Large Scale Central

1/29 scale correct track, not 45mm? Ideas, comments, etc

Track and Trestles
#41
Quote:
... As a 'younger' modeller maybe you think that time is on your side and you have forever to build to your requirements. I can assure you that your available hobby time will become very limited as life and family interrupt your life. Right now maybe you think you have all the time in the world, but family responsibility will intervene and limit what time you really have. Will you spend all this time scratcbuilding new track (reinventing the wheel) or will you simply run trains and enjoy yourself doing so on commercially available track. Only time will tell. Dreams do not often become reality.
Tim, you seem to be suggesting that hand-laying track in general is a waste of time, because the work involved in hand-laying your track is the same regardless of whether the gauge is 45mm, 32mm, 70mm, or anything in between. I would counter with the notion that the aesthetic of hand-laid track is unmatched by any commercial track on the market, so if you're after a particular look to your track--regardless of the gauge--then you do the work to achieve it. So what if Craig can't run trains for a little bit while he builds enough track to make running a train worthwhile. That's his motivating requirement, thus worth the effort to achieve. That's the exact same scenario my dad and I faced 32 years ago when we were planning our railroad. There was no commercial track that did what we needed it to do, so dad and I spent 2 years building our own track and switches, laying it down 6' at a time. Sure, operations were "limited" (to say the least) during construction, but the results quickly proved worth the effort. If it's important to you, don't compromise.

Yes, with an incompatible track gauge, Craig has to spend time resetting the wheels on each piece of equipment he buys. So what? I spend my time scratchbuilding or customizing each piece of equipment on my railroad. There’s no difference. Each is a mandatory step to ensure the model fits in well with what we’re trying to accomplish on our railroads. An under-gauged truck would be as detrimental to the atmosphere Craig’s working to create on his railroad as a shiny box car would be to mine.

A hobby isn’t a race to be won, but a journey to be enjoyed. There will always be things to take available time away from your hobbies. The key is to enjoy the time when you do have it. No, few of us will ever build our “dream” railroads. But can “dream” railroads even be built, or are they simply a collection of abstract ideals from which we choose when building in whatever location we happen to be? The trick isn’t to build your dream railroad, but build your railroad such that it allows you to dream.

Later,

K

#42

Kevin,
at no point did I state that handlaying track was a ‘waste of time’. Read my previous comments as to how modellers gain their enjoyment from this hobby. Not once did I denigrate any person who handlays track. I consider the practice an art in itself and I am aware that many, in all scales/gauges enjoy this pursuit.

     Craig stated that he would like to share his railroad with others and yet by setting track specs outside what the normal modeller pursues,  then any modeller would need to adapt to his requirements.  I have applauded several times Craig's wish to embrace a track gauge accurate to his chosen scale.  I have also commented that not all in 1/29 scale is to actual scale,  thus pedantic adherence to track gauge is diminished by compromises in the models themselves.

     Also Craig seems very persistent to push this track scale.  Those who have a desire to embrace actual scale may be drawn in this direction, but for most the scale issue of 45mm is not that strong a detraction.  I really believe that few give it more than a passing glance.  The most pedantic followers of scale are undoubtedly the 1/32 scale crowd,  followed by the 3 foot,  1/20.3 modellers.  For most of the rest of us track is just for our trains to run on.  Look to the many who embrace many scales to run on their generic 45mm track.  We all gain enjoyment from different aspects of the hobby from the person who runs once a year around the Christmas tree,  to the die-hard modeller who must have everything to 'scale', including modelling timeframe and actual reproductions of equipment for that period.  Some even gain enjoyment from simply looking at shelf queens on the mantlepiece.
#43

Tim,
Sharing my RR with others doesn’t require that I have a common track standard. If I want to run operations and invite people over I would already supply the rolling stock, and motive power. As I said before any another other scale of the hobby if one was pursuing the goal of prototype modeling it wouldn’t be expected that another era or scale would have to operate on my railroad. Kevin for example models the East Broad Top. I wouldn’t expect Kevin to host an operating session and be happy with my bringing over my 1970 diesel locomotives to run on his layout. It doesn’t make since to me to require that kind of interoperability.
And if I never complete my goals before I die I still will be enjoying the hobby because I’m working on something that I want too, and desire to model. I’ve gone through the whole experience of quickly throwing down track, and having a train run around. I personally lost interest in the hobby for a while because it wasn’t what I wanted. So having learned from that experience, I’m moving forward, and the track gauge issue is only one aspect.

Craig

#44

When I moved West and switched to IIm (1:22.5 scale on 45mm gauge) most of my friends back East couldn’t believe it. The general comment: “You mean at your age (at the time 54) you start to play with toys?”.

While not a waste of time handlaying 45mm track is certainly for the dedicated! I used to have a HOm (12mm gauge) layout with 750 feet of handlaid track along with 140 handlaid turnouts and 4 handlaid doubleslip switches It was a no brainer to only handlay stuff (turnouts) because I really think the Code332 stuff is Elephant track for 1:22.5!
The 45mm track is actually 1% too narrow for 1:22.5, but rather than worry about that I soon discovered all kinds of scale discrepancies with the rolling stock.
Like most things in LS - BTW LS should stand for Large Stuff since the Scale is mostly absent! - it was one large, happy jumble of whatever the mfgs decided was close enough and/or the consumer too “dumb” to notice or for that matter care.

Good for Craig if he wants to tackle the track discrepancy first; in his shoes I would tackle all the other discrepancies i.e. inconsistent scale in most any respect, first. Adjusting/replacing the wheelsets - Sierra Valley would be a good source - to happen later.
Devious me would also invite other LSers to bring their “1:29” BN equipment over, that would serve as a nice contrast between what is (normally) and what could be (with an attention to details). A small switching layout with Code 215 track would do for that purpose, major track handlaying saved for later.

As always strictly my opinion.

PS They don’t have these problems in the smaller scales? Ha ha, I’m in the process of proofing once more that snap track is a crock and doesn’t lend itself to construct realistic looking track work. In N Scale! It looks questionable on the monitor and will look no better when built.

PPS @ Craig

Great idea! I’ve done that for years and years! I also gnashed my teeth for years and years when another of my kitbashed or scratchbuilt cars hit the ground because someone wasn’t paying attention. What I needed was trapdoors in the floor to have certain operators “disappear”.

#45

Tim, I’m confused then. You wrote “Will you spend all this time scratcbuilding new track (reinventing the wheel) or will you simply run trains and enjoy yourself doing so on commercially available track.” The use of the phrase “reinventing the wheel” implies a sense of wasting time for no good reason, thus my assumption you were suggesting Craig would be wasting his time hand-laying track. He’s made it clear through this thread that the commercial track isn’t an option, so the notion that he’d be able to enjoy himself with precisely that compromise confuses me. It’d be like me saying shiny diesels are devil’s spawn, then you suggesting I’d enjoy running shiny diesels.

I definitely understand the concept of compromise in the interest of expediency. That’s the premise by which the Tuscarora Railroad came about. When I moved out to Colorado, I shifted from 1:24 to 1:20.3, selling all my old rolling stock off or scrapping it for future projects. I was starting over. I wanted to model the EBT, but there were no commercial EBT locomotive models available. I knew if I did want to get something running, I’d have to either scratchbuild an EBT loco (fairly time consuming), or use one of the various commercial locos as a stop-gap just to have something that moves, allowing me to spend my time concentrating on building the rolling stock since I was starting over there, too. So the rolling stock was built after EBT prototypes, and TRR #2 and #3 were turned out of the shops fairly quickly to provide ready motive power for the slowly-growing fleet of cars. Yet, those two locos–despite being “stop-gap” locos, were still customized to my liking prior to being placed in service. They weren’t just willy-nilly thrown on the track for lack of “true” equipment. The mythology of the TRR was drawn from history, and these two locomotives were built to be plausible within that context. The irony is that they took nearly as long to build as any of the EBT prototypes I’ve built since.

In terms of sharing the railroad, each of us builds our railroads for different reasons. Mine is a personal railroad. It’s a complete canvas–the buildings, plants, figures, trains–they all combine to create a sense of atmosphere. Railroads like Marty Cozad’s or Fr. Fred’s for example are designed on a much more social foundation. They’re designed to be enjoyed by multiple operators, and don’t have a strong over-arching theme which would render others’ trains “out of place” as they would be on my railroad. When I have an open house at my place, it’s solely to show of my little personal world to others. It’s much like an artist opening his studio. You get to come in and see what inspires me, and enjoy my vision of the hobby, but the idea is you draw inspiration and go home to apply it.

Later,

K

#46

Kevin,
Nicely said! Having had the experience of building a layout that I wasn’t completely satisfied with to begin with began to change my perspective and ideas on what I wanted if I started over. Well now I have that opportunity to fix my mistakes.

And I don’t consider building track a waste of time, for it allows me to keep working on the hobby even if I don’t have a layout currently. So when I get done with school I can potentially have a stock of track ready to go. :slight_smile: It’s either that or walk away from the hobby for 2 years and hope that I’m still interested. So I’m working on one aspect that I know I want to correct.

Craig

#47

Kevin,
my reference to reinventing the wheel is that for many, if not most of the standard gauge 1/29 modellers, the factory track is sufficient for their needs. I agree that the width difference is noticable and rather impressive and, as several times before, applaud Craig for his intent in scratching another track gauge. I did not state nor intend that he was ‘wasting his time’. For Craig, the new gauge is what rocks his boat. For others, the work required to attain this goal is not that importatant and so they suffice with stock factory rail, with a growing emphasis on a shift away from 332 profile.

     It would be a very brave manufacturer to take up the new gauge as basically there is totally zero support as regards ready to run equipment and a 'why bother' attitude from the general hobby.  This in no way implies that Craig is wasting his time.  We have all had grandiose plans in our younger years.  Some come to fruition and some do not.  That is the nature of planning.  

     I believe that Craig has the right attitude and ability to succeed in his venture and if one reads the thread on the other place, initial reaction was why bother, but by the end of the thread there seemed a lot of support, but then those offering support were doing multiple postings.  Will this catch on - hardly likely as most hobbyists are not that anal that everything must be to scale.  Overall, the venture is a compromise,  as existing wheel standards are being used and existing non proto scaled equipment is being modified.  Craig is also happy to run non-stock radii.  Once again, even though one attempts to reach scale,  compromise creeps in.

     Largescale is a very, very niche hobby.  It survives economically because many parts are generally accepted as being able to be interchanged between scales.  We generally share common track, switches, trucks, wheels, etc.  'Scale',  or what pretends to be scale,  is taken up in the locomotive and rolling stock.  For many even the rolling stock and locomotives are interchangable, e.g., small 1/20.3 scale locomotive with 1/22.5 rolling stock.  Our hobby commenced as a compromise and economically continues to do so.  Obviously there are thos brave souls who want things to look right.  These are the pioneers.  Look to Scotty with his two foot gauge 1/29 scale Forney.  A marvellous achievement, but limited economic future viability.

     I have not criticised Craig for venturing into his chosen plan,  but it is his plan only, so he should just get on with it and enjoy the benefits that he sees.
#48

I want a pony!

#49

Tim, I got you. I was mistaking your “you” for a reference to Craig and his specific situation, not a generic “you” aimed at a larger population and choices each of us face. Makes sense now.

Absolutely, I don’t see “proper” 1:29 gauge track as being remotely viable on a commercial scale. There were rumors at one point a few years ago that one of the manufacturers was thinking about it, but we’ve seen seen how far that must have gotten. Prior to the 1:20 revolution, there was a similar push for 1.5" gauge track for those who wanted accuracy in their 1:24 models. That never gained any traction, either. Such pushes for absolute accuracy will, I think, remain the playground of the individual.

But who knows? If you asked back in the mid 90s if “accurate” 3’ gauge models would cause many of us to sell our current 1:24 collections and completely rebuild with new products, we’d have laughed. At that time, the gauge discrepancy didn’t bother us. Yet that’s exactly what many of us have done as we’ve come to appreciate the proper relationship between model and where the rails stick out from beneath it. If a manufacturer wer to start selling replacement axles for 1:29 locos, or properly gauged tie strips? Maybe as more people see what folks like Craig are doing, the movement may gain more traction. Perhaps the hobby has finally begun maturing past the “toy trains in the tulips” era to where the proper relationship between scale and gauge may become a driving consideration.

Let’s revive this thread in 15 years and see where we’ve gone.

Later,

K

#50

Very interesting thread! And I though this was a hobby! Something to enjoy without being anal retentive and being so concerned about “engineering” down the nth level…I thought that I had left that behind at TRW/Hughes Aircraft/Raytheon…As I have been know to say “Whatever makes your boat float!”