A new layout!

[Desertdweller]

Wiley,

I just want to tell you how much I enjoy looking at your railroad.  It reminds me of the HO railroad I had in the late 60's-early 70's.  Yours is much more developed.

This was a sort of "golden era" of HO railroading.  Good variety of products at a low cost, even for those days.

Les

[rogertra]

Wiley,

I just want to tell you how much I enjoy looking at your railroad.  It reminds me of the HO railroad I had in the late 60's-early 70's.  Yours is much more developed.

This was a sort of "golden era" of HO railroading.  Good variety of products at a low cost, even for those days.

Les

And other than Athearn, most of it was, how to put this kindly?  Lacking in quality?

Cheers

Roger T.

[James in FL]

I've been following this thread Wiley.
Thanks for the pics.

I love the nostalgia look of your layout.

It's good stuff.

[Doneldon]

And other than Athearn, most of it was, how to put this kindly?  Lacking in quality?CheersRoger T.

Roger-

Your comment is anything but kindly.

We all know that you are a focused, detail-oriented, prototypical modeler, but that doesn't make you special or give you the right to make nasty comments about someone else's model railroading interests. The worst part is that your comment reveals that you knew your statement was out of line and yet you did it anyway!

You know, people could make fun of you as a rivet counter. Although I know such comments are often worn, ironically, as a badge of honor, I'll wager that you wouldn't appreciate the slight or the malice behind it. I'm happy that you enjoy how you participate in this hobby but I'm equally happy that Wiley enjoys his pike, too. In fact, Wiley's enthusiasm suggests he enjoys model railroading at least as much as anybody and more than most. Judging from your chronically sour, condescending attitude, he's getting something out of our shared hobby that seems to be eluding you.

Please don't try to weasel out of what you wrote. Your put-down and intent are obvious. You need to acknowledge your arrogance and apologize to Wiley.
                                -- D

[jward]

well said doneldon.

wiley may not do things the way I would but neither does roger. the big difference is that wiley is too busy havng fun to put down others with comments that are not constructive.

[jbrock27]

I agree with Doc and Jeff.  It gets old and tiresome ole boy

I would also add that Atlas was around at that time as well as being quality.

[Jerrys HO]

As said in the last two posts.....
VERY WELL SAID, my hats off to you D.
I don't visit much here for a couple of reasons, one, me and my son are doing R/C cars right now, two, for the reason that was just given.
I still have my layout up and ready to go back to. I love trains but do not have all the knowledge of the railways most of you have. So my layout is built to what I like not a prototypical era.
Although Wiley's layout is a lot of old stuff, he has done a remarkable job with it. I think he should stand proud for what he accomplished.

[wiley209]

It's also worth noting that back in the '60s and early '70s, TYCO's locomotives were pretty decent. They had good motors (the diesels typically had Mantua's MU-2 drive) and could be solid runners. Only when TYCO was sold to Consolidated Foods Company and they came out with that crummy PowerTorque motor was when they began to go downhill. (From the mid '70s onward, TYCO's locomotives were a lot like the older Bachmann ones from the '70s and '80s, if not worse.) But they still offered a bunch of cool accessories and building kits, and quite a bit of their rolling stock looked cool too. Had I been running a model railroad in the late '70s or early '80s, I probably would've started with a Bachmann or TYCO set like that, but eventually get a better-quality locomotive for it, very much like with my model railroading.

[Desertdweller]

Those 45 year old HO items may be crude by today's standards (horn-hook couplers, passenger cars without interiors, etc.).  But they were affordable, and worked well enough for me.

More importantly, they made the difference for a broke college student like I was between having an HO railroad that provided many hours of creativity and enjoyable operation, and no model railroad at all.

There seemed to be a bigger price difference back then between trainset quality items and high quality brass imports.  Nothing to fill in the gap between them.

Back then, my 4x6 ft. HO railroad had about $150 1970 dollars tied up in it.  About the price of a single top-shelf non-DCC locomotive today.  A nickel-plated brass HO E5 back then (Hallmark) sold for about the same price as an N-scale plastic E5 today (Kato).  I'll never know how well the Hallmark model performed, but I do know the Kato version performs very well.  If I had the attitude that "only the finest is good enough", I maybe could have bought one state-of-the art loco, but would have had no train for it to pull, nor anything to run it on.  So why bother?

Les

[jbrock27]

I feel very fortunate to be able to say, that I was lucky in that I avoided throwing any $$ away on TYCO or Bachmann locos from the '70s and '80s.  $$ was tight then and a shame to have wasted it on such products.

[Desertdweller]

jbrock,

If the product performs up to expectations, it is not a waste of money.  Tyco was a continuation of the Mantua line of HO trains, a well-established brand. Their locomotives were smooth running and quiet with an acceptable speed range.

The major problem I had with Tyco was that their couplers were truck-mounted.  While they would operate well with each other, they had problems operating with Athearn stock, which used body-mounted couplers.
It took me quite a while to understand why.

The Tyco Diesels back then used a self-contained power truck.  They didn't have the pulling power of the Athearns, but they were plenty sufficient for short trains on a small layout.

My model trains back then were mostly a mix of Tyco and Athearn.  I had some AHM-branded Rivarossi models, and two sets of Con-Cor streamlined passenger cars.  I remember riding the Milwaukee Road Hiawatha to get to my nearest hobby shop to buy an Athearn SW switcher.  Those were exciting days.

Les

[jbrock27]

I should have clarified, I was referring to diesels by those 2 makers, not steam locos.

I stand by what I said is my sentiment.  Here is why: People make choices in their lives over what to spend their disposable income on and when to spend it.  Bc many people take the "want it now", "need to have it now", approach they fail to grasp that with some patience, they can save their money, spend a little more and get a better product, ie: Atlas or Athearn locos from the '70s and '80s as opposed to the need for instant gratification, for what back then would be to  buy a cheap and less expensive TYCO or Bachmann (diesel) locomotive.  Even at their lesser cost, I could never justify buying either TYCO or Bachmann back then; you got so much more for the $$ from either of the 2 "A"s.

[jward]

the big drawback with the early mu2 drive is that they didn't have all wheel pickup. I would imagine that somebody resourceful who didn't mind tearing one completely apart, and rebuilding is could add all wheel pickup. probably the easiest way to get wheelsets that had metal wheels on both sides would be to find an old tyco trolley, or Plymouth switcher and use its wheelsets in the rebuilt mu2 drive. there are also those who have successfully rebuilt powertorque drives with motors from cd player disk drives. neither conversion is for the faint of heart, and it is a modification that, once started cannot be put back to the original configuration.

having cut my teeth in the 1970s, my locomotive fleet was primarily athearn diesels which were solid performars right out of the box, with all wheel drive and pickup. only minor modifications needed to be made if desired, namely the replacement of the bus bar which clipped onto the top of the motor and contacted both trucks, with a soldered wire, in the early 1980s, Ernst came out with a drop in replacement gear set which lowered the top speed of the locomotive to about 45 scale mph. measured against that standard, even the atlas units came up short.

the only reason I had tyco and ahm locomotives on my roster was my weakness for alco locomotives. I had to have alcos, even if the sat in a line on one of my yard tracks out of service. that was not an uncommon sight on the real railroads of that era.

it should also be mentioned that certain of the ahm locomotives were the worst of the whole bunch, having a cheap 3 pole open frame motor mounted directy on top of the truck, directly driving one of the axles through a worm gear with no gear reduction whatsoever. they had very little low speed control, and rubber traction tires that would bounce the locomotive off the rails when attempting to pull a heavy load.  the c liner, rs2 and "alco 1000" (s2) were among those so configured.

[rogertra]

And other than Athearn, most of it was, how to put this kindly?  Lacking in quality?CheersRoger T.

Roger-

Your comment is anything but kindly.

We all know that you are a focused, detail-oriented, prototypical modeler, but that doesn't make you special or give you the right to make nasty comments about someone else's model railroading interests. The worst part is that your comment reveals that you knew your statement was out of line and yet you did it anyway!

You know, people could make fun of you as a rivet counter. Although I know such comments are often worn, ironically, as a badge of honor, I'll wager that you wouldn't appreciate the slight or the malice behind it. I'm happy that you enjoy how you participate in this hobby but I'm equally happy that Wiley enjoys his pike, too. In fact, Wiley's enthusiasm suggests he enjoys model railroading at least as much as anybody and more than most. Judging from your chronically sour, condescending attitude, he's getting something out of our shared hobby that seems to be eluding you.

Please don't try to weasel out of what you wrote. Your put-down and intent are obvious. You need to acknowledge your arrogance and apologize to Wiley.
                                -- D

No, the intent was to put down the products, which I clearly did, not someone's modelling interests.

Unfortunately, you chose to interpret my comments as an attack on someone's model railway.

I never mentioned the model railway in question and as I have written on here many, many times, in various forms, your modelling is whatever makes you happy.

I will repeat, this time without mincing words, other than Athearn, most of it was, how to put this kindly?  Lacking in quality?  And I'm referring to the products of Tyco, AHM, Rivarossi and yes, even our host Bachmann, none of them came up to the standard of Athearn.

As jward wrote "having cut my teeth in the 1970s, my locomotive fleet was primarily athearn diesels which were solid performars (sic) right out of the box, with all wheel drive and pickup....."

I wouldn't touch any of the other products mentioned.  In fact, my diesel fleet was all Athearn until Life-Like introduced their Proto 2000 line, which even put Athearn to shame and then Atlas really upped the standard with their improved line of diesels and my purchases of even Athearn came to a halt and still have by the way.  Finally, Bachmann came along and blew the steam competition out of the water with their Spectrum line.  Even my Athearn diesel fleet was retired from active service and given to teenagers in the school where I worked, once the improved P2K and Atlas diesels come onto the market.  I therefore stand by my original comments.

However, if I upset Wiley with my comment, I sincerely apologize as it was not my intent to criticise his modelling choices.

Cheers

Roger T.

[jward]

the early p2ks were improved athearn clones. the Ernst gears would fit them as well, and if you needed replacement parts, athearn gears were a drop in replacement. the biggest improvement I saw with p2k was the can motor.