I tell you it will easier. No more difficult choices about road name. Everything will be UP. It will pretty much be all containers, so all you’ll need is a resin kit and a bunch of decals.
And you won’t need DCC or DC because the prototype freight just sits on the tracks due to over-crowding. Unfortunately, that makes ops sessions rather boring. But then again that’s why they always put those well stocked coolers in the cabs. That’s a prototype practice I easily can model.
Now I’m heading over to eBay to see if I can score a Dash 12 or an SD-130M.
Anyone know a good technique for suspending hovercraft? Yes, they finally do get here.
Sounds like a fun concept. How about coming up with a new locomotive design.maybe kitbash a UP http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:UP6936.jpg with a new style that makes the engine twice as long. I actually been thinking about the caboose makes a comeback in the future but is more hi-tech. Imagine a satellite dish on the cupola with a more aerodynamic design.
Easy way to make an engine of the future? Give an SD70ACe nuclear (ˈnü-klē-ər, not “nucular”) reactor detail where the diesel engine would normally be, and replace the radiator fans on the rear with cooling towers![:D] That would look interesting, wouldn’t it[?] And maybe give the crew radiation suits, and replace the UP shield with one of those radioactive symbols.[:D] And give the trucks magneticly suspended bearings.
Just a thought but if you were willing to shrink down to “N”, or possibly even “Z”, I see a working mag-lev line as a real possiblity. Start collecting those refrigerator magnets now…
Starting in the late 24th century, it became necessary to build a high-capacity freight moving system on Monolith - the planet-size starship, not the cement plant in California. The solution was tubeways, mostly underground, but occasionally on or above the surface. Couldn’t just build something out in the open air, because the open air was vacuum…[:O]
Not really very interesting. The tubes are opaque, so the capsules are, for all intents and purposes, invisible…[|(]
(Never tell a science fiction writer that you’ve decided to model the future.)[swg]
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - when not writing about the Confederation of Galactic Civilizations)
You don’t have to make it all stream lined and futuristic looking. Remember in the original Alien movie how bulky, gritty and industrial the ship looked? Still futuristic looking, but almost an urban decay feel to it.
Quite correct. If one looks toward rail transportation of the future in any serious manner and less tongue-in-cheek, then dramatic streamlining and other aesthetically pleasing locomotive designs are unlikely to be factors of serious consideration. Locomotive designs have been moving away from such for decades, ever more to be replaced with simpler, utilatarian and totally boxy shapes, increasingly without any exterior protusions to breakup their lines and air flow. Locomotives of the future are likely to more resemble the very clean boxy lines of many current European engines than what Americans are used to seeing on our rails today.
Neither is some exotic form of power source, like nuclear, to be expected. Even use of electricity could be rather doubtful. Perhaps look for the industry to come up with a way to utilize America’s overly abundant supply of coal - likely processed in an entirely new, absolutely clean-burning manner - as their carbon-base fuel to replace dwindling oil supplies.
Further, rail traffic is likely to move in a more limited fashion, linking huge central manufacturing/product loading yards with equally large and centrally located receiving yards in distant cities, rather than serving a multitude of individual businesses on their own sidings.
Kinda makes for some rather dull model railroading, if you ask me. [;)]
Actually If I were to guess Ii would suggest two possibilities.
One is a frame and cab assembly, but with modular componenets on the deck. Individual boxes containing a motor-generator set, an air handling device, dynamic brakes, maybe even an electronis package for PTC, DPU, etc.
The other might be a control cab, fuel tender with a string of “trucks” behind it, each with a genset MU’d to the control cab. You just keep adding "trucks until you get to the power you need.
Chip, I was going to suggest in your previous post (updating to 1908), that you might want to make that 2008. Then you would have more choices of locomotives, cars and all. Could possibly give you a headache trying to decide. Have fun in whatever era you choose.[:)]
