Just wondering what you guys see in your minds when you think of Model Railroading. I think of Cold winter days in the basement, going to the LHS and spending all my money or planning how to spend it. lol Going to the Big E trains show and having a great time. Taking my purchases out of the boxes 10 million times on the ride home and staring at them. I just love Train and no I will be in the hobby all of my life. Tim
I think of older heavywight grumpy solitary men when I really think of model railroading. Well the good news is I do not fit that profile at all.
Thoroughbread diesel,
Thanx for the compliment.
I see what I choose to do when I feel like doing it. Unfortunately, I also see those who make it their life’s work to be critical of anyone who does not “measure up” to their opinion of what they believe the hobby to be.
In tribute to such folk, let it be known, by unanimous vote, there will always be an area of the TENNESSEE CENTRAL which will consist of nothing but bare track, (Code 100, of course) attached directly to bare wood. No scenery, no structures, nothing but track on wood. A siding will be reserved in said area for exclusive and permanent staging of straight out of the box shiny rolling stock with horn hook couplers.
So let it be written, So let it be done.
cobwebs
For me, model railroading means bringing back locomotives I don’t see any more. It’s a nostalgia thing.
I see a layout. It may not have scenery yet, but the model railroader intends to add it. The model railroader has also given serious thought to the trains. The model railroader doesn’t just run a jumble of trains he/she found at a swap meet because they’re cheap; he/she has carefully chosen a representative collection of locomotives and rolling stock to fit his/her theme. That’s right; the model railroader in my mind’s eye has a definite theme. That includes a prototype (or plausible freelance, usually based on some real railroad or combination thereof), an era (not 1940-1990, but something a bit more focused), and a locale (preferably on Earth, and some part of the real Earth). The model railroader doesn’t pull 89’ autoracks with a USRA 2-8-2, and neither does his/her SD70MAC pull a string of 36’ billboard reefers. To me model railroading is attempting to simulate the look, environment, and, to some extent, operations of a railroad. Simply running trains without regard to the above is, in my OPINION, model “training.” But I don’t set the standards, and I’ll consider anyone who wants to improve beyond the loop of track and Tyco cars to something better (even if he/she can’t afford it right now) as a model railroader.
I see an era in time long lost in the History books brought back to life (somewhat) as I see fit. I do use my modelers liscens quite often. Mike
Lately what I see in my mind is a bunch of old fat guys sitting around their apartments complaining about how they can’t afford the hobby anymore. The model railroader stereotype is always an old fat guy for some reason.
I see a person who, for their own reasons likes trains and enjoys having models of them. They may have a layout or just a short test track, they may be fully scenicked to the finest degree or be track on cork on plywood or foam, but they like running trains. They may run tycos. katos or brass, double stacks pulled by the general and amtrack locos pulling heavyweights, they’re enjoying it. It may be 1954 in their world, right down to cars, billboards, signals, or maybe it’s train of autoparts running on a schedule in a operational session, it’s model railroading. Oh yeah, they may be fat old men, but maybe their teens or thirty somethings. but deep down, they all like some sort of model railroading, saving money for purchases, train shows, spending hours sitting detailing,checking specific prototypes, oh hell, they may be counting the rivits, but they’re still model railroaders, so tread lightly boys, we’re all doing it. happy railroading…MIKE
I think of creating a memory. Sometimes that memory is of a real train or a location that I would like to try and create in miniature. Sometimes, more often, the memory is of running trains, either as a child on th floor or with good friends around a layout. If I manage to “escape” the reality of the day, even for a little while, I figure I was successful in creating the memory.
Rick
First off, let me state that I am very much a lone wolf.
I see:
- A string of 20 four-wheel freight cars, with a 2-8-2 pulling at the head end and a 2-6-2T shoving hard at the rear, climbing a 2.5% grade on a line that hangs on to a steep, heavily forested mountainside by its fingernails.
- About a million commuters being crammed into EMU cars by professional ‘pushers’ in black uniforms.
- A big-boilered, low-drivered, seriously ugly 2-8-0 smoking up the catenary in a large urban junction.
- A string of 3-truck articulated coal hoppers with a 2-truck hopper/brake van at each end, all of no known prototype, rolling out of a cassette onto a scenery-free module with an intricate track arrangement behind a Baldwin 0-8-0T, with a Kawasaki-built 0-6-0T pusher on the other end.
Whenever I start seeing #4 above, that’s my cue to go into the garage and arrange to see it with my real-world eyeballs!
Chuck (modeling central Japan in 1964 - sort of)
I think of a few things. The joy it brings when people see the layout and enjoy it as is, plywood and all. The socialization it creates. In the future I see operating nights where anybody can attend and just have some good fun, share ideas and anything not just trains. Its a way to bring people together, not to say everyone like trains but fo me I just make sure its not the only thing in the room. I leave plenty of space for groups to just hang out.
I also picture the old fat guy ( Wit Towers) laughing his but off when a group makes a huge mess of an operating session.
I think of the many friends I have made over the years I been in the hobby,the joy it brings and how boring life would be for me without this great hobby.
l see the railroads of my boyhood, the 40’s and 50’s. I also see some of the railroads in my area that did logging, as well as haul milk cars from Vermont and New Hampshire to the cities of Southern New England, rolling over mountain passes, tunnels, crossing many rivers and streams. I am still in the layout design stage, but the benches are built and power is available, as well as many bought MRR locos and cars, track, etc. Winter, where art thou so I can get back indoors? I got a good laugh from some of the comments so far…" fat, grumpy olde men" ? Hey, I may be 67, but I only weigh 180, and I just got through building a 150 foot wall, 7 feet high, with blocks that weigh 80 pounds each!!! I don’t sit in a chair and “grump”… LOL
Artistic and creative craftsmen.
Oddly, I think of children playing with a trainset. When I work on / operate my layout, I don’t think model railroading, I think I am having fun working on my hobby. I don’t feel like I am “playing” either. Odd, I know. Peter
The world in miniture as I think it ought to be, time jumping and going from a great place to to another with out a two day drive in between. I like McClanahan’s statement, This is not a model railroad, it is a miniture railroad. It is my world.
What I do see about this forum is that there are a few members who will use any thread to advance their peculiar views of model railroading. But I tell you folks, I’ve been searching and I have yet to find the authoritative rulebook that defines exactly what is or is not model railroading and who is or is who is not a model railroader.
But the great thing is: IT JUST DOESN’T MATTER! because it’s my railroad and I’ll do what I want, and I’ll do what I want because I enjoy it, and that joy I get from model railroading whether it’s building a structure, laying down scenery, going to a train show, attending a NMRA Division Meeting or just running trains is what it means to me.
That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it.
Funny thing, when I think about model RR’ing I am still always visualizing prototype scenes, whether it is a freight making its way out of a yard onto the main, or heavy tonnage snaking ever upward at about 10 mph with the units in run 8, and, rarely, I can see a sleek streamliner (green and orange, of course) crossing the nothern rockies, following a river valley. jc5729