I was just wondering about something: We all know about North American, European, Japanese model railroad manufacturers but are there any manufacturers in Australia / New Zealand / Russia that are dedicated to producing model railroad equipment that is used in those countries? And if so, how is the quality / detailing? Like I wrote, just wondering.
I'll answer the New Zealand part as I live there The only manufacturer of any note in N scale is Mark4design Home and most you already know Marks work. Quality is extremely high and accurate. There are no other manufacturers of note producing N Scale items. We have South Dock which produce S Scale Sn3.5 NZ Rail / Kiwi Rail locomotive kits in Pewter and rolling stock in kit form. Frateschi (HO) produce NZ Rail equivalent locomotives and some rolling stock and are a custom run in Brazil. We also have Etchcetera who produces NZ120 etched locomotive kits which are TTn3.5. http://www.automationz.co.nz/nz120/nz120.html These run on N scale track and use N scale mechanisms. The etchcetera have good detail but when compared to an Atlas or Kato , the lack of definition shows up. Then there is Trackgang products who produce NZ120 and S gauge NZ Rail / Kiwi Rail locomotive kits and rolling stock kits. The NZ120 kits lack good definition on details. I have 1 DX model and that is basic when compared to commercial offerings. Trackgang Products | Products > Browse Just bear in mind that the NZ models aren't available by any mainstream manufacturer and are made by enthusiasts and hobbyists. I'll leave the Australian offerings to the Aussies as I will undoubtably miss someone. Their offerings look quite good. If you follow this link you will get a listing of Ausralian N scale manufacturers. Australian-N-Scale , Be warned everything down this neck of the woods is expensive!!!
Home Page Aust-N-Rail is a source of Australian N scale, I get my ALPS printer cartridges from him. I'll leave it to others to comment on quality etc., for some reason I've never had much interest in modeling Australian prototype. The Australian railway network was developed separately in each state with different gauges (though all states are now linked by standard gauge and the broad gauge has mostly been converted to standard, the main holdouts being Melbourne and Adelaide's commuter lines), going clockwise from my state you had Queensland 3'6", New South Wales standard gauge, Victoria 5'3", Tasmania 3'6", South Australia 5'3" standard and 3'6", Western Australia 3'6", on top of this, with a few exceptions (mainly diesels) each states rollingstock was distinctly different. Because of this, unless you lived in New South Wales or Victoria where the population is concentrated you didn't have much to choose from in the way of models or coverage in the national model railway and railfan press, especially if you were from one of the narrow gauge states where scratchbuilding skills are still almost a necessity, more so in N scale. I use past tense occasionally because with the train operating companies now separated from the track owners and now mostly privately owned the former barriers of state borders have less of an impact these days. I've resigned myself to the reality that hell will freeze over before anyone makes some decent N scale Santa Fe steam locomotives much less a Queensland Railways C17 or BB18 1/4.
:thumbs_up:Thanks guys for the info! :thumbs_up: It seems to me that Australian and New Zealand rail equipment is a mixture of North American, European and maybe Japanese styling influences (to me anyway).
In Australia, what you're seeing is a shift over time from British to American influence. For example, between the 1950s and 1980s, very British-looking 4-wheel freight cars were replaced by larger 8-wheel cars with knuckle couplers. Steam locomotives were generally made in Britain or Australia itself; older ones looking very British but the last generation rather Americanized. Some early diesels were British, but as with other Commonwealth countries, American designs supplanted them because they lasted longer.
Hello! Russian havent any domestioc products at N scale. They make only some H0 and TT locos and cars. I know one company, named as "Peresvet", and located at St. Pitersburg, who makes this things. Also PIKO made some Russian rolling stock at 80-ts years. For exampe, very popular russian Passenger Car "Oktjabrj" and Che-Es-4 Loco, named as "Aquarium" Also some german companies make some exported locos from Russia. For example this is M-62 loco (Trix) and T-109 loco (Trix, Brava) named as Ljudmila. ---- Vadim
It was actually used in various parts of the world, also in Europe. Actually, everywhere except for North and Central America. (Though there is now apparently a South African NG Garratt in Texas.) But the Australian one is the first non-brass model of any Garratt.
One of the HO guys at the club has one of the Eureka Models Garratts, it's a very nice model. There is a lot more available in HO, the pages of the Australian Model Railway Magazine, like MR, are full of ads for very nice HO models, there are even some HOn3 1/2 models of Queensland prototype, but even in HO things lean towards NSW and Victoria. I'd like to see one of these, IMHO a much nicer looking engine than the NSW AD60, but an N scale one will always be a major scratchbuilding job. [nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_D46SV-Igcw"]YouTube- Broadcast Yourself.[/nomedia] is a film made by manufacturer Beyer Peacock when QR's garratts were delivered in 1950, beware the video is about 17 minutes long.
"Garratt" is a generic term for a category of locomotive, like "Mallet". The NSW AD60 is a standard gauge 4-8-4. Most Garratts in Africa were 3'6" or metre gauge. Garratts of various designs were found on every continent except North America.
I recall reading that Alco had the US license to build Garratts but never had any customers. Imagine a 4-8-2+2-8-4 on Cumbres Pass, or one of these on the Maine two foot gauge.
I did not care too much for this lengthy video. However thanks to it, I found others that I like very much. In particular this one on the 1009: [nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPNSWBGTffk&feature=related"]YouTube- Broadcast Yourself.[/nomedia] It has much better quality and fine sound. But this one: [nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6gEjZYFs0M&feature=related"]YouTube- Broadcast Yourself.[/nomedia] is even more impressive, with the double-heading AD60s. It's a matter of taste, of course, which Garratt one prefers. Now if we could just get more models, and hopefully a fine one in N scale as well.
The film in my link was made almost 60 years ago after all, I posted it mainly because it outlines the rationale behind the garratts and there's not much film around of the QR ones in regular service. I was on the trip with 1009 that you posted, I didn't see myself anywhere, but I recognize the voice at one of the photo lines yelling at the people standing in front. We had just about every passenger car they could dig up on the train that day and 1009 only worked hard when the crew put on a show during the photo runpasts. Unfortunately she's been out of service for a few years now wth boiler problems though there are rumors now and then around the crew lunchrooms that she could be returned to service, maybe as an oil burner. Whichever one you look at garratts were impressive and interesting machines.
I presume there are not too many Garratts in Australia than can still be operated. So it would really be a shame if 1009 could not be brought back into operable condition. She sure looks phantastic in that video. There is a NG (600mm) Garratt in Switzerland that was bought in South Africa and renovated here. And even this diminutive Garratt is a very impressive piece of equipment. It's the one that LGB/Aster produced in G scale.
There is now a Kickstarter project to build a NSWGR AD60 Garratt at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1560185090/n-scale-nswgr-ad60-garratt-locomotive, the project closes on 30th June, so if you want one, you will have to pledge before then and hope the required number of pledges are met
Pricing for the AD60, if Kickstarter funding is met, will be around AUD$600; therefore someone pledging to the project at AUD$500 will save 16% on the expected retail price
