I kinda get a kick of the N scale copies of the original HO buildings that are incredibly uh, overexposed: Atlas HO passenger station Bachmann "Bakery" or "Machine Shop" that's actually a Revell HO enginehouse dating back to about 1959 Bachmann coaling tower; a copy of the Atlas HO one, or something like that. Etc.... I mean, those are so common that they've shown up on not only every layout, but in multiple scales, in the identical paint schemes! They've mutated like pygmy goats. They aren't BAD buildings, just EVERYWHERE... hence the cliche factor. The other one I get a chuckle out of, working with 12"=1' railroads on a daily basis, is the 'figure 8' track plans with the horrifically steep grade, piers with no stringers (no visible means of support), a bridge with no stringers, and down the other side. Grass mats... And YES, I had one way back when.
Roots.................I wonder how many on here, on Saturday morning, draged books, jar lids or what ever to the kitchen table to get a track over it's self? Oh what thrill to see a way to fast enginge pulling molded in color box cars up and over our enginering marvel. Freinds knocking at the door wanting to go play baseball, seen our railroad, and for the next three hours watch as a tyco gondola hauled everything from cherrios to our barlow knife in endless trips to nowhere..........the thrill is gone.......not for me! .....now where is that ole' gondola.oh yea in that cardbord box..uhhm I mean stagging yard
"Grass mats... And YES, I had one way back when." had one on my first layout. still vacuuming the little green things up. HO scale vehicle selection bothers me. I am trying to model the 60s-70s. there are so many cameros and mustangs and cobras and vintage bel aires that you can scatter around. where are the mopars??? just my two cents...
check out woodland senics again I seen a 59 or 60 (I think the year is close ) Dodge or Pylmoth.. the one with the tail fin fenders at the hobby shop this week.. www.//woodlandscenics.woodlandscenics.com/images/AS5336B.JPG
A lake feeding a river that is only there so there's a reason for the bridge. Apparently this lake is self-filling.
Would a DPM bashed into a condensed facsimile of a recognizable "signature landmark" of a modeled prototype scene be a cliche?
No, Ken. I love to see kitbashed DPM kits, and actually I think that too many people only interpret the DPM kits literally and build them the way they're supposed to when actually they were essentially made to be kitbashed and heavily modified like you did so excellently there. :thumbs_up:
Oops, guilty as charged- my HCD layout is mainly an oval, with the back half semi-hidden. But with my restricted space, it works well. All the action is "out front" anyway.
Ok. Lets see if I can offend some really great model railroads here. I think the fascia following a topographical contour rising and falling along the scene is over used. I agree it is interesting, but it does not help with photography of the scene or really frame it that well. It always reminds me I am looking at a model instead of blending in. I have seen many wonderful railroads with this same “feature”… Hopefully I wil remember this when it is time for fascia on my layout.
Or, in rolling stock, crane idlers which are the body of a center-cupola caboose one on end of a longer flatcar. Was there even a prototype for that? But Lionel made it, and other companies copied it. One MR article (the Lorigan Lumber Co, wasn't it?) showed a different approach: extending scenery over and down the edge of the layout a bit. The builder noted in made photography easier. Wouldn't adapt too well to an area with less rugged scenery than what he was modelling, though.
Oh yeah!? I can beat that. I have a folded oval....a large oval folded and stacked so that trains can pass overhead. :tb-tongue: What else ya got? :tb-biggrin:
The model world has to end somewhere. Especially on a module, you have no choice but to just slice off the model world and let roads and rivers come to an abrupt end. Especially if you are trying to model a prototype scene.
I suppose maybe what offends you most is 1000 miles of railroad adventure being crammed into a 10x12 room, yes? This is afterall what gives way to your largest number of model railroad sins... But wait - That's PRECISELY what we get in this life! A 10x12 room!!! In order for everyone to model like you would demand we model, and get the same volume of railroad action/operation into the same layout, we would need 50x75 rooms every one of us or we should all be content to have mdel railroads that resembles that version of Tehachapai in Great Model Railroads 2009 [all it is, is an oval that crosses over itself with a passing siding]. Now I ask you this: In the case of the former, WHERE are we all going to get these buildings, HOW are we going to afford them, and WHO is going to have the time to build that layout??? And in the case o fthe latter, jsut HOW LONG can you enjoy driving a train over techapai pass and molest it with your camera as it rides by before the whole thing gets old? I do believe this is the chief reason most of us tore up the initial ovals that came in the trainset box! Most of us have only so much space and time to build a layout, and we have a number of preset elements that must be in the layout, The tunnel may only be a foot long, but the conceptual idea "TUNNEL" is what is being represented. Not "Cut." You might see one river with five bridges over it all at once. The representation is five crossings over one river - with all the river parts between the bridges removed. The representation is the ROUTES, which is the Important part in operating a model railraod. You can only set cars out on the track you have on the bench! A large number of your steel truss bridges do come "out of a box" so to speak; no need to redesign a bridge when the bridge manufacturer already has a number of models ready to choose from!! Yes, many miss the abutments, but the width situation really isn't that much of an issue! The reappearence of many building kits might just coincide with what each kit costs and what builldings people actually like to look at. And that bachmann coaling tower seems to be the result of a set of articles from 1988 by Wayne Weslowski on scratchbuilding that tower. Take a guess why it is so popular: we don't have time to scratchbuild and superdetail our model railraods, so we do with what best we can get!! I think a lot of people tend to forget this reality in our postmodern Malcom Furlow inspired Minimalism era. We are trying to ignore FUNCTION to maximize the value of FORM. Go watch Susan Boyle. Tell me you HAVEN'T become someone who judges what a model layout should look like based upon a scale map of the prototype! I personally find minimalism as it applies for instance in interior decoration to be an impersonal collasal waste of time. I find this to be quite true in Model Railraoding as well; if all you have is a single track through that entire 4x8x8 foot space...well, lets just say in a family environment there are more funcitonal ways to use that space, and the land manager will be quick to point this out! I live in the reality similar to the reality from Frasier - yes, Dad has his old ugly hideous chair because THAT chair is COMFORTABLE! My railroads are the same way - there's enough track to comfortable accomodate a 20 car train - even if it looks hideous to the undertrained eye! I can support some arguements about the lack of loading and unloading facilities, as they are under modeled. I dont; see your arguement abotu the gondola on the trestle however, as most model railroaders can't tell the difference between gondolas just as long as it is not a covered hopper or a flat car!! There were dropbottom gondolas? Then in your mind, your imagination, remember that the gondola on the trestle in that picture is a drop bottom gondola!! I found your blog to be interesting, but the over glaring reaction of offense to this and that and everything [such as your review of Prototype car history] made the reading unpleasureable. In your quest for the ultimate gourmet cuisine you now shun that which gives life. There is a wookie in the forest in the park. There is a C-3PO on the passenger platform. He was wandering in the desert and near invisible if you didn't know he was there standing by the cactus! Do you have any idea how much fun the children have finding him? Where's the picture of the smilie smacking the other smilie over the head with the Fun stick??
Ok I've had my coffee, checked the ballast I put down last night, so here goes. A self test based on the original comment: passing score is anything between 70-100 If you've ever looked at a MR mag -10 If anything on your model railroad was bought at a hobby shop -10 If any of your motive power is brass -10 For each "cut" with bridge -10 For each stagging yard -25 For each walk-around controler jack -10 If your score was less 70 no worries do the make-up test: Invite someone you've meet in the last 30 days to see and operate your railroad + 1,000,000,000,000....................get the point "The real test of a hobby's worth is how much one enjoys it" Al Kalmbach 1935 (founder of Model Railroader)
May I have another? I guess I am sort of the opposite on many of these "cliches". I kind of miss my old train sets. Some of the best times of my life involved non prototypical layouts. I remember covering party balloons with paper mache and then painting that with water colors and getting two tunnels for the price of one. I loved those things. I still sometimes get out my old dog eared little blue book of atlas blueprints for HO layouts and just drool like a kid for the gadgillianth time. I actually bought another sawmill kit by pola or some other company like that so I could have the same structure I had as a kid. I can't see having a point to point layout because I actually get a great deal of pleasure from having a train that runs on an oval of track. I love roundy roundy! I still have a tyco ho scale caboose with operating flood light. Was this ever prototype? Damn it was fun to run behind my 060 tank engine in the dark. I've read all the articles about proto this and that since 1970 something. I aspire to have prototype operations on my layout. I ponder an artificial history for my layout. I consider just how far I can stretch reality so as to have my 1970's diesel era and my 1950's late days of steam era. I do like my semi prototype layout and yet I pine for toy train moments of absolute bliss. Yeah, that's it, I just like toy trains and real trains. How can I have both? Yes sir, I do want my cliches.
Oh and the can of glue and the bag of way to green sawdust grass, Atlas plastic "rustic" rail fence and a box of Phiser dairy cows, oh the good ole' days when we were realy injoying this hobby. We were excited by every trip to the hobby shop!
