Possible Scale Switch

[rrinker]

This has me thinking again. And that's probably not a good thing. The last time I did N scale, I finally got fed up with the poor runnign quality and mostly junky locos available. Right before the Atlas/Kato diesels appeared on the scene. I went back to HO and have been there ever since. I could definitely do a ton more in N scale. Most of the locos and cars I need are available no in N scale, although like much of my HO stuff I would ahve to comb eBay as many things are out of production. Some of my HO structures are limited run items for various historical societies but the company that made them has the same kit available in N scale as a stocked item, so rather than living with the one I have with no more to be made, I cna buy up as many N scale ones as I would need.
Oh it is so tempting, but I haven't even gotten the current layout operational, let along sceniced. And there is the vision issue, my eyes are pretty bad and have been since I was in second grade. Adding scale size grabs to HO rollign stock is tricky, even with a big magnifier light at my workbench. I'm not sure I coudl do it in N scale. A friend of mine has a nice N scale layout, handlaid track to 2mm finescale standards, and he scratchbuilds locos. I'm pretty good at soldering but cramming those tiny decoders in and soldering wires that are only a millimeter or so long seems rather daunting to me. I would be pretty much all diesel though and the newer ones all have drop-in decoders. Sound I don;t care about, I have a few sound locos in HO but definitely not needed.
Then there's starting over - I have a pretty significant collection of HO equipment. Perhaps I shall put this line of thinkign off until I have to move again, and then decide to rebuild my current layout or start all over.

--Randy