Large Scale Central

2019 NGRC Portland Photos!!!

Conventions, Shows, Clubs and Get-Togethers
#41

John,

A little more info on the future of the place. This is a copy of my earlier post.

John asked about who is running Tom Millers layout now that it is sold. For the open house he was there doing the operating. I do know a little about what the future plans are for the place. A local company that makes apple cider is going to build a plant to make hard cider on the property, I’m guessing in the old machine shop building and use the building where the F scale is as a tasting room. The layout will stay. That’s really about all I know. It looks like all the 1.5 scale track is still there. I don’t know what the plans are for that.

#42

Greg Elmassian said:

…

The only thing I thought was not good was that most of the lines around the outside were at 6 foot plus, most people could not see the nice buildings, I took the pictures holding my camera over my head.

…

I had no idea. That is more than disappointing. Yes, Tom may be 6’6" and yeah it is his railroad, but, still, all in all, I have only one thing to say:

#43

I’m 6’ 2" and the around the wall track was just visible to me standing next to it… would like to know some day why it could not have been a foot lower.

This is Ted D. walking under the track, high enough?

#44

If a raised boardwalk were to be built over most of the floor surrounds, short people like me would see the layout better.

-Ted

#45

I just hope that when they put the hard cider tasting room in there that they don’t mess with the railroad. We go trough that area every so often on our way to the Willamette Valley for wine tasting. Now we will have another stop for some hard cider!

#46

Funny comments. I build my railroad for me. If you can enjoy what I create, fine, if not … I don’t care.(https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-wink.gif)

#47

True, but when you build a compound of this size, it’s not just for you, unless you never let anyone visit. Quite the opposite here, all set up for visitors, so I would still love to hear the reasoning why.

It certainly looks impressive, and standing on the second floor observation deck, it gives quite a view, but the thing that gets me is the beautiful detail of all the buildings on that 6-10 foot high area, who can see that to appreciate it? Even a person 4" taller than me would have difficulty. That cuts out a lot of people, as you can see by the pictures.

So all that fine detail seems a bit wasted when it can only be viewed from afar.

But maybe we’ll never know.

Greg

#48

those were my thoughts too, Greg.

John, we all pretty much build how we want it , but if you ever want to have people come see what you accomplished, it would be nice for them to be able to see it. I when designing my RR actually took some of this into consideration, trying to give some places where anyone coming to view it would be able to see the details. But like I said we all build our own, and he must of had a reason.

#49

Pete Lassen said:

those were my thoughts too, Greg.

John, we all pretty much build how we want it , but if you ever want to have people come see what you accomplished, it would be nice for them to be able to see it. I when designing my RR actually took some of this into consideration, trying to give some places where anyone coming to view it would be able to see the details. But like I said we all build our own, and he must of had a reason.

I hear you. My mining district starts at six feet above the ground, that’s the level of the tracks on the bridge, so people have to look up at the mine structures and can’t see the bridge tracks at all, but I am also integrating some steps and a little platform so people can see all the detail at eye level…and they can also look back and get an aerial view of the freight yard from there too.

I get it, to each his own. and I’ll sure as hell never do anything as expansive as what Tom Miller did.

#50

I suspect there were elevated board walks, but somebody twisted an ankle and insurance made them take it out.

I don’t remember this negativity when the mag(s) first visited.

#51

This is what used to be on that balcony…

#52

I have seen that S scale layout. Also downstairs where there is now a large open space he had a beautiful collection of model ships.

There will be many more pictures from the convention layouts and preconvention layouts posted on Flickr at some point. The person who took them is in the process of preparing them.

I will post the link when he has them ready. It will be worth the wait. I think they will be posted in albums by date.

#53

the “balcony” is a large square raised area, and you can see the holes in the carpeting that were the legs for that layout, plus several transformers that power the halogen spotlights underneath the platform.

In any case, if anyone ever talks to the original owner, perhaps the answer can be gleaned. I would like to see if I can find a review of the layout and see how they took pictures. I found a couple of youtube videos and and someone was on a ladder, or had a long stick… a number with cameras on the rolling stock.

Greg

#54

Greg Elmassian said:

the “balcony” is a large square raised area, and you can see the holes in the carpeting that were the legs for that layout, plus several transformers that power the halogen spotlights underneath the platform.

In any case, if anyone ever talks to the original owner, perhaps the answer can be gleaned. I would like to see if I can find a review of the layout and see how they took pictures. I found a couple of youtube videos and and someone was on a ladder, or had a long stick… a number with cameras on the rolling stock.

Greg

Greg,

I haven’t seen Tom in probably 25 years or more. But he was very tall. I may be wrong, but it seemed like he was 6’-5" to 6’-6". I’m only 5’-11", so it’s all relative.

There were many Youtube videos out about ten years ago that showed various aspects of the building of his 1:20.3 masterpiece. Pretty much state-of-the-art in electronics, lighting effects and sound effects.

#55

Jerry (Naptowneng) reported that he had a long chat with Tom at the Convention tour visit. He was more interested in the log skidder weathering, so the above questions never came up.

#56

Gary,

I wondered if you might have a say here. I talked to Tom a little while visiting the layout and said hi for you. He remembers you well.

#57

Paul Burch said:

Gary,

I wondered if you might have a say here. I talked to Tom a little while visiting the layout and said hi for you. He remembers you well.

Thanks Paul…yeah Tom and I go back 40 years. He was president of Los Angeles Live Steamers when I joined. AND I learned how to fire an oil fired locomotive on his donated Little Engines Pacific. He actually started the class as an experiment to let those who could never own a large scale steam engine, actually run one. The club now has a half dozen steam engines that any member can learn and run on the track. Our largest steam engines are the 3-3/4 inch scale Sweet Creek engines. Pretty close to operating a full size NG loco. Tom is a great person and long-time friend :). He’s done a lot for the hobby.

#58

I added Ted Doskaris’ pictures to the links I gave above, now 813 pictures total on that link.

Sorry, but just too much time to organize, roatate, crop, etc.

Greg

#59

For anyone coming in late to the party, here’s Gregory Hile’s folder from the first post, great pictures of some great layouts, both a lot of garden layouts and Tom Miller’s first-class work.

https://flickr.com/photos/greghile

As he mentioned the pictures include this (hmmmm, I wonder why the county inspectors haven’t been around to condemn this disaster?):

#60

John, didn’t Greg do that for the Mik Challenge a year or 2 ago? Built something then burned it