Rick, the other Rick among many Rick's that participate here, and of course everyone else tuned in here. I sware to all the rath within me. Someday when someone says Thank-you Rick and doesn't say which Rick, we are all going to jump in and say your are "WELCOME". Rick N., wrote: Let me challenge you with a question: "When does prototypical modeling cease to be prototypical modeling?" Will I be able to answer this, can I rise to the occasion? NO. Allow me to point you to several examples of what I think is a responsive uptake to the question posed, perhaps it will be thought provoking and/or perhaps interesting model railroading. If nothing else I will have thrown my hat into the ring along with my two cents. My layout! What's so special about my layout? It's my layout? What else needs to be special about it? I make the rules, I set the standards and I have one goal in mind and that's to have fun! Well, perhaps it goes deeper then that, but that would be the crux of it. More to learn, see below. So, get to the point! I heard you. I operate as prototypical equipment as I can buy off the shelf at a BM LHS, which after all the California earthquakes is hard to find (Brick and Mortar...what did you think?) I may take sometime like Bruce/Arbomambo to detail out the equipment available. More then likely it comes straight out of the box and onto the pike aka layout. The locations I'm modeling on my layout are fictitious...sort of. There will be an Ashfork, Wiliams and if I'm lucky a Flagstaff. None of which resembles the real deal. I already have a San Berdu.. Why? I don't have room for the whole city so I had to shorten the name. No Barstow, no balls to get busy and scratch build the station. How do I refer to my layout. I call it a Prototype/Free-lanced model railroad. Almost sounds like blasphemy? That would be the best part. And yet, I'm not the only one who has built layouts with this in mind. Our premier layout in the valley has some of the finest prototypical train equipment I've seen lately and the towns are named after family members. I would call his layout a Prototype/Free-lanced model railroad. Factor in something else here. I'm trying to recapture memories I have of the Santa Fe, when as a youngster I visited these locals afore mentioned. Did I answer the question. Not according to some of you and besides how can I justify having both. What? Did I not say, it's my railroad, I make the rules, I set the standards and number one is to have fun! So why the....well...does it matter to you? Who resurrected this dammed post, anyway? LOL Gosh as a good friend would say "I DGAS". Figure it out. I enjoy what I'm doing even if it doesn't fit the purist :angry: thinking that is so prevalent today. Why do I have to conform, why should I give up my choices and who said you are my authority?
Rick (from another Rick) -- I always love reading your posts! A perfect example of the Prototype/Freelance -- my new Silicon Valley CalTrain module. There is no such place, that looks like that station; yet it is a full scale-sized station, with very real activity and details, with elements based on a number of the Amtrak / CalTrain stations in the Bay Area. The JACALAR, on the other hand, is total freelance.
Yup. Neither do I. When it comes to how folks look at others ways of enjoying this hobby, not enough of us will say I DGAS. GASP! Another free thinking individual? I am not alone? Could it become crowded in this sand box? Next comes being labeled as radicals....
Radicals? Radicals, gosh no we don't want that label. LMAO Independent...yep, I can grove on that one. Good one...Rick B. Right on. LOL Love what you are doing with your layout. I don't care what anyone else thinks. Now if you don't mind I need to shovel the cat $hi+ out of the sand box.
pro·to·type - noun 1. An original type, form, or instance serving as a basis or standard for later stages. 2. An original, full-scale, and usually working model of a new product or new version of an existing product. 3. An early, typical example. 4. Biology A form or species that serves as an original type or example. pro·to·typ-i-cal - adjective 1. having the typical qualities of a particular group or kind of person or thing 2. very typical The 1:1 railroads are not prototypes (only the very first was) everything after that including our little empires, are prototypical to some degree I enjoyed all of the Ricks' comments
Hello Komata, Thank you for bringing this thread back. It is a topic that has been and is discussed many times. Our option's are as many and varied as our model railroads. I agree with your comments 99.9 percent. I've loved trains ever since my first American Flyer set. And over the years have settled on N Scale as my preferred scale. My opinion is that if I like it, I will run it on my MRR. So there can be an 0-4-0 and a modern diesel running together and this works for me. I call my style Imaginary Free Lance. I like small time operations and watching trains run. I've just finalized my track-plan and benchwork and will finally making progress toward it's building. See ya Ron
Ron, so that you all know aka Switchman, Looking forward to more reports and pictures of your layout. I DGAS, what anyone else thinks. I love it, "Imaginary Free Lance". LOLOL Spells F U N! In my book.
I've been around the hobby for many years and visited layouts in the company of many well-known and unknown model railroaders. I've seriously never heard anyone disparage what someone else is doing -- during the visit or in the car afterward. Some might have mentioned different ways the layout owner might have tried to reach his own own goals, but that's about it. It's puzzling to me how many people are in in a state of high dudgeon about others telling you what to do. You are jousting with windmills that don't exist, but maybe that suits your needs in some way. 99.999% of the people in the hobby could not possibly care less what you are doing. (In other words, they "DGAS") I can't remember meeting anyone in the hobby who wouldn't say "If you are having fun, keep doing that." I've designed layouts for others that have ranged from dedicated attempts to portray specific real-life scenes and operating practices to one based on Warner Brothers' cartoons (Roadrunner, Animaniacs, etc.). I hope that all of them have been fun for the owners to build. By the way, "Prototype-Freelance" is an accepted practice and term that's been around the hobby for decades.
I am just a beginner but this is an interesting thread so I will post my opinion. If you are an advanced modeler and can scratch build/kit bash structures, prototypical is the way to go. Use Google maps to research a railroad, take a trip to the area, take pictures. My first layout will be prototypical-freelance, because due to my limited modeling skills, I will use commercially available kits. But everything else will be prototypical. I am modeling modern era CSX, so I purchased locomotives that are still in service today,(GP38-2, GP15-1, SD60, SD70ACE, ES44DC). All the freight cars on my railroad are still in use and the companies still in business. The illusion I am trying create is, imagine just standing by the road, rail fanning, and watching a train go by.
Team DTO Re: 'All the freight cars on my railroad are still in use and the companies still in business' You do realise I trust that with the passage of time, (and assuming that you don't 'upgrade' what you are currently buying/running), because the inevitable mergers and replacements of rolling stock, you will have a 'museum' on your hands - something which will be historically 'accurate' and representational of a specific time. Not meant in a disparaging manner BTW, but rather to illustrate that today's 'modern' is tomorrow's 'History'. It's an interesting concept that is rarely considered; I thought you might like to know. (Keep up the 'Collecting') Komata "TVR - serving the Northern Taranaki . . . "
Komata, you are correct that "today's modern is tomorrow's history". But with modern diesels service life can be extended, with rebuilds, to 80+ years. Re-paints of freight cars can sometimes take years. So looks my layout will be modern for quite some time.
I was surprised to see this old thread resurrected, it was like taking a time machine back into the past. I'll add quick update. In the end I didn't do anything I set out to do in the original post that started this whole thread. I built the bottom deck, added track and realized the dream in my head and the reality of what I had done just wasn't going to work so I designated the bottom deck of my N scale layout, the "Slesse" yard, part of the Slesse Sub (which doesn't exist). I then built my nolix (a modified helix) and the areas I thought I would have for structures just didn't materialize but I am very very happy with the nolix I built which will reflect the Fraser/Thompson Canyon, except mine will be called Slesse Canyon, the track following Slesse Creek [same creek into Washington state has a different name starting at the border]. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slesse_Creek My top deck is going to be a city which will be a clever disguise for staging only as the "throat" area in my layout for operators can only handle two easily, so all switching will be done on the first deck. I still don't have a name for the city yet but I"m getting there. If any of you still are out there and contributed to this thread in the past I'd love to hear what you final accomplished.
