Last night I was leafing through some issues of Model Trains, Kalmbach’s magazine for beginning model railroaders in the late '50s and early '60s. As I enjoyed the reading (early '60s issues), I was struck by how much was expected of a beginner by Kalmbach back then.
In the two issues I looked at last night there were two articles on building Mantua steam locomotive kits, an E.L. Moore gem on scratch building an excursion passenger car, how to build tunnel entrances, a “railroad you can model” featuring the NWP terminal at Tiburon (one of the reasons I bought that issue), modifications to X2F (horn hook) couplers and coupler boxes to make them perform better, and of course the obligatory table top track plans with mostly Snap Track. IMHO, except for the use Snap Track and mostly island layouts, the modeling and layouts represented as much if not more effort and skill than is seen in many of today’s Model Railroader articles.
The Portage Hill & Communipaw started off as a Model Trains project layout, not a Model Railroader project. Yet the PH&C series did more skills-needed or developed layout building than all but a very few later MR project layouts. The series included bashing low end brass locomotives, modifying figures, scratch building a turntable, and thorough DC wiring explanations in addition to the usual benchwork, trackwork, and scenery how-tos.
Judging my own efforts and skills, except for my handlaid track, I would pretty much fit in to the Model Trains “beginner” profile I get from reading the magazine - not anywhere near the big step up to NMRA MMR. Which is probably why I enjoyed buying these old magazines and reading the issues. But I see the modeling and layouts as quite a step up from what is considered a beginner today - both my own and that featured in the magazines.
Answer yes they should be able, but not expected to. The first layout should ample provide opportunity for doing all those things you mention. Often it doesn’t. Everyone has different wants and desires for their layouts. I know a neighbor of mine who (I was told) has a wonderful complex layout up in his attic space. He has been building it for about 40 or so years. I went over to see it and it consists of a 4’ x 6’ piece of plywood with grass cloth stapled over it and a mountain with a vertical cliff with the same grass cloth and a couple of RTR buildings plopped down. He has 4 loops on it and one siding. The outside is a double loop of Old Lionel 3 rail with a crossover and a siding for storing a train. Inside that is an HO loop, and up on the flat top mountain is an oval of “n” scale. He loves it, enjoys seeing his trains run, and doesn’t want anything more. That is no problem for me.
For me personally, I don’t like RTR! I have some on the layout, but all my current buildings, scenery, and cars are from kits or scratch built. Only RTR are the locos, and even they had to be decaled for the SLOW. I consider RTR to mean “All Fun Removed”! For me the fun in model railroading is in the creation of as much built by me as possible. No! I don’t ever expect that is the case for many others out there.
There are folks here at this forum who I know have physical limitations that prevent them from doing craftsman kits and scratchbuilding. And YES they are Model Railroaders too! Others enjoy the running of trains in prototypical fashion and don’t care a bit about scenery and build
A point I’ve frequently made here, much to the consternation of many.
For decades the hobby was based on real skill and craftsmanship. Indeed, even beginners were expected to have a range of fairly well developed modeling skills before they should considered entering the hobby. Those given to simply running store-bought trains on largely plywood empires were regarded as essentially part of the Lionel/Flyer crowd, not the more serious model railroaders (and why MR and RMC both turned their backs on such folks in the mid 1950’s). Model railroading was considered a serious adult hobby, populated mainly by craftsmen of a calibur right up there with the likes of machinists, or the quality furniture making hobbyists.
Given the crude materials they had to work with, the efforts of many “average” modelers from way back when would have to be considered on a par with a lot of today’s best of the best in model railroading.
While reading this I had a new thought about RTR. It allows the modeler, beginner or advanced, to do what he wants to do, and avoid some of those aspects of the hobby that he doesn’t like to do. An Operations-oriented modeler can concentrate on his track plan and signalling, but buy his engines, rolling stock and scenery ready-made. A scenery guy like me would ignore the ready-to-plop buildings in favor of kits and styrene sheets, but still take solid, reilable engines out of the box and put them on the track.
Some folks like to dive into a pool without testing the water. Others want to put their toe in first, and still others wade in slowly from the shallow end. RTR lets you choose your path, and get started in the hobby without demanding an extensive skill set (and tool set) beforehand.
Few of us can do it all. I’m in awe of those who can. At the same time, I’m grateful that I don’t have to hand-lay my own track, so I can concentrate instead on making molds for cobblestone castings for my streets. Without RTR, I would never be able to build the layout I want in my lifetime.
First I agree with the sentiment that no matter what you like to do in the hobby, all who participate are Model Railroaders.
What I think has changed from those early years is that RTR has become so good that it is hard for people to equal it, much less exceed it. When Tyco and Lifelike were the RTR and Athearn and Roundhouse/MDC were the easy kits it wasn’t hard to do better with a craftsman kit or scratch building. But with excellent RTR, why bother building.
Personally, I like the building part. But when time is short, I focus on building the layout and use RTR cars, track, etc. Now that I’m retired I’ll get back to building cars and locomotives from kits as well as scratch building. I have been stockpiling scratch building supplies and craftsman kits. I don’t know that they’ll be better than or even as good as RTR, but I’ll pick things not available in RTR (easy to do in S) and just do my best while having fun. But I’ll continue to use RTR as well.
See, I never cared for the “body goes on frame, screw on trucks, done” thing, so I don’t particularly care about RTR cars. I like planning, designing, and building everything else. My layout is really just a big diorama right now, but I like that I can populate it with rolling stock quickly and easily. I only have six structures, but five of them are not from kits. Sure did buy mountains of Walthers and DPM modulars though.
Almost every one of us is a beginner in at least one aspect of the hobby. If one hasn’t done/practiced/mastered a particular skill before, one’s a beginner. A great advantage (or disadvantage depending on one’s point of view) is that multiple skill sets are necessary. Fortunately, the more difficult and costly skills such as machining, etc., are mostly done for us.
Back when I was a beginner (and Harry Truman was President) it was expected that anyone who wanted to be a modeler (ANY kind of modeler) would have to learn how to use tools, assemble kits, paint, decal… RTR meant tinplate, or paying a professional to custom-build what you wanted (an 0-6-0? $300 1947 dollars!) or buying somebody’s hand-me-downs. Even the simplest kits weren’t all that simple. About the only skill a layout builder didn’t (usually) need was plumbing.
Fast forward to today. A rank beginner often starts with the impression that he can simply open some boxes, push things together until the joints snap-lock, plug in the AC line cord and, viola! instant model railroad. Not only that, but he can start at 8 PM Christmas Eve and get a good night’s sleep before going to the Nativity services at his church. Screwdriver? Pliers? Wazzat???
In my case, I was familiar with tools - both my father and my mother had considerable mechanical aptitude, and things that stopped working got fixed, not thrown away. There was a sizeable toolbox in the front hall closet, and I learned to use everything in it. Contrast that to today’s ‘throwaway’ society. Many younger people have grown up in a world where even simple hand tools are the provence of professional mechanics (with framed certificates on the waiting room wall) and insurance concerns keep the curious away from the places where they get used. I can’t tell for sure how many homes on my street can even muster a screwdriver - but looking at the curbside display on trash day makes me suspect that it’s under 50%.
Now, I do not disparage RTR. Most of the little metal ‘boxes on wheels’ that simulate freight cars on my layout came out of their bought at the LHS boxes ready to drop on the track - except for the Baker couplers. Installing Kadee #6 couplers with
I think MRRing is just following the same progression seen in many other areas of today’s society. Early Internet users had to pay a lot for very specialized equipment and had to know exactly where to go- no real provider to take you there. Same thing for cars- early car owners had to be their own mechanics. There are a lot of people nowadays who don’t even know how to change their oil.
It’s kind of just how things go, IMO. Nobody’s going to make you do things any way you don’t want to just because it’s what’s in at the moment.
One thing of note, the poster said that the engines run better now. I have known some craftsman that could make the older stuff run perfectly. One friend of mine got his MDC shay to run at a tie a minute with the supplied motor and all the gears on (I got the same results but could not get one of the outside gears right which I just left off).
I was looking for something notional called ‘fun’, and it was fun related to toy trains. I would not have entered the hobby if I had been expected to have designing, cutting, shaping, lathing, welding, soldering, and other skills required to form a working locomotive. I do not take pleasure from assembling things…not pressboard furniture, not model structures, not rail cars. In my youth I had a desire to build model airplanes, and I enjoyed some of that. Maybe 10 all totaled.
Now I have other demands on me, and when I want to have fun, I don’t want to have to do un-fun things to have fun in the time available to me. So RTR has been most welcome, and I shall continue to pay those who provide it my money.
My creativity and energy lie in other areas, other pursuits. When I need a break, throwing a switch and pondering which of my nice RTR engines to play with is about as involved as I’d like to be. Well, that and deciding which type of beer to drink while I watch the train move.
First model railroading as a hobby isn’t rocket science nor has it ever been regarded as a “craftsmen hobby” as CNJ claims…If that was the case 98% of us old heads would have left the hobby years ago.
All one needs is basic carpentry skills,understanding 2 wires to the track or one wire to each block if the modeler uses Atlas selectors and plastic rail joiners.If a modeler has experience assembling any plastic kits he can assemble a plastic building…If one can read and understand instructions he can mount KD couplers and build the majority of today’s car kits…Thanks to Bachmann a beginner can use basic DCC.Instructions can be found on Youtube from ballasting to weathering.
I guess I am getting fed up with those that triesto complicate a very simple hobby! Why they want to complicate hobby is beyond me.
Guys,the cold hard facts is any 10 year old child can build a simple 4x8’ layout using snap track and have tons of fun in his innocents.
I too have some old issues of Model Trains magazine and yes, the articles do vary quite a bit in intended audience – a mix of scale and Lionel/Flyer. So an issue might show a fairly simple Lionel track plan and then how to scratch build a caboose or whatever out of shirt cardboard.
I don’t think Model Trains was aimed at promoting high craftsmanship, but it did expect the young reader to be prepared to cut wood or cardstock or metal with some precision, to assemble parts with care, to not slop up the paint, etc. I bet most readers of Model Trains also had various “shop” classes in school that promoted similar basic skills. And the “beginner” kits in the early 1950s, such as the Varney or Athearn metal line, were not craftsman kits but rewarded careful work – it WAS possible to screw up. I think the original poster was trying to say that what was regarded as an “easy – you can do this” article for kids back in 1952 somehow seems to be asking more in the ways of skill sets than is asked today. And it might be that the results that Model Trains would publish simply might not pass muster today, even if you could say “I built this.” A steam locomotive boiler showing wood grain of the dowel it was built from for example.
I guess it is worth pointing out that in the bigger picture, Model Trains did not succeed as a magazine. Linn Westcott once wrote that it was doomed to fail because it was aimed at beginners and beginners have so many questions and things they want to do and know about all at once that they can’t wait for a monthly magazine to finally get around to “their” topic. That is what Kalmbach books were supposed to do. But some of its articles remain good reading and even useful.
I liike RTR…I don’t have time to build or kitbash or scratch build and furthermore you can create your own personalized layout just the same by selecting an LDE that you like and/or going freelance. No one thing on my layout is scratch built…however the layout as a whole is my personal creation…
Well said, most of us started with those “cheap train set”. The difference is that while we loved it, we wanted it to looks much more the real thing. And for that, nobody’s gonna feed it to you. Just to see a string of brown CN boxcars pulled by a Zebra-painted pair of M420 with a Pointe Saint-Charles caboose, I went thought a lot of things in the last 23 years. And it’s started wrong with a Bachmann CP Rail F9!!!
And to make the best RTR stuff looks good, you still have to work a lot on many other aspects. I won’t compare myself to old times modellers, I’m pretty sure there was a bunch of skilled guys and a lot of casual modellers among them just as you can see today. To me, scratchbuilding and kitbashing was a matter of necessity (modeling canadian prototype was a nightmare until recently and worst, doing scenery based on Quebec City architecture is like crossing the Styx river) to achieve my goal, but I quickly found out I loved tinkering and modifying rolling stocks and buildings.
But I will be honest, rarely my kitbashes end up on the layout, except if the original motor and frame is good. Often, I reuse cheap engines and since I’m not a mechanic fan, I never improve their running performance (my kitbashed HO Lionel CP Rail GP-30 is one of those bad dogs). So, for the layout, I use RTR engines for this sole purpose. My frankeinstein stays on my shelves.
What I love about this hobby is that it will take you as far as you want or can go, there’s almost no ending… you can tore everything down and it is still just a new start. When I was watching my CP Rail F9 running on a 36" x 36" inches back in 1986-87, I couldn’t possibly think that I should know carpentry, painting, decalling, detailling, electricity and mechanics, even history, geography and railroad operation. But steps
I completely disagree that a beginner can buy a bunch of built-ups and RTR rolling stock, throw some snap track and a grass mat on a table, and get a layout that looks like a master craftsman built it. You can build a servicable layout this way, but not a great one.
On the other hand, the fact that these things ARE available reduces the entry barriers to our hobby. Speaking strictly for myself, I doubt I will ever assemble a locomotive from a kit. But over the years, I have replaced a lot of my scenery as I learned better techniques or mastered old ones, and have replaced many stock model structures with ones I have built or modified myself.
Even my 7 year old has lost interest in the cheap Thomas train set from Bachmann and has me helping him build a more realistic layout with a lot of my cast off stuff. Would he be doing this if the only way to get a structure for his layout was to scratchbuild it?
Definately, our hobby has evolved to the point where every participant can do what interests him, and find a ready made solution for the parts he’d rather not delve into. As we get deeper into the hobby, most of us push our limits and expand our skills as we go. And that’s a very GOOD thing.
I guess I was amazed by the “easy – you can do this” in the articles aimed at beginners. There is a definite contrast between these Model Trains articles and today’s how-to’s in Model Railroader. Of course, part of the writing style and theme of both MT and MR in the '50s and '60s was to encourage readers to give it a go. The aim was to get armchair model railroaders out of the armchair and into actual modeling, layout building, and operations. As you said, less than “perfect” results were acceptable, and would even get published in the photos.
Taking this in a slightly different direction, I find the various model railroading Internet forums of today to be less encouraging at trying something that might be a reach or stretch, or just plain new to me. And I can see how the forums can actually discourage a newcomer - I’m guilty of this - by citing the negatives to a proposed idea or method. For myself, the forums have become a way to procrastinate and avoid starting a project that I’m not sure I can complete successfully. When all I had was an encouraging monthly magazine to connect with other model railroaders, there wasn’t anything else to do but give the “difficult” project a try. But now I can turn on the computer and read how difficult or fraught with danger or just plain stupid my proposed project is.
The other part that holds me back on modeling projects is that the co
The other part that holds me back on modeling projects is that the cost of failure has risen significantly. If I broke the fiddly details assembling a Silver Streak reefer (which I did), well, it was a $2.98 kit. The same for cutting and changing the coal load, or repainting my $30 or less locomotives. Even though the Silver Streak kit was over an hour’s wages, and today’s kits are close to the same with inflation, the idea of breaking the plastic grab irons during installation on a $35 Micro-Trains car is a lot more intimidating. Even more intimidating is spending and then installing a $100 remotor/regear kit on a used brass locomotive. My potential screw-up costs tend to hold me back from getting started on the project.
Time to turn off the computer and get back to my Keystone Shays!
Fred
Fred,Here’s the kicker…
One doesn’t need to do any of that even back in the 50/60s that was a choice one made…The most I ever did to Athearn shells or non brass steam locomotives was add details from Details West,Detail Associates,Cal Scale or Kemtron…I never did like car kits with a zillion ittybitty fragile pieces the exception being those old wood Main Line Model B&O cabooses that wasn’t all that bad to assemble.
Today’s new model has great models without all that heartache and pain of having to build and then (if one chooses) super detail those kits.
As others have said, this hobby allows you to focus on the parts you like while maintaining a good-looking railroad.
Having said that, I’m a beginner, and I’d like to do things on the list (decal, paint, weather, scratchbuild) but it’s a fairly long list and honestly as a beginner it’s a bit intimidating. Especially the scratchbuilding and weathering. I feel like I don’t have the artistic ability for those things.
I think there are a couple hindrances to doing more advanced work:
Articles for scratchbuilding or weathering always seems to assume the reader knows more than I do. In other words, I feel like I’m coming in late to the lecture.
I don’t really know what I need or where to buy it. Everyone says “Oh, you’re local hobby shop has x, y, and z.” But I don’t have an LHS (nearest one is almost an hour away), and when I look at online sources for “styrene” (for example) I don’t really find what I think I’m looking for.
So what I think would be awesome is a series of articles expressly for the beginner that starts at step one, has a parts list (including tools) with model/part numbers, and sources that have those parts. Ideally, the magazine could form a partnership with an online supplier so you could buy all the parts for the project as a package (maybe make the tools optional since you only have to buy those once). Give the reader a month or two advanced notice to order the supplies, then walk step-by-step through the project over a couple issues of the magazine.
(Instead of forming an online partnership, the magazine could just provide LHS’s with a parts list and say this is the “official kit for the September project”. And they could provide it to their customers if they so desire.)
Anyway, it’s a thought for helping beginners get into more difficult aspects of the hobby. It may be more hand-holding that some of you guys like, but I think it would be a great help.