Ok for me it is HO, and the reason is that is what I started with. My dad brought home a Tyco train set back in 78-79 and we used to take it out for X-mas. The train was the Chatanooga Choo choo set, it came with a GP20 and like 3 cars and a caboose. Every year after that my sister and I would get a new car to put on the train around the tree. I finally got a Bachmann 0-6-0 steam set when I was 7 or 8 again in HO, that was followed by the Tyco Turbo Train (you know the sleek looking one that would go up the walls and through a loop). I kept all of these trains until last december when I sold them at a club fund raiser. So since as far back as I can remember I have had HO so that is why I still have it today. To me HO is the right size for a layout and details for the equipment. I am planning on one day building a garden layout with the nice G or larger scale trains but I will need a house first.
Oh yea another thing on my list of things to build... I want to build a modern loco (SD40-2, Dash-9 or SD80MAC type) true to life function. I am not sure what scale this will be yet that is going to depend alot on how small I can get a IC engine and some traction motors. I want this to be self powered using the engine to turn an alternator or generator to power the traction motors just like real ones do. I was thinking about using automotive starters for the traction motors and an internally regulated alternator and some gel batteries for the generator portion of the loco. The small engine will be the hard part, I dont want a chainsaw engine or lawnmower engine I want something that is 3 or 4 cylinders, small and possably runs on diesel.
A Veteran, whether active duty, retired, national guard, or reserve, is someone who, at one point in his or her life, wrote a blank check made payable to "The United States of America" for an amount of "up to and including my life."
sfrailfan wrote:I have several friends that have O gauge (2 rail) ... They were great too,
RXR Wolf wrote:I'd love to give N Scale a serious try... but the lack of "close to accurate" PRR steam engines ... is pointing me back to HO or O.
I'd love to give N Scale a serious try... but the lack of "close to accurate" PRR steam engines ... is pointing me back to HO or O.
Oh, now I don't know about that...
You will have to kitbash to get Pennsy steam in N... ...or buy brass. But it is possible! Here are my N sscale Pennsy steamers:
Shown here (N scale):
PSC brass PRR K4s 4-6-2
Kitbashed Kato/GHQ PRR L1s 2-8-2
Kitbashed Trix/Bachmann Spectrum PRR H10s 2-8-0
Modeling the Rio Grande Southern First District circa 1938-1946 in HOn3.
Greetings,
I chose Z scale in 1979 whilst I was stationed overseas. Space was limited. Portability was essential. I built a 3 foot by 5 foot portable layout of two mainlines, three track division yard, three passing sidings, two reversing loops and two stub siding which could be shipped in a mattress carton and was moved 5 times. The control panel was detachable and connected via multiplugs and sockets. The basic layout was constructed on 1/4 inch plywood with 1 x 2 inch bracing and syrofoam terrain. A separate table or benchwork was needed to support the layout. Hidden areas of trackwork were accessed from underneath by holes in the plywood. Obviously this degree of complexity, portability and small space available made Z scale ideal.
Howard
The gods willed it!
As a child, I had an American Flyer S-gauge tinplate set, and it was my pride and joy. A neighbor's kid had an O-gauge Lionel, and of course they are incompatible, except that we found a way to make them so (there really is no restriction on the imaginations of little kids). Later, when my brother asked for a set of his own, I lobbied to get an S-gauge set so that his would work with mine; but, I was out-lobbied by the local hobby-store owner, who convinced my parents to go with HO. So, at that point, the neighborhood consisted of three gauges, with my brother's Athearn set being closest to anything scale.
Well, the neighbor also got a new HO set (Tyco), and then a second hobby store opened in town and had the usual give-away promotions. I entered and won an HO train set of my own, and that was the death knell of the tinplate. I eventually traded it for more HO equipment -- not anywhere near the value, but it was compatible, and it worked (and I still have some of it).
In those days, at first, N was out -- it didn't exist. If you wanted smaller than HO, you went with TT. N first appeared around 1964 and was called "OOO," but it was almost all European stuff with huge flanges and just not very appealing. So, I never really considered N.
When I was in eighth grade, every boy had to take a year of shop. If you were a girl, they taught you how to sew and cook -- no sports, no tools, no fun if you were female. But, I was the right sex, so I was in the shop, which for me was a quarter of metal, electrical, drafting, and wood (in that order). I got an "A" in everything except metal shop, where I got a "B" from Mr. Hill. The school library had a subscription to Model Railroader, and it was full of all sorts of neat stuff to build. Mr. Hill wanted everyone to do a metal project, and in his mind, that meant making a hammer or tin box or something similar (the shop was equipped with, e.g., bending brakes, riveters, and even had its own forge). I took the time to trace plans for an HO Forney 2-4-4T -- I didn't know any better. Of course, things like that are made from brass, but I didn't know that either. So I set about trying to make it out of galvanized steel with a forge-heated soldering iron big enough to use as a murder weapon, which was a waste of time. But, you learn from your mistakes.
Mr. Hartley's electrical shop at the time was more fun. Linn Westcott was publishing a lot of stuff on transistor throttles, so of course I wanted one of those also (another frustrated project which failed, this time for want of funds -- even then, transistors and diodes were expensive, especially for an eighth grader who was shaving his lunch money). But, I found a $5 bill on the ground walking out of shop one day, and believe it or not, I came close to pulling it off (and eventually did build a TAT IV, which worked). Westcott always told modelers never to not do something because "I've never done that before," and I took that advice to heart. You really never do know if you can do something until you actually try it. At that age, I didn't really know what transistors were or how the worked; but, I could see what they could do, and considering that everyone else in the class was learning no more than how to solder a couple of wires together, it wasn't hard for me to get a top grade.
Of course, with my plans for the Forney, drafting was a cinch. And woodworking was learning to make cabinets and the like. I was OK at that -- got another "A" -- but what I built at home was Linn's L-girder framework for my first layout on a side of the garage. My dad, who never really mastered which end of the screwdriver to hold, was amazed.
All that was 40 years ago, and I really never have changed all that much. That first layout had fully interlocked three-color signals using a circuit described in October 1964 MR (use the contacts on a Kemtron switch machine to bypass the twin-T from "C" to "P" to get the interlocking effect when the turnout is adverse). A guy by the name of Fyffe described how to make a snap-action power supply for the switch machines, and of course I had to have one of those too. The local radio shop didn't have any 8000 microfarad capacitors, so I hung four 2000 microfarads in parallel that could throw the points of a single machine into the next county. I spent a lot of time adjusting the turnouts (even code 100 can't take that for long), but at least the lights turned color. Today, I suppose, we'd all be using micro-chips, but not me -- simple circuits one can assemble and service himself are so much easier and cheaper, so why bother with the newer stuff?
Somewhere along the line, I picked up an entire set of Model Railroaders -- I have them all, from 1940 to 2001, am missing only those first years. You know exactly what the "right" paint schemes are because the "wrong" ones haven't been invented yet. Over time, I picked up my share of brass locomotives, which (of course) had to be super-detailed, and that meant I had to polish off those old "B" metalworking skills. There were many articles in the early MRs about how to scratchbuild steam locomotives -- you don't see much of that any more. Still, if you want the best, you have to be able to do stuff like that, because it simply is not commercially feasible for a manufacturer to do it for you. And these early articles actually show one how to construct detail such as cab interiors which aren't covered anywhere else. Today, I don't consider an injector complete unless it is drilled for all three control lines from the cab, and that involves drilling #80 and #79 under a jeweler's loop (I don't think Mr. Hill would give me a "B" today). And yes, I finally figured out that one uses brass and not tinplate or galvanized steel.
Would I consider switching scales at this point? I doubt it -- too much invested in HO. Also, I still think that N is too small, although the quality is much, much improved. I cannot imagine myself trying to do in N what I do today in HO.
I suppose I could go up to S or O, and I've long been attracted to garden railroading, except that I don't own a house. And where I live now there are several active live steamers running on a very large oval at the old depot -- those things can really pull!
But, what would I gain? As long as I still can see well enough to use #80 drills, moving to O would do no more than oblige me to put more pipes on the engine. I'm trying lubricator lines now -- do we next insist upon lubricator control lines? A real steam engine has about 15,000 parts in it, all of them replaceable, so how many does a model-maker have to install before he can claim to be a "scale" modeler?
I figure that if I can get current O-scale detail in an HO engine, most will find that acceptable, and I will be satisfied simply because I wasn't able to do better.
So, I guess HO will have to be it, unless I get to the state where I can't see it anymore.
And then I guess I will have to switch.
The gods willing.
nobullchitbids wrote:When I was in eighth grade, ... I was in the shop, which for me was a quarter of metal, electrical, drafting, and wood (in that order).
I have my father to blame for the MRR bug. He set up an 8 x 14 HO layout in the family room in the mid 70's. I ran trains there until I joined the Navy.
In 1982 or 83 I was getting ready to deploy on a submarine for a Christmas deployment, we were asked to bring a little bit of home out with us. I picked up a Bachmann N Scale set to put around a miniture Christmas tree. They made us take the tree down after New Years, but the train set was OK. The best part was, we could have grades to order!
Now, I'm happy to say that most of the cars and locomotives that I have desired are available in RTR. I've also learned that if it's not available, that a kit bash or scratch built item will more than meet my needs.
I look at the other scales from time to time, but when it comes down to it, I still need 30 more 55 ton hoppers to make that coal drag that I've been working on all of these years.
It all started with a figure-8 HO trainset my dad got us for Christmas when I was 4 or 5.
When I was 13 or so, he and I again worked on an HO layout at "his house", while I had a 2 x 4ft N scale layout for about a year (then I discovered girls and drums, then shelved the whole MRR'ing thing for 15 years or so...)
Getting back into it a couple years ago, I looked at both N and HO (even thought a bit about 2-rail O, and more recently (within the past couple months) G scale. I just started really looking at G scale prices, and they're pretty high.
It's really great how much you can fit in a given space in N scale, but the size of it just doesn't make my heart go pitter-pat like HO does. (O is even better, but the space and cost requirements just steer me back to HO).
HO truly seems like it gives you the biggest bang for your buck (Thank you Athearn!!!). It's sort of the "every man's" scale. Kids could buy HO stuff at the toy store, the hardcore brass collectors have HO, it's just everywhere. I think that popularity just drives the cost way down.
You can go detail crazy, or just buy Athearn BB equipment for pretty cheap and get yourself a huge "fleet" of equipment.
A couple years ago I was dead set on N scale for a few days. I only had one piece of HO equipment in the home - an HO 40 ft boxcar. Just looking at that boxcar made me know HO was the way to go for me. I'm quite sure other people must feel the same way about other scales, both smaller and larger.
I have built in O and N gauges but now believe H-O has the most to offer and a decent layout can be built in a single room or a 4 x 8 foot layout if one doesn't have much space. It is fairly easy to model most time periods. I am also in this scale for my son who only knows modern times. We model 2003 after the CSX takeover in a generic New England settings with plausible industries for this area. The amount of ready-to-run rolling stock & engines, some detailed to specific roads and smaller ready built buildings are great for arthritic hands, and more and more details are coming on the market, thanks to Athearn, Wathers and many other companies
http://community.webshots.com/user/connrail
Hey Phillip,
Thanks for asking!
It is in my blood! Pure and simple!
My great grandfather had an HO scale layout way back when, and my grandfather had an HO scale layout in the 50's and 60's, my dad and I built an HO scale layout in the 70's, and I have been into model railroading off and on since then.
How could I jump ship now?
BTW, this is the only known remaining piece of rolling stock from my grandfathers old layout.
Ryan BoudreauxThe Piedmont Division Modeling The Southern Railway, Norfolk & Western & Norfolk Southern in HO during the merger eraCajun Chef Ryan
My first train was a clockwork Lionel then later kibri wood sets. Then later I got interested in plastic scale models of all sorts and Hot Wheels. It wasn't until I was a teenager that I got reinterested in model railroading. HO scale has been my preferance because it's a good compomise for space, size, cost and availability (oh yeah and vision). I have some N and Lionel and O stuff but I keep levetating back to HO. 1:87 seems to be just right, at least for me.
wrestling with the question of a tiny scale like O but increasingly tending towards 7/8n2 and 7/8n18 scale. Much easier to see and work on like this 27" derelect boxcar, ala Maine 2'
HO for two reasons:
1) It was what was given to me by "Santa." (http://www.dallasmodelworks.com/about/about_us.html)
2) For me, HO feels like just the right size for detail and space.
N is obviously brilliant for expansive scenery but seems limited when it comes to detail.
O does detail but I can't begin to imagine how big a space you might need to do a layout that didn't feel crammed.
3) Third bonus reason: there just seems to be a lot more locos, rolling stock and accessories available in HO than any other scale.
Craig
DMW
heshute wrote:I chose Z scale in 1979 whilst I was stationed overseas. Space was limited. Portability was essential. I built a 3 foot by 5 foot portable layout
Well when I was given my first train set in the mid 1950s it was the smallest scale available and affordable. OO/HO.
Being here in UK meant the strange blend of 4mm / 3.5mm that you probably don't really have over there.
Ever since things have evolved and changed but now when I ponder a smaller scale I think fingers, thumbs and specs and stay put! If retirement in 8 years time didn't mean a smaller house I might even think about O guage!!
By the way Philip thanks for the tag line on your original message:
Preach the Gospel at all times, use words if necessary.
Martin Truscott, UK
RevM wrote: By the way Philip thanks for the tag line on your original message: Preach the Gospel at all times, use words if necessary.
It's my signature on all of my posts. It really says it all, doesn't it?