07-28-2010, 09:22 PM
Now that's an interesting slant on things ...
... but it somehow flies in the face of so many things that are considered tenets of model railroading in this day and age of "operation."
Back when I first got into HO scale, everyone I knew cramed every car they had on their 4'x8' "platform" and made up a train of whatever cars seemed easy to couple together with those old X-2F "horn-hook" couplers (or the old dummies if that's all you had - maybe you had a car that had a dummy on one end and an X-2F on the other so you could use all your cars - and then you set the rheostat on half-power and watched the train go around and around as it went from "Philadelphia" to "New York," or wherever they went where you lived, and then you backed the train into the yard's several (two or three) tracks and that was an evening of model railroading.
The concept that so many "Brass Hats" (if I can resurrect that old term) embrace today is that of moving some sort of freight from here to there, wherever those two places are. Sure, there are still people who enjoy continuous running and that is just fine ... for them. And there are those who have one locomotive and a half-dozen freight cars and enjoy a half-hour of switching John Allen's TimeSaver, and that's fine, too ... for them.
If you like having your yard full of freight cars, even those that "are missing this or missing that," hey, you go for it! Personally, on my layout, if it doesn't conform to the NMRA weight or gauge RP's, or if the couplers don't slip easily onto and mate nicely with the Kadee Coupler Gauge, or if they derail often for some unknown reason, the car gets "B.O.ed," pulled from the layout and placed on the "Bad Order" track on the work bench, with a "Bad Order Form," filled out, describing the problem needing attention, and that's where it sits until the problem has been addressed ... or that's how it used to work when I lived in Pennsylvania and had a layout. And that's how it will be again when I get enough track hand-laid to the point where I can actually run some trains, the system will be the same.
I suppose my point is ... whatever fires your boiler! I like Camelback steam, Gary S. likes fairly modern diesels. Both are valid. I wouldn't berate him because his freight cars aren't 40- and 50-footers sporting boxcar red paint and pulled by something that boils water for power! And I won't berate you for wanting a full yard and full sidings ... I just chose to be able to justify the existance of everything on my layout, and insure that if it is called upon to move, it can do so without causing me to exercise my extensive military vocabulary of off-color words!
... but it somehow flies in the face of so many things that are considered tenets of model railroading in this day and age of "operation."
Back when I first got into HO scale, everyone I knew cramed every car they had on their 4'x8' "platform" and made up a train of whatever cars seemed easy to couple together with those old X-2F "horn-hook" couplers (or the old dummies if that's all you had - maybe you had a car that had a dummy on one end and an X-2F on the other so you could use all your cars - and then you set the rheostat on half-power and watched the train go around and around as it went from "Philadelphia" to "New York," or wherever they went where you lived, and then you backed the train into the yard's several (two or three) tracks and that was an evening of model railroading.
The concept that so many "Brass Hats" (if I can resurrect that old term) embrace today is that of moving some sort of freight from here to there, wherever those two places are. Sure, there are still people who enjoy continuous running and that is just fine ... for them. And there are those who have one locomotive and a half-dozen freight cars and enjoy a half-hour of switching John Allen's TimeSaver, and that's fine, too ... for them.
If you like having your yard full of freight cars, even those that "are missing this or missing that," hey, you go for it! Personally, on my layout, if it doesn't conform to the NMRA weight or gauge RP's, or if the couplers don't slip easily onto and mate nicely with the Kadee Coupler Gauge, or if they derail often for some unknown reason, the car gets "B.O.ed," pulled from the layout and placed on the "Bad Order" track on the work bench, with a "Bad Order Form," filled out, describing the problem needing attention, and that's where it sits until the problem has been addressed ... or that's how it used to work when I lived in Pennsylvania and had a layout. And that's how it will be again when I get enough track hand-laid to the point where I can actually run some trains, the system will be the same.
I suppose my point is ... whatever fires your boiler! I like Camelback steam, Gary S. likes fairly modern diesels. Both are valid. I wouldn't berate him because his freight cars aren't 40- and 50-footers sporting boxcar red paint and pulled by something that boils water for power! And I won't berate you for wanting a full yard and full sidings ... I just chose to be able to justify the existance of everything on my layout, and insure that if it is called upon to move, it can do so without causing me to exercise my extensive military vocabulary of off-color words!
biL
Lehigh Susquehanna & WesternÂ
"America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves." ~~Abraham Lincoln
Lehigh Susquehanna & WesternÂ
"America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves." ~~Abraham Lincoln