With the highly detailed engines and rolling stock, the DPM, City Classics, Cornerstone, etc., buildings, nickel silver track that doesn’t need to be cleaned as much as the brass, the easy methods for scenery, it seems to be hard to build a bad layout.
We owe a debt of gratitude to those who developed the ground foam technique, the ones who first started using craft paint, and I’m sure you can all think of other things that make our layouts look realistic without much effort.
Well, looking at a fairly large burn on my index finger, from grabbing the soldering iron by the wrong end, I would say that this goof still has some work to do!
You would be amazed at how some folks can still get it wrong. I guess they don’t pay attention or have 10 thumbs. It’s remarkable. Some guys can do scenery (like Pelle Soeburg) that looks so real you can’t believe it. Some do wiring, benchwork, electronics, or painting like masters. And then there are the few that can’t seem to do anything right. Even when you take the time to carefully show them step by step, it doesn’t sink in. Nothing is fully goof-proof and that is a shame.
Model railroading can be considered an art. Those who can get it right have the “right stuff”, others may never get it right. It’s one thing to buy all of this neat stuff, but blending it together into a realistic scene is something else.
I don’t think so. I think that the hobby is going all the way arround. Each day, with the technological advances, the hobby is getting more complex. A long time ago, detail wasn’t important, cause tracks where 3 rails and rolling stock where considered toys. Now days is different. It seems like there is no excuse for having a “toy like” layout with all those super detailed locos and structures. I think now days the hobby ask more of the model railroader. So many kits, so many products, so many choises… It took almost 3 months to decide which DCC system would suit all my needs. I still mess up big time some times. With DCC is easier to control trains, but I already have a couple of broken handrails and couipler from a frontal collition…
Model railroading is an on going learning process. You have to goof to learn
from the goofs. Just some goofs are bigger than others! But I do think that some
people, just like in other parts of life, are better at some things than other things.
Manufacturers are making it harder to make mistakes though. Dave
I think a “goof-proof” hobby wouldn’t be very fun, one of the main reasons why this is such a great hobby is becyase you have to work with it to get it right, You can’t get it right the first time, i wouldn’t have alot of fun if i got it right the very first time
Goof proof??? It better not get that way ! If it does there will be a huge number of us who will never make any further progress in the expansion of our rail empire…for example
“Jeez Honey, I guess I goofed and forgot to tell you about the new engine I put on the charge card!”
“Oh man, I goofed. I said I needed three cars for my reefer block but it turns out they only sell them in sixpacks.”
I am planning on getting back into the hobby soon, but I’m not sure how to put my own stamp on it. You can buy perfect looking locomotives, track, etc. now.
It seems as if scenery and whethering are the only challenges left.
I think about this stuff a lot - glad someone brought it up. I’m thinking to have “my” own Model Railroad, I’ll have to keep it very small, and try to do most of the work from scratch. This way I could experience what people got to experience years ago.
I don’t know about the hobby, but some people (like myself) will never be goof proof. Just the other day while using an x-acto knife to remove some detail, the thought crossed my mind “if this slips I’ll cut myself” and boom. I’ve been modeling one thing or another for 40 years and I really do know better. Just sometimes…!!! [censored]
If one learns from his goofs, I probably have a couple dozen PhD’s by now. lol. Goof proof? Hardly. We just goof up things that modelers never even approached years ago. Kinda like we have diseases now that kill us off people never contracted 100 years ago because things like chicken pox, polio and even broken bones killed off our ancestors.
Tom,
I don’t think I will ever be goof proof. There are way too many possibilities for me to make a mistake, even if I read the instructions over and over again. I might be one of those modelers who has a problem with “The brain knows, but the hands refuse to follow”. My minds-eye sees the finished result, but I don’t quite know how to get the end product. Know what I mean? There really are times when I do things on the layout over and over until I get it right. Sometimes it will take a few weeks. But, the end result is well worth it.
Archie
Spring game is two months away.
CARRfan: Nobody FORCES you to buy that stuff, y’know. Those who want to put a personal touch in still have the options of scratchbuilding, kitbashing, doing custom paint or other detail work, or otherwise modifying or improving beyond the ken of the RTR-only crowd. And so far, aside from those with the means to build custom layouts, nobody does RTR scenery!
Skills like painting and scratchbuilding really aren’t that hard, and aren’t that demanding if you aren’t planning on immediately entering contests or trying to get your layout in the professional magazines.
Craftsmanship, artistic skills and care in creating things are vanishing in our culture–model railroading offers quite a few ways to carry on that tradition.
Building the layout is a lot like woodworking. There are techniques you can use to hide mistakes–or as one carpenter put it, the difference between a craftsman and a apprentice is the apprentice makes his mistakes look like they were meant to be that way.
To me it is a matter of patience. The more patience you put into a project, the more refined the outcome. Each of us gravitates to our own level of patience.
i hand make alll my track, i make all my own throttles i even scratch build rolling stock but i cant doo scenery to save my life! i just cant seem to get the hang of it.