Great Model Railroads 2020

[thomasjmdavis]

Agree 100%... The latest cover at the hobby shop was a Santa Fe SD45 in Bicentenial pulling 2 tone gray passenger cars on a multi level shear cliff mountain spagetti bowl... (Ohh are those Santa Fe cars?? [picks up magazine..] .. Nope! New York Central ... Then I think I spent the next five minutes wondering why 1 person would own BOTH of those things.. let alone have them on the same train..

~Ian

I think the answer to "who would own both of those....and have them on the same train" is that many N scalers (at the moment including me) are primarily collectors. Some collect "themes" and others just buy what they like. They may also have a layout for the primary purpose of displaying the collection.  Now, there is nothing "wrong" with this, but it is a frame of mind more like that of a Lionel collector, or perhaps a curator of an N scale rail museum, than like a detail oriented HO modeler.  Look at the percentage of Micro-trains releases, for instance, that are "collector" cars without any pretense of being scale models of some real railroad paint scheme.  Add to that the collectors who buy all things Circus, or all things Santa Fe, or all things in Tuscan red.  And let's not forget the dozens of Con-Cor foobie passenger trains.  Who buys AT&SF "blue goose scheme" passenger cars, anyway?  Well. somebody does, as they have done several runs over the course of the past 40 years, and still on sale even today, apparently purchased in preference (by somebody) to a Super Chief or El Capitan off the shelf from Kato.

I have been quite successful collecting- although I do have a theme that works well- I am collecting equipment for modeling a major Midwestern urban terminal with a major passenger station and numerous freight houses, circa 1954- 1956.  I probably have enough passenger car projects to last the rest of my life.  Not that it will stop me from purchasing some single window coaches.

And I have to confess myself that I am making virtually no progress on a layout that I keep finding excuses not to work on.  I feel almost obligated to completely remodel the basement first.  I can still hang sheetrock, but truth is, I am a decade past being able to lug it down the rickety basement stairs.

Of my 5 previous N scale layouts, 1 was a "false start",  2 never got beyond the "this building might look good here" stage, one was reasonably operational with major industries in place, and one- a 2x8 module with loop modules that fit on the ends to form a dogbone, actually got to the point where "downtown" had curbs, backyards had grass, the track was ballasted, and some amount  of weathering had been done.

[mrp]

My layout was in GMR 2007, and the experience was generally positive. Bernie Kempenski took the photos; without him, no article. Lack of good photos is likely the main reason many layouts are not published, regardless of scale.

Kalmbach built up the detailed track plan from the photos. All I had was a benchwork footprint with a mainline sketch. It took a few iterations, but it came out fine.

The text I wrote survived mostly intact, though GMR did the photo captions.

The only gripe I had was not enough pages. After talking to some other folks who have been in GMR, this may be more garden variety author griping than anything else.

I didn’t encounter any hostility to N scale on their part. If anything, it was the opposite. They were more than happy to have a large N scale layout to balance out the magazine. They want to sell magazines; it doesn’t help them to ignore a big chunk of the market.

The whole thing was unplanned on my part. A member of my operating crew knew Bernie via N trak layout setups, and contacted him about taking photos of my layout. Bernie was in my area on vacation and came by for a day to take pictures. I’m not sure it would have been worth a special trip or not. At the time, Bernie lived in the Washington, DC area and I am in Oak Ridge, NC. At some point, the travel time and expenses begin to exceed the value of the article to the magazines.

Probably time to contact them for an update article.

Michael Pennie

[Ed Kapuscinski]

My layout was in GMR 2007, and the experience was generally positive.

I just took a look. Neat layout! I'd love to see more photos of it (I agree about wishing there were more pages).

[John]

Ok, I went out and purchased the latest GMR today .. $ 9.00 -- pretty steep .. took it to the office and skimmed it .. overall, it wasn't bad -- and a couple of the layouts illustrated some really good points.  I liked the Story City article .. its a good concept.  Not sure why they included the article on the commercially built layout, but its also nicely done ..  I'm still reading the rest before I form any more opinions, but I don't think its worth the money I paid for it -- certainly not one of their better efforts

[Cajonpassfan]

Ok, I went out and purchased the latest GMR today .. $ 9.00 -- pretty steep .. took it to the office and skimmed it .. overall, it wasn't bad -- and a couple of the layouts illustrated some really good points.  I liked the Story City article .. its a good concept.  Not sure why they included the article on the commercially built layout, but its also nicely done ..  I'm still reading the rest before I form any more opinions, but I don't think its worth the money I paid for it -- certainly not one of their better efforts

John, there’s supposed to be a Cajon layout in it? If so, we’ll done?
I don’t have a hobby shop nearby to go look at the mag... and don’t want to order on line sight unseen.
Thanks, Otto

[Point353]

I don’t have a hobby shop nearby to go look at the mag... and don’t want to order on line sight unseen.

Is there a Barnes & Noble bookstore near you?

[John]

John, there’s supposed to be a Cajon layout in it? If so, we’ll done?
I don’t have a hobby shop nearby to go look at the mag... and don’t want to order on line sight unseen.
Thanks, Otto

Yup .. page 78 .. will have to look at it tmrw ..

[learmoia]

I think the answer to "who would own both of those....and have them on the same train" is that many N scalers (at the moment including me) are primarily collectors. Some collect "themes" and others just buy what they like.

Yeah... I totally get that... My vintage collection is somewhat varried as well.. and 'Its my railroad, I'll do what I want'...

But my poorly made point, was.. I have a Santa Fe Train, and. New York Central Train... If my railroad was to be featured in a national publication. I'm not going to run my Santa Fe engine with my NYC train on the day photos are taken for the article.. And I'm going to make DAMN SURE that the cover photo doesnt include any portion of both of those trains together.

Knowing it's in public view, it should be presentable to a broad audience.. and mix and match non prototypical is 'toylike' in my mind (and I assume others).   I wouldnt want to portray the scale as toylike.

You don't see (or I dont notice) those types of HO layouts featured in MR..

~Ian

[peteski]

You don't see (or I dont notice) those types of HO layouts featured in MR..

~Ian

But you probably see that (toy-like) type of 0 scale layouts featured in magazines. 

[thomasjmdavis]

Yeah... I totally get that... My vintage collection is somewhat varried as well.. and 'Its my railroad, I'll do what I want'...

But my poorly made point, was.. I have a Santa Fe Train, and. New York Central Train... If my railroad was to be featured in a national publication. I'm not going to run my Santa Fe engine with my NYC train on the day photos are taken for the article.. And I'm going to make DAMN SURE that the cover photo doesnt include any portion of both of those trains together.

Knowing it's in public view, it should be presentable to a broad audience.. and mix and match non prototypical is 'toylike' in my mind (and I assume others).   I wouldnt want to portray the scale as toylike.

You don't see (or I dont notice) those types of HO layouts featured in MR..

~Ian

Ian, I completely agree with you.  I do know folks whose collections seem random to me.  But how something like that ends up on the cover of a magazine is beyond me.  I did not mean my comment as a critique of yours.  Your remarks got me thinking.

[wm3798]

Agree 100%... The latest cover at the hobby shop was a Santa Fe SD45 in Bicentenial pulling 2 tone gray passenger cars on a multi level shear cliff mountain spagetti bowl... (Ohh are those Santa Fe cars?? [picks up magazine..] .. Nope! New York Central ... Then I think I spent the next five minutes wondering why 1 person would own BOTH of those things.. let alone have them on the same train..

~Ian

If you read the article, the modeler is a retired secret service guy and he was describing the operations of a presidential campaign train.  His layout is set in New York State, hence the NYC car, and the bicentennial unit was added to the special.
The problem might be that N Scale doesn't slather their covers with expository prose, so without opening it, it's hard to judge what's inside.
There are a lot of "spaghetti bowls" wot there, but I dare say that's what most layouts tend to be.  Even my old layout, which I worked hard to photograph in ways to disguise it, was a terrible tangle.
But that, to me, is what defines a great model railroad.
It's the creation of an illusion, the feel of a time and place, and if it floats your boat, an operating scheme that lets you conduct an interesting game of pretend.
Endless modules that depict a railroad inch for inch are indeed impressive, but while they might be long on skilled execution, they tend to lack imagination.
You really have to work hard to create a long run in a smaller space, folding it over itself, then disguising it with scenery tricks to break it down into a series of believable vignettes.

Lee

[robert3985]

Even though many layouts are "spaghetti bowls" because of space limitations, N-scale offers the opportunity to build a layout that's only half as crowded as an HO-scale layout that's the same size.  Part of the reason that spaghetti bowls are common is because a very dominant tendency for layout builders is to attempt to fit as much into their available space as they can...and N-scale looks more crowded from a God's Eye View than an HO-scale layout that's identical in proportion...just because you can't as easily take the whole layout in without moving your head...and N-scale is just "there" for you to look at without moving your eyes from point to point as much.

This is because of the scenery-to-track ratio, and as we know, if you build an N-scale layout to the same trackplan as an HO-scale one...the same size, but pull adjacent trackage closer together, you get a much much more pleasing layout in the same space as the HO-scale one...with space for dominating scenery, bigger urban/industrial areas, more siding space, larger yards and set-up trackage.  When I say "larger" I mean a larger effective volume for 1/160th structures and trains to occupy...nearly twice as much, which is significant.

My LDE of Devils Slide/Wilhemina Pass/Ideal Concrete Plant was two 6' long Ntrak modules, with blue line being diverted to run behind the skyboard.  I never got the Ideal Concrete Plant finished, because I'd used "Plumber's Honey" flux to solder all the turnouts together, and it ate the ties, ballast and the solder since I didn't wash the finished turnouts (live and learn eh?).  Overall, the actual LDE was about 8 feet long if you didn't count the blue line going into tunnels that weren't in the actual location on either end of the scene.

Photos I took of it comprised between 4' and 6' of length visible in the photos, and the scenery was complex, but the track plan was dead simple...just two superelevated mainlines running through red cliffs and an obviously man-cut river on the near side, with a cantilever signal bridge at the 1000-Mile Tree Monument, which is actually there in Wilhemina Pass...now minus the cantilever bridge.  Total depth of the scene was about 18" or less as the track cut a large-radius S curve through the scenery, just like in reality.  The tops of the rock formations were about 2' 8" from the front fascia.

I enjoyed immensely visitors stopping and doing a double-take...then finding me and telling me that they watch trains "right there, on that rock"...or that they fly-fish just below the signal bridge where my little Preiser fly-fisherman was located in his hip-waders.

That being said, to duplicate this scene in HO scale would mean it would have to total 24' long, the track would average 3' from the front fascia, and the tops of the rock formations would be 40" away.  Minimum mainline curvature would be 48", and I'm not really sure just how tall the rock cliffs would be...probably wouldn't fit in a room with a "normal" ceiling height.

Obviously, this is a LARGE scene, even for N-scale, but for Ntrak, it was just two 6' modules.

In HO-scale, it would be virtually impossible to duplicate it proportionally simply because of its weight, size and the length of a human arm.

When I compare the perspectives of the real location to the photos I've taken of my LDE, it's pretty obvious that I've selectively compressed it a great deal, but if there aren't photos to directly compare, then the overall effect is having people describe the locations and names of formations on the cliffs and show me photos of trains they've taking from several vantage points.

I've posted photos of this area before, but it was a finished scene.  I thought it might be interesting to post a photo of it before it was complete...at least about 7' of it.

Photo (1) - Wilhemina Pass Ntrak modules with blue line diverting into the cliffs at the end of the right module:


As much as we bad-mouth Model Railroader, several N-scale layouts they've built incorporate some very advanced scenery separation techniques, and emphasize N-scale's scenery-to-track-ratio pretty well.  I'm not crazy about their use of Kato Unitrack, but...oh well...the layout still captured the "look" of modern mainline railroading in the Southwest.

When I design my layout sections, they are specifically designed to be photographed, and now that I've got one of the best smart-phone cameras and extra apps to go along with it, I am looking forward to taking more and better photos than I ever could get with my old Nikon F2 on its tripod with my 60mm Micro Nikkor f2.8 lens stopped down to f22 with Fulichrome Velvia positive film with an ASA of 64.  That seems like it was in the last century!  WAIT!!  IT WAS!!

Truth is, it doesn't take a lot of effort to detail the Hell out of scenery.  It's the best effort-to-reward part of model railroading.  Let me give you an example.  I'd spent a couple of weeks detailing out a couple of Overland brass Centennials and getting them to run halfway decently...I did the superdetailing thing, bought special decals, bought a book about 'em, did a color test of commercially available model train paints to see what was the most accurate...y'know...having a great time!  I was test running them and my little sons Rob and Ben were helping me of course, asking all sorts of relatively intelligent questions about the real engines...at 5 and 6 years old, it was actually pretty remarkable.  Down the stairs comes their mother, and the first thing she asks me...interrupting the boys...is "How much did those cost???"...and "When did you buy them???"  I attempted to show her what I'd done to them, but she just turned around and went back to watching TV or whatever she was doing that Saturday afternoon.

Two weeks later, I decided after a bit of research and getting my reference photos together, that I was going to carve the rock cut on the west end of Wilhemina Canyon, as well as the natural rock formations lining the Weber River there...sooooo...I mixed up my plaster, and started applying it to the Styrofoam forms, and it took me about 15 minutes to get it where I wanted it.  I had accelerated its curing by using vinegar...then I started some more fine carving with a couple of dental picks and a couple of worn-out file cards...and then I started staining and painting it.  About 40 minutes into the project, I hear the wife's footsteps coming down the stairs to the layout room and she comes over and looks over my shoulder at what I'm doing...and doesn't say anything.  I'm busy with getting the dry-brushing just right and in about two minutes, I'm done.  She stoops over, gets down almost to the point that her nose is touching the newly carved cliffs, and she says "THAT is the best thing you've ever done in model railroading!"  She didn't give a damn about my engines, or my cars, or even my scratchbuilt structures, but that little rock-cut and the cliff were something that she could relate to...even though it only took about about 45 minutes total to finish, as opposed to hours and hours with my other stuff.

So, I guess what I'm getting at is that even if you have a spaghetti bowl layout, with a little effort, looking at prototype references, taking those intimidating photos of your work (which show every flaw), there are surely some areas of it that can be really detailed out with a bit of thought, good photos taken and submitted to the magazine of your choice and some wide recognition gained.  Hey, it feels GOOD!

Bed time...

Cheerio!
Bob Gilmore

[CRL]

@robert3985 is absolutely correct about scenery being the best effort-to-reward in model railroading. Plus, it’s cheap to accomplish a lot.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

@robert3985 is absolutely correct about scenery being the best effort-to-reward in model railroading. Plus, it’s cheap to accomplish a lot.

Haha, until you price out the GOOD stuff... lol

https://www.sceneryexpress.com/Martin-Welberg-Studios/products/1379/

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Oh, also, this thread convinced me to dust off my old GMR article, reach out to Hal Miller and ask if we can get enough photos that work from the stuff I shot before the layout came down.

Fingers crossed!