new to hobby

[Beatthe9ers]

I hear ya, brother.  Just do what I am doing, buy all the equipment and wait until you get a bigger house.  LOL.

But seriously, there is always the temporary carpet layout option, depending on your circumstance.  Every couple of weeks at my house the 4 year old and I bust out the ez-track, set up a route that goes across the room, under chairs and round the ironing board, run our two (soon to be three) loco's and then close up shop 3 or 4 days later.

A permanent layout is literally 2 to 3 years away.

[Yampa Bob]

If you are really tight for space, you could have a HO layout on a piece of plywood  42 inches X 86 inches.  By fastening the track down, you could stand it against a wall when not in use.   My first layout was that size, and we sat it on the coffee table for awhile.

The choice is yours, but I think you would be much happier with HO scale.  The N scale is small, and at least for me, hard to work with.

Have a look at my thread "Yampa Valley Railroad" for an idea using a folding picnic table.  I'll bump it up so you can look at it.

Bob

[Yampa Bob]

Newfie:

I showed your last post to my wife, and she had a comment about your "lack of space", as first noted by your wife.  Remember, this is from a woman's point of view, and her exact words.

     Is your name on the house title?

When you've been married as long as we have, you learn to share everything, including "space".  We have a 1200 square foot garage. From a man's point of view, my wife could park her car outside so I could have a  12X30 layout.  So we negotiated, and she preferred the layout in the house, so she could watch me enjoy it. She also wants to share in the hobby and agreed to do some scenics for the ranch theme.

We had 3 huge couches in a living room that hardly ever was used.  Exit one couch, enter one 4x8 layout.

Yampa Bob

[TonyD]

First to Bob. Tel your wife couches and sofas are loaded with BTU's, and it is best to burn them all in the stove before springtime... hey, worth a try! To Newfie.... tell your sweet loving wife that by some freak co-incedence of nature, N scale requires a 4X8 sheet too... and if that doesn't fly... well, not so poular not because of the On30 and larger scales nowadays, but HOn2 1/2, which is N-guage track but the easier to work with HO scale equipment and buildings, might be the way to go. There was an awesome little "Maine two footer" called the Elk River, back in the early seventies, when this guage was catching on, a nice oval of mainline track, siding, tunnel, trestle, switchback spur to a mine, it was an inspiration to a kid just playing with trains before that. 2X3 feet. I had 4x6 to work with back then, so I did the same thing only standard guage...And alot of nice stuff fit in there without crowding the scenes. Best part? When you do get more room to build in, this can be an addition to the big one, just extending one line off the old layout to run along the full HO track as an interchange, or guage transfer.. like 'Port o Basque' was in the good ol' days.... I collect more moldy old magazines than websites, but you should be able to 'google' something along this idea..... It was in the 1970? into 72? Model Railroad Craftsmen mags....Frary and Hayden? Don't know how to spell their names. In the late 70's or 80's they did a maritime waterfront layout, forgot the name, which the old one could become an addition to. Check it out, might just keep peace- and trains- in the family...    

[TonyD]

Ahoy skipper. Being known as 'Newfie', I assume you are in the great white north! I thought of something last night- I can't seem to bring it up except from a maill file, but look for <www.miniaturesbyeric.ca< or something like that. He is north of ED, makes resin parts for detailing generic models into Canadian prototype. AND as I had a hunch, I checked, yes, he still makes HOn30 resin models, some are cool looking Hawaiian- (I don't know how to spell) prototypes.... If you can't find his site, email me off line, I will forward it to you.....   

[newfiegod]

Hey Tony d its funny that you mentioned Port Aux Basques......thats my home town.....lol....i do remember the trains we use to have years ago.....faintly...lol. I went and bought a n scale set and put it in the part of my basement that is not developed......bought the Bacmann explorer set .....i think it will be the sons set because i was a little dissappointed with the actual size when you take it out of the box and mostly hobby stores dont stock half as much n scale stuff as n scale.....i think i am going to get rid of my poker table for now and get something ho scale.

[r.cprmier]

Tony;
Dave Frary and Bob Hayden have been in this hobby since the year two.  The two have more credentials in it and other things than I could count.  Dave is really well-known in the "North Boston" area; Bob I don't know much about.  I have had the priviledge of meeting and talking with Dave at length several times, and he is quite knowledgeable with regard to the Maine two-footers.

Without looking in past issues (which I may not have anyway), The waterfront scene you may be referring to is an area of Rangeley Lake that was called "Marble's" in the days of "Rustication".  It seems that one could board a B&M passenger train in Boston, ride up to Waterville or Farmington that night, and find himself deboarding a two-foot parlour car-the Rangleley-in front of marble's Hotel.  T'was the day, I guess.

[TonyD]

Rich, I know the articles you are talking about, the ones I remember are ..even earlier. Carrabesset and Deadwood? Driftwood? It had the flat bottom Chessapeake sloops-skipjacks? and a probably testor's tug, 'cause that's all there was in HO scale boats back then!... sadly, because of Newfie here, I am going to put a oval of n-scale track like the Elk river one I remember in an empty 2X3 1/2' corner, but I do have an HO main down the middle of it, won't be easy.
NEWFIE! don't go to far with that N scale set- that could be the start of the narrow guage I've been on about. The track is fine as is, the cars and engine can be converted as you get the knack. Check out that Eric website, and get some ideas from the On30 page, just remember you will be half the size.... i've had no luck with search engines lately....wish I had a scanner again.... Well, an HOn30 (used to be HOn2 1/2, or HOn9? HOe9? in Europe) anyway a layout could fit ON the poker table....hey! the black diamond route? Queen of spades southern? hummmm.

[Chessie Sys. 3022]

Hmm... I'd recommend not going with N scale, but that's just my opinion. Some reasons why not...:

• It can be more expensive than HO
• It's really tiny. I wouldn't be able to stand it!
• Last, I know your not supposed to give into peer-pressure, but HO scale is the majority, and N is kind if the minority. As I write this the current post stats are:
  N-2025
  HO-13089
  Thomas & Friends-4126
  On30-3049
  It would be hard to find information on N-scale, so I suggest you go with HO scale.
  
  ~Justin
  

[Guilford Guy]

So your saying there are more Thomas Fans than N scalers...
HO is easier to handle, there is more readily available equipment, and scale wheelsetss and couplers can be pruchased (N scale wheelsets SUCK, not in their mechanics, but in appearance!)

[Chessie Sys. 3022]

So your saying there are more Thomas Fans than N scalers...
HO is easier to handle, there is more readily available equipment, and scale wheelsetss and couplers can be pruchased (N scale wheelsets SUCK, not in their mechanics, but in appearance!)

That's what I was trying to point out. I think it's kind of sad...

~Justin

[Guilford Guy]

This is a small forum compared to other websites. It is also the only one I know of to include a Thomas section. AFAIK There are wayyyyyy more N scalers than Thomas Fans.

[r.cprmier]

"close to scale" HOn2.5 wheelsets are available-I had seen them this past W.Springfield show.  Do not ask me where-I wasn't looking for them but ran across them anyway.  I wish I had that kind of luck with great women.
Many years ago, Joueff had marketed HOn2.5 stuff, but I don't think the market was there for fine scale 2' gauge.  Search the "Information Superhighway!"

[Conrail Quality]

So your saying there are more Thomas Fans than N scalers...
HO is easier to handle, there is more readily available equipment, and scale wheelsetss and couplers can be pruchased (N scale wheelsets SUCK, not in their mechanics, but in appearance!)

That's what I was trying to point out. I think it's kind of sad...

~Justin

That's not neccesarily an accurate representation of N-scalers. Bachmann has a bad reputation in N-scale right now due to the whole rapido/knuckle coupler fiasco(plus memories of the Junque Bachmann released in N-scale way back when). By contrast, Atlas, which is revered among N-scalers (the Atlas/Kato RS-3 is often considered the first N-scale locomotive that really ran well), has an N-scale board that is actually more active than their HO scale one. Clearly, quite a few N scalers are avoiding this site altogether.

I don't know why everyone here is so against N-scale. N has it's downsides, yes, but it alows much larger and more detailed layouts than an average person can do in HO. Indeed, I'm seriously considering switching to N scale myself for that very reason.

Oh, and "scale" couplers can be purchased in N scale. One just uses Z-scale couplers, which do work very well. No, it's not exactly to scale, but neither are the Kadee #58's.

Timothy

[Guilford Guy]

But there isn't "Proto 160." Proto 87 is where its at!