated tthe space I had been buying for a layout in that space. Son had to move home and space was filled. Put up a pratice layout in the new space, but it meant no progress could be made on a shelf for the new layout. A coouple of years before COVID I started selling surplus stuff at train shows, just started up again. Last fall I bit the bullet and moved the layout out, sold it and started working on the room. Progress is slow, but walls are up sheetrock and painted, suspended ceiling in place, half the floor sealed, currently on hold for a stomach bug.
Hope to get the work done so I can at least get a loop of track around the room, so great grandson can run a train (me too) before we get into summer haying.
Good luck to all at getting at least one long time project completed.
Richard
I have @ 35 Athearn BB locomotives on the shelf going back to early eighties waiting to be put in service. Also have original Train Miniature Alco FA/FB units still waiting for their day. Eight Kato sd80mac units, 2 Kato sd45 units, 2 Bowser Alco C630 units, and a set of BLI PRR centepides round out the locomotives. Freight car kits from various manufacturers number @125 going back decades. Many building kits going back to the 70's including Tyco,AHM,Model Power,Woodland Scenics,and early Walthers round out that list of things to do. All parts and pieces are categorized in plastic bags and kept in a number of large industrial storage bins. I do know what I have where. I also have a sizable "O" gauge layout built under the HO layout and that's another whole set of parts,pieces,and things to do. Getting late in life and honestly don't suspect much of these things will be finished, but it was fun collecting it all through the years. This has been a great lifetime hobby. Told the two kids....either sell it all or find someone in the hobby and tell them to just come and take it. Ill be gone and someone will be very happy.
One of the first steam engines I bought was a Mantua camal back 4-6-2. I vagly remember that it may have been a kit, but would not bet my life on it. For years I have been looking for the running gear. Well thanks to you guys, tonight I found it inside a Monogram Hudson plastic model kit.
I guess I'll put it back in the box and forget it for a another maybe 30+/- years.
Now I am wondering where the Camal back's tender is? Maybe I'll gut the Hudson and rebuild the Camal back.
Hoarding...
I have bought as much as I could to insure that when layout construction begins, I have as much on hand as possible to be sure construction can continue without delays.
I have bought very few locomotives in the past year since I calculated that I have all I need, but a couple were added. I have not bought a plastic train car kit in ages except for one airslide hopper. I bought six carefully selected resin freight car kits about six months ago, and none since.
I know I have accumulated too many structure kits. I will not get rid of any until I am certain which ones I will use in my city scene. I also have too much ground cover, ballast, and plaster cloth.
I might have too many Kadee trucks/wheels, but I doubt it. I know I have too many Kadee couplers already, but I have full assortments of all the 20/30 series and 40 series couplers so I have what is needed on hand.
When it comes to #11 X-Acto blades and #78 drill bits, well, I probably have way too many.
Where is the line in between "buying everything I will need" and "hoarding" drawn?
SeeYou190 Hoarding... I have bought as much as I could to insure that when layout construction begins, I have as much on hand as possible to be sure construction can continue without delays. I have bought very few locomotives in the past year since I calculated that I have all I need, but a couple were added. I have not bought a plastic train car kit in ages except for one airslide hopper. I bought six carefully selected resin freight car kits about six months ago, and none since. I know I have accumulated too many structure kits. I will not get rid of any until I am certain which ones I will use in my city scene. I also have too much ground cover, ballast, and plaster cloth. I might have too many Kadee trucks/wheels, but I doubt it. I know I have too many Kadee couplers already, but I have full assortments of all the 20/30 series and 40 series couplers so I have what is needed on hand. When it comes to #11 X-Acto blades and #78 drill bits, well, I probably have way too many. Where is the line in between "buying everything I will need" and "hoarding" drawn? -Kevin
It is a fine line. I went from a smallish layout to a switching layout to one that is double the size of what I had before. I had stocked up and now I have a bit of stuff left over. I had waited to do much with clearing out until I had projects at the club done.
As for hoarding as a club we have had to deal with a couple of situations that would be considered hoarding. One was pretty bad as the basement was chock full of junk and tons of trains all stacked. While there was some better stuff there was a ton of train set type cars. I lost track of how many of the same cabooses there were as many as a dozen duplicates each. We were literally stepping on track and parts on the floor. Most of the kits had never been touched. I have seen a couple of estate sales that were similar.
I think in the hoarding situations it piles up and nothing is done with anything. On the other hand the limited run nature of our hobby does tend toward a buy it when you see it mentality. When it gets out of control and heads in a compulsive way and people are unwilling to fix it when it causes relationship, financial, emotional, or health issues is when it heads into hoarding. A lot of hoarding derives from insecurity. Just my 2 cents as a pastor and counselor.
crossthedog maxman Throwing away money. Some non-interventioned people are buying them off ebay: @maxman, that's hilarious, but I felt a little sick to my stomach looking at that linked page. -Matt
maxman Throwing away money. Some non-interventioned people are buying them off ebay:
@maxman, that's hilarious, but I felt a little sick to my stomach looking at that linked page.
HO Scale horn-hook couplers, box of 85, black, mostly used. | eBay
This listing probably gives a better idea of the value of hornhooks. A guy is offering a package of 85 and so far has only one bid for 99 cents. That's a little more than a penny apiece. The shipping cost of $3.81 brings it up to about a nickel apiece. I doubt it will be bid up much from where it is right now. I don't know how many hornhooks I threw out but it was a lot less than 85. If I threw cash in the trash, I doubt it was much more than a buck's worth.
PC101Now I am wondering where the Camal back's tender is? Maybe I'll gut the Hudson and rebuild the Camal back.
"Put the Camel back"