Model Railroading...Anyone?

I play with model trains myself. I unabashedly use the word play. For that is what I do. By no means am I trying to emulate some particular rail pass, nor do I ever want to do that. I want to have fun.

There is something mystically wonderful about laying those big segments of O-gauge track out across the floor. Over the carpet, through the doorways, stacked up on books for trestles and such. Battling the cats, listening to that thump-thump as those big locomotives cross the joints, the smell of the smoke pellets. I love it.

Some day I want to build a special oval on a 4x8 board as a box diorama. It would involve dragons, and a segment of loose track across a frozen lake, and a leap from a broken trestle.

Jim Pettengill wrote: Anyone on this forum who has even a passing interest in model railroading needs to read Sam Posey's book Playing With Trains. It's a great look at the hobby, and a good insight into Sam himself, including racing references and his problems with Parkinson's.

Very true. Great book. I read it a year or two ago.

Best part about 3 rail is you can do a reversing loop without all the magic electron BS.

Appleseed wrote: Best part about 3 rail is you can do a reversing loop without all the magic electron BS.

Haha! I was going to post that, but didn't! I still remember the first time I did a reversing loop with HO. Took me a minute or two of scratching my head. DOH! I was using a plastic roadbed snap-track with copper contacts, so I just isolated it with a little piece of electrical tape.

Years ago I inherited an HO scale hand made train set. Many cars and locomotives. It was built by an incredibly talented uncle of mine who was an electrical enginerer. Unfortunately, he was also an alcoholic and died young. I've never set it up because I never had the space or any trackcage. I'm afraid the trucks and couplers are too fragile now for it to ever be used.

spitfirebill wrote: Years ago I inherited an HO scale hand made train set. Many cars and locomotives. It was built by an incredibly talented uncle of mine who was an electrical enginerer. Unfortunately, he was also an alcoholic and died young. I've never set it up because I never had the space or any trackcage. I'm afraid the trucks and couplers are too fragile now for it to ever be used.

Couplers and trucks are easily replaceable. If you're not up to it. A nice display shelf with some of the locomotives and rolling stock would be nice.

I also looked at the 2012 MTH catalog last night. Wow do they have a lot of awesome stuff. I'm still not paying $1400 for a model locomotive though.

SyntheticBlinkerFluid wrote:

spitfirebill wrote: Years ago I inherited an HO scale hand made train set. Many cars and locomotives. It was built by an incredibly talented uncle of mine who was an electrical enginerer. Unfortunately, he was also an alcoholic and died young. I've never set it up because I never had the space or any trackcage. I'm afraid the trucks and couplers are too fragile now for it to ever be used.

Couplers and trucks are easily replaceable. If you're not up to it. A nice display shelf with some of the locomotives and rolling stock would be nice.

There's a company called Kadee that sells knuckle coupler kits that fit just about any HO scale loco or car out there. More modern rolling stock have knuckle couplers as standard and all fit the Kadee #5 coupler, which is considered the go-to coupler in HO scale model railroading. Plenty of companies also sell replacement trucks and/or metal wheelsets.

I've been on-and-off with HO-scale model railroading since I was a child. There was a hobby shop close to my grandparent's house that I would visit often. I could never get an actual layout going due to space and money restrictions. Now that I have moved, I have a walk-in closet that I plan to build a small layout into. I already have a planned theme and a ton of rolling stock (some of which I have to sell). In the meantime, I'm looking for a display case so my stuff isn't just collecting dust in the closet.

I used to be into HO Scale big-time in my teenage years. My folks made me dismantle the layout and box it all up before I went to college. I also used the train hobby as a way to create a web site about model railroading - the site is still functioning today. I keep it online because the advertising revenue breaks even with the hosting and DNS fees. Some day I'd like to get back into it - the trains and the web site.

The technology has advanced in the last 10-15 years, that's for sure. I used to like the older MR magazines with projects, back when Radio Shack clerks actually knew what a potentiometer was and people used to build electronics kits.

Thanks for the reminder. I think I'm going to find some ez-track to go underneath my tree this holiday season.

SyntheticBlinkerFluid wrote: I also looked at the 2012 MTH catalog last night. Wow do they have a lot of awesome stuff. I'm still not paying $1400 for a model locomotive though.

Bah, those are toys. Step up to the big leagues: I kid, but honestly I can't imagine what kind of disposable income you'd need to do live steam. That's a whole level of insanity higher than electric trains. Note the cap he's wearing; probably drives a 7 series.

ddavidv wrote:

SyntheticBlinkerFluid wrote: I also looked at the 2012 MTH catalog last night. Wow do they have a lot of awesome stuff. I'm still not paying $1400 for a model locomotive though.

Bah, those are toys. Step up to the big leagues: I kid, but honestly I can't imagine what kind of disposable income you'd need to do live steam. That's a whole level of insanity higher than electric trains. Note the cap he's wearing; probably drives a 7 series.

Wow. Live steam. That's some hardcore E36 M3 right there.

I played with my father's old Lionel trains as a kid. For some reason, they ended up in my grandparent's (mother's side) basement and when I'd go visit them for the summer, we'd set up an oval on a large (ping pong) table. I'd run them around until they flew off the track, crashign to the floor below. Fortunately, those trains were tough and shrugged off the abuse.

Eventually, my father took them back when my parents split. I think he finally sold them a few years ago...

I know of a couple of model train places in PA. One in Quakertown and another off Rt 33 near Bethlehem. While browsing the one in Quakertown a few years ago, I saw an HO scale E30 M3 in the display. I talked them into selling me one of them.

ddavidv,

You my friend need to make sure you get to this show at the York Expo center com January.

http://www.cabinfeverexpo.com/

Real scale steam engines are but a minor part of all the amazing stuff to be seen and drooled over. This is boy toys gone wild.

Conveniently rationalized by the addition of the Greenburg train show going on in another building on the grounds.

When I was a kid, my Aunt and I would stay at her cabin in the mountains north of L.A. There was a guy up there that had a steam train he could ride on. He built a full trestle style bridge to scale, had a turn table in his shop, etc. The locomotive was probably about 2 ft tall. Also, similar trains were run at Griffith Park, if I recall. If not Griffith Park, it was real close to there, kinda at the south end of where Glendale and Burbank come together.

foxtrapper wrote: ddavidv, You my friend need to make sure you get to this show at the York Expo center com January. http://www.cabinfeverexpo.com/ Real scale steam engines are but a minor part of all the amazing stuff to be seen and drooled over. This is boy toys gone wild. Conveniently rationalized by the addition of the Greenburg train show going on in another building on the grounds.

I've been at the Greenburg show with my N-trak club. But no, no, no, I do not need to go to that "model engineering" show. I have enough expensive hobbies already. I mean, do I really need to be tempted by this stuff?

Lots and lots more photos here: Cabin Fever 2010

Finally took a few pictures of this year's layout. Will post a video as soon as I figure out how

In reply to Wally:

Looks like you have a good balance of newer and older running stock.

One of these days I'm gonna get a Christmas display except mines gonna be a table because we have dogs.

I am not a 'model railroader' but my father was obsessed with it for about 20yrs from the late 60s to the mid-80s before an addiction to clock-making required more space.

I had a lot of fun as a kid playing with them but never quite got the bug for building sprawling layouts.

In any case - he was an N gauge guy. It is remarkable how much you can do with that size in the same space it takes to do a basic O gauge oval loop. He had a whole round-house, side-outs, 3 complete circuits, a mountain pass, village and river on a 4x10 shaped up with homasote board and plaster of paris.

Due to my decidedly biased upbringing I've always thought anything larger than HO was silly, and a waste of space but... then again, I don't do railroads. We have 2 lanes of slot cars laid out like Suzuka under our tree

In reply to SyntheticBlinkerFluid:

The NYC Passsenger train the wife bought me for a Wedding gift so that we had a train under out tree. She picked it becasue her grandfather worked for NYC and she wanted the passenger train because much of the ime we dated we took the train between her house in Albany and mine on Long Island. The green and red steam engine was a gift from her last year, and the black steam engine was one of my Dad's. The freight cars are a combination of new ones we found on sale and inexpensive used ones we picked up at shows. We have to make room for a fourth because tonight my mother in law gave us her father's complete O gauge set from the late 40's. So far the dogs, my cocker spanniel, my parent's Yorkie, and my brother's Ridgeback, have all been good with leaving the trains and village alone.

Giant Purple Snorklewacker wrote: Due to my decidedly biased upbringing I've always thought anything larger than HO was silly, and a waste of space

My N gauge club laughingly refers to HO as "Horribly Oversize". Ironically, I've since jumped right over HO to On30.

Does the On30 train need special track or does it run on HO. I was looking at how to add my newest train for next year and decided if I got a flat screen and hung it on the wall I'd have another 6x4 spot to work with, and wile drawing up a plan found a spot I could run my Dad's Burro crane and maybe a narrow gauge mine train across the back.

It works on HO scale track.

http://modeltrains.about.com/od/oscale/a/What-Is-On30-Scale.htm

ddavidv wrote: My N gauge club laughingly refers to HO as "Horribly Oversize".

I haven't really priced out N scale stuff, but is it much cheaper than HO?

My only issue with N scale is that It's not as detailed (or at least used to be) than the larger scales and I'm a stickler for detail.

ddavidv wrote:

Giant Purple Snorklewacker wrote: Due to my decidedly biased upbringing I've always thought anything larger than HO was silly, and a waste of space

My N gauge club laughingly refers to HO as "Horribly Oversize". Ironically, I've since jumped right over HO to On30.

I always thought it was stupid for them not to have made HO aligned with the Matchboxes at (1:43 or 1:64 ?) so I could have a realistic looking set of cool cars to crash into at intersections.

I love the idea of being able to make a complex layout on a wee door. N sure is great for that.

But, a locomotive that get stopped by a single hair wrapped around its axle? Car so small that I can't see if they are on the track or not without reading glasses?

Hmm, maybe we should do a swap meet in this thread. I'll toss up my N gauge stuff for 3 rail O gauge stuff.