Dave- those are some great pics! I’m not a steam guy but I like seeing the smoke, it makes the pics more alive.
Mike- Your pics look great too! I would love to see a trackplan.
BTW- since I am also an N-scaler, I would love to see more in the forums.
Craig
Yeah, the smoke is the clincher.
How do you create the photographic smoke?
Cool layout. N scale is awesome! The models are small, but not microscopic, like Z. My 4x8 (soon to be redone) has a great # of industries.
Thanks…!
The smoke is using the airbrush function in Paint Shop Pro 7.
Dave,
Really nice! Truly inspiring work, a joy to behold. What curve radius are you using on that layout?
13.5" on the inner track; 15" on the outer.
your photos are really impressive! Thanks for posting them!
Always enjoy your pics, DV.
…and from what I’ve seen at shows in the Mid-Atlantic region, N-Scale is still very much alive and well, thank you.
No matter how you slice it, unless you have a vast room to work with in a larger scale, you can’t beat N scale for it’s scenery to train ratio. I shot this last weekend, and in my opinion, it’s perfectly do-able in N on even an average size layout…
Look for more threads on N scale, not less. The range and quality of products available grows every day, and there’s a lot of people of all ages finding the benefits of working in N. No longer must we skulk about in the shadows.
I’m N with the N crowd!
Lee
As space constraints and the stress of moving often (I’m active-duty Air Force) made HO less and less practical, I looked at N with envy in terms of size. But I was never quite sure I could do what I wanted to do convincingly in N. But then around 2000 or so, MR ran a few really nice layout features in N scale. Lance Mindheim and the late David Haines had shown me N scale layouts that looked better than most of the HO ones I’d seen. Then I stumbled across Jerry Britton’s reproduction of 1954-era Pennsylvania Railroad 4-track mainline operations. I was sold.
So, in March 2002 I switched scales and never looked back.
The debate rages every few weeks about when the “golden age” of model railroading was. I’m convinced that in N scale, the golden age is NOW.
Atlas, Kato, Athearn, IRC, ConCor, and Bachmann Spectrum are hitting the market reularly with new and exciting locomotives that perform (for the most part) on-par with HO, and there are a wealth of small manufacturers making proto-specific cars and structures. Even for us kitbashers, we’ve never had such a choice of materials in N.
Add to that our two dedicated publications, and N scale is doing just fine these days.
A big boost came along when the prototype modelers started taking N scale seriously. Now I can build a highly-detailed and accurate metal brass, wood, and zinc exact model of a PRR/TTX F30d or a cast-resin and brass PRR X31a or B60b… The possibilities in N are growing every day.
The best decision I ever made in model railroading (after asking for a train set for my 8th birthday) was to switch to N.
Cool! My 2000th post! I need a life…[:-^]
Dave:
Any, and all, photos you show of you layout are just awesome. I plan on starting out with a layout like yours and then add it to a larger layout when I get the room finished.
Mike (mls1621)
I like the photos of your layout too. I, and I bet others, would like to see more.
My layout will be around the wall of a 10ft x 14ft room.
Keep up the great work.
Dave,
I have been to your site a couple of times and I love the 6 minute intro video. I watched it before I looked at your trackplan and I was blown away when I saw that it is only 36 x 80. Excellent work and the operating signals are great.
Gary
The debate rages every few weeks about when the “golden age” of model railroading was. I’m convinced that in N scale, the golden age is NOW.
Er, uh, Dave, it doesn’t matter which scale we’re talking about. Now definitely is the golden age.
P.S. I like the working position light signals. That’s cool. Adds a touch of authenticity to your layout. Now, if someone would just make Harriman style lower quadrant semaphores in N scale…
Andre
Dave
When you get your GG1 how are you going to do the cantery? or how much r u going to need?
Dave great work, I always enjoy seeing your photos. Your layout is one of the inspirations of my own revisit to the N scale world and steam.
Hmmmm… I have to have a GG1, no question about it. But the Middle Divison wasn’t electrified. That poses a problem…!
Someday, when I do the “big one,” I’ve been thinking of adding a short stretch of electrified track. I was thinking like an “impressions of Pennsy” layout that would include Philly 30th Street, Enola, some town on the Middle Divison (like Huntingdon or Lewistown), a coal mine, and Altoona. So Philly to Enola (across from Harrisburg) would be “wired.”
Lewistown presents a good LDE candidate because there was a steel mill just up the track (Standard Steel at Burnham on the Milroy Secondary). Plus Lewistown had a yard and a small engine terminal.
Dave,
You could have the GG1 being transported across your division, behind steam or a Geep.
Just turn off the headlight. It will appear to be rolling along behind your head end power.
I thought about that… But a few counter-arguments come to mind.
If I just want a dead unit to drag I can save my bucks and use my existing Arnold/Rivarossi GG1. No, I figure the Kato GG1 will run like a Kato, which means I’ll want her running. Of course, as you suggest I could have her running headlight off and pans down, so as to appear to be dead-in-tow, but really pulling.
Good point.
But then the other issue is why she’d be in tow on the Middle Division at all. One GG1 was rebuilt at Altoona in the 1950s; that’s the one that lost its brakes and crashed into the Washington Union Station concourse. She was repainted Tuscan Red with 5 stripes (instead of DGLE like the Kato). But this was a one-time deal. All repairs on the GG1 fleet, including heavy class overhauls, were done on the Northeast Corridor facility at Edgemoor, never leaving the elctrified territory.
So… I’m thinking I may have to take a giant step away from prototype up-tightness, and just run her from time to time with rear pan up (Pennsy standard procedure) and pretend that there’s catenary!
Imagine that… literally![:O]
Dave,
My first train was a Lionel GG1 with three Pullman heavywieghts. My dad got it for me when I was 4 years old in 1949.
My brother and sister both had steam drawn freights. I was jealous because I thought the steam locomotives looked neater.
I wish I still had my GG1 today, I just didn’t realize what a prize it was.
I hope you have a few heavyweights to drag behind yours when you get it.
Dave,
You do know that at one time the PRR considered (seriously) extending their electrified trackage as far west as Pittsburg, don’t you?
Oh, and how did you make th smoke for the steamers in your pictures? JK LOL
-George