How much can we justify spending?

[eightyeightfan1]

I use to buy the Athearn BB GP-35 locos all the time. Did I really care that the hood was 6" too wide or that the fans were the wrong diameter, or the lettering was 4" lower than the prototype. No! They ran good, were strong pullers. I couldn't justify the $800 for the brass version, just because they were protypical, and didn't have a chunky casting. Now today, do I really want to drop $200-$300 for a loco just cause it has "prototype specifc" detail and a DCC decoder. I could care less if one railroad uses a firecracker antenna on a GEVO, while another railroad uses a shark fin antenna, and my layout is still DC. Even if I was modeling one of those railroads mentioned, I don't think I would care. Besides, when the train is rolling around the layout, who's gonna see the small "protoypical specific" detail. Kind of like Athearn adding roller bearings to their rolling stock that actually rotate. Yeah its a neat detail, but you're not going too see it when the rolling stock is moving, and the bearings aren't going to be moving while in the car is spotted in a siding. Maybe it's just my personel preference, but as long as it looks good enough, operates good, it works for me. Besides, I'm not letting a rivet counter pick up one of my locos, let alone put his scale ruler to it.

Would I like DCC layout? Yeah. But I started building my layout when DCC was just coming of age. Converting twenty locos, especially all the Athearn BB's, to DCC is just not justifiable right now. My layout operates good, I can run my locos in a consist without having to worry about programming, and I can't justify the cost of dropping $40-$50 for a decoder, or the hundreds of dollars needed to convert the layout to DCC. Maybe on the next layout.

Ok. I'll get off the soap box now.