When it comes down to realism, model steamers and diesels run with electric motors doesn’t make it. Only model electric locomotives fill the bill. One exception would be the New Haven railroad that had diesels that could also operate off the power grid. That is why I prefer to run electric model engines over steam or diesel. I’m not saying steam or diesel is not realistic, it’s just the thought that a steam or diesel engine is run by an electric motor just doesn’t fit into the 100% realistic scene. In my case, I have limited myself to northeast, specificly New York area railroads and other railroads that ran electrics.
A potential problem is that, by this logic, you also need to run prototypical supply via an overhead catenary or third rail – the former being difficult and frequently expensive to do correctly, and the latter requiring what may be substantial measures to assure continuity across necessary gaps.
“Technically” all modern diesel locomotives in the United States use an electrical final drive, with a significant part of the control being electrical modulation. And most model railroaders did not use the ‘notch’ system of throttle control (with some of the senior voices on this forum in fact actively disliking that).
I’ll grant you that ordinary electric-model steam locomotives don’t behave at all like real ones, and are controlled nearly utterly non-prototypically. But it is possible to model both the appearance and operation to closely resemble what the prototype does, by using electrical and electromechanical means, so the mere fact that steam is not the ‘working fluid’ is not a real operational concern. The Hornby live-steam OO locomotive, spectacular as it was, doesn’t bear any real engineering resemblance to a real locomotive except that it vaporizes water to produce piston thrust.
I am tempted to add that very few model electric locomotives are driven or controlled electrically in a manner remotely like the prototype, and that models that aren’t are just as ‘unprototypical’ by the OP’s own assumptions than diesel models without functional combustion prime movers are.
(Which is not to say that ‘simulating’ the prototype operation via computer code with appropriate processor control in something like a decoder is not an adequate solution to the operating side of the concern, or that it isn’t delightful to see models with more ‘prototypical’ electric drive… for example, some of the motor technology developed for drones, with careful Welbach arrays and careful rotor geo
I’m right there with you, Mr. Ron:
NH_300_E33b by Edmund, on Flickr
NH_EP5_Jet-FL9 by Edmund, on Flickr
PRR_DD-FF-GG by Edmund, on Flickr
NYC_DES-3_529 by Edmund, on Flickr
PRR_under-wire6_2k-1 by Edmund, on Flickr
An electric with side rods, best of both worlds:
PRR_DD1-fi2i by Edmund, on Flickr
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not quite. i doubt a prototype electric locomotive uses a worm gear that prevents the wheels from continuiing to turn without the motor being driven
even an electric locomotive needs brakes to stop. the wheels don’t stop turning when power is no longer provided to the motor like in a model. and the locomotive doesn’t stop a train, brakes in each car as well as the locomotive stop the train
this means that an electric locomotive, just like a steam or diesel locomotive should coast when power is no longer applied.
143
No offense, but the refusal to run steam locomotives or diesels on a layout due to the absence of coal and oil to power such locomotives is carrying the hobby of model railroading to the point of absurdity.
I cannot even begin to enumerate the number of compromises that we make make on our layout that depart from reality such as plastic structures, fake trees and grass, vehicles without motors or transmissions, plastic people who can neither walk nor gesture, and on and on and on.
Just my [2c]
Rich
Why doesn’t anyone here just want to have fun running trains anymore?
Mr. Ron says he likes to run electrics. I do too. It is fun.
I used to ride behind some of them in the D.C. - New York - New Haven area. I like to model them.
I have fun.
Some people seem to want to throw a wet blanket on somebody else because they have a special interest or a particular reason to like something. Or nit-pick every detail of WHY they like what they like.
It’s a rainy day. I’m going to be running trains… for fun [:-^]
Be Happy, Ed
C’mon, Ed, now you are taking things too seriously. Mr. Ron, and anyone else for that matter, can do anything that they want. The best adage is model railroading is, it’s your railroad.
Let’s not overlook the fact that this is a forum. Someone posts an opinion or a preference and everyone else is free, or should be, to express a contrary opinion or preference. If it weren’t for that freedom, what would we do with a thread like this one? Everyone would rush to post their applause for the way that the OP prefers to operate his model railroad. That, to me, would be boring.
Rich
This question presupposes certain things about the hobby that have little to do with ‘fun of running model trains around’ I think Ed needs to understand that the responses he decries are within that frame of reference, not counter to ‘model railroading is fun’. This is by no means intended as criticism either of his opinions or his modeling.
I personally can’t stand flathead screws on side rods of model steam power. Do you see me chastising people who consider operational reliability more important to them than appearance? Or arguing that ‘moral fidelity’ requires that model steam locomotives be made with accurate 90-degree quartering rather than just the precise relative ‘quarter’ needed for smooth operation?
I happen to be someone who has always liked ‘running trains’ to watch far more than running a railroad in model form; that’s a reason I try to avoid any ‘showstopping’ visual details about how the trains or the structures supporting their running are made. I am perfectly happy (strangely enough) with model steam locomotives that do not use steam or compressed gas for power, with functional admission and exhaust valve functionality from accurately represented valve gear; that are not emitting appropriate steam from various points at prototypical times; that do not prototypically smoke; and that do not have actual animated ‘people’ running them. That doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy modeling them the way I do; it just means that I have my own priorities (and am willing and open to discussing matters in which they are concerned).
We can look at Ed’s pictures and note an interesting thing: in every one of them, the ‘electricity fairy’ is providing power to them. None of the third-rail engines has any ‘visible means of support’, and in fact there is one picture titled as ‘under wire’ in which no overhead wire is present even though cat bridges are. &nb
Hey Mr. Ron. Are you running 11,000 volts or 22,000?
[:-^]
Hey Dennis. If you scale voltage the way you do weight, he’d be running either about 7.25V or 14.5V in HO scale, and the latter is probably ‘close enough’ to DCC that nominal 14V would do. [:)]
Of course to be fully consistent he’d have to model using Maerklin equipment and wiring, and adapt DCC data to a carrier structure that runs over AC as that company has… [:-^]
The beauty of this hobby is that there is no right way or wrong way to enjoy it. Your free to criticize or compliment anything you want. Just don’t try to be a social justice warrior. Freedom to model anything I like is key to the hobby. The fact that my steam fleet is powered by electric motors is not relevant to the enjoyment of modeling. If you want to take it any further, than modeling any motive power is wrong because we don’t have a scale engineer at the controls.
Model what you want.
Pete.
As a good friend of mine says: “We model management, running trains is just for fun!”
I have fun running trains, any type of model trains and when I run on another persons layout, I’m there to enjoy his layout, maybe learn a thing or two, and I’ll say it again, to have fun!
So let’s not be so judgemental…
Neal
duplicate reply…
One of the coolest layouts I operated on was an O Scale trolley layout. It sounded and smelled the same as a real trolley, they wiff of ozone in the air.
For you, surely, and I’m happy to read posts here where people signify that they have found their own particular sweet spot in the hobby. They’re all toys, after all, and what fun would a toy be if we can’t enjoy it?!?
Sort of repetitive here, but yes, as I said just now, it’s your fun and you have to create it. And, you must enjoy your decisions or modify them as you learn more about the hobby and your place in it.
As several others have pointed out, the hobby’s activities are necessarily all electric. No prototype that I’m aware of has a can motor coupled to a vertical gear tower, and plastic gears running non-traction-motored axles beneath it. But every one of our non-brass toys is precisely thus.
As I have said a number of times, we all have to suspend disbelief in this hobby, and to embrace the realism that it affords us. Some can craft entirely believable pikes as evinced by quality photography where the lens is at track level. Videos of the same orientation can be quite pleasing. But, if we let disbelief get in our way, we will have limited our appreciation of the ho
My Aristo Train Engineer wireless radio thottles use push buttons to “step” the PWM voltage up or down.
Somewhat more realistic than encoder wheels or or fixed travel knobs.
I did not know if I would like it, so years ago I borrowed one to test before commiting to the idea, and to 10 throttles for my adavance cab control system.
I find it very effective and realistic when compared to a knob, yet it is rock simple.
Likely the reason why things like DCC or the Proto Throttle don’t interest me.
Mr Ron has some interesting ideas about the hobby, none of which I have found any personal application for…
Sheldon
Correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t prototype diesels run with electric motors?