Train Sets, and waxing poetic

[Warflight]

A lot of us tend to buy just engines, and just cars... we build our collections, and layouts, and maybe it started with a train set, and maybe it started different, but how many of us really think about it?

So, today, I was looking in my closet, at the few boxes of "sets" I've bought recently, and it dawned on me... is there a better thrill in this hobby than that of a full train set? That big flat box, opening it, and seeing the contents inside? Those memories of the sets we had as children... or the sets we have bought our children, grandchildren, or even for ourselves?

There is just something about that box. Knowing that what's inside is all you need to run a simple train. The track, transformer, engine, and a few cars... maybe they aren't fancy, and maybe they don't look at great next to that $500 engine on the shelf, in it's shiny brass, and maybe the detail isn't the world's greatest, but, the details were still far better than any of the other toys you remember as a child.

Well, I'm off to go set up some track, and run a train around it for a bit.

Cheers!

[WoundedBear]

Can't say as I have ever bought a "train set"......or even owned one. Never had trains where I grew up, so they weren't a big attraction to us kids. I can't recall any of my friends having trains either. Actually, I never saw one in person till I was in my teens.

My railroad modelling only started about 10 years ago or so.

Sid

[James in FL]

I've had one, that was given to me from my now wife, many, many years ago.
It's what got me back into the hobby.


Why not set it up, and keep it up?
You'll be surprised as to how fast it becomes a layout.

Yes, to me, there is a better thrill in this hobby than that of a full train set is.
We can play God.
We can resurrect the dead (lokies and stock).
We can create, or destroy at will.
We can do what we want and are unchallenged.
We have true free will.
For this,
Is why I am in the hobby.
There is no conflict and no hardship.
When I turn the layout on, I'm in a different world.
A world of solace and tranquility.

[Warflight]

Why not set it up, and keep it up?
You'll be surprised as to how fast it becomes a layout.

Exactly!

[Len]

Sets? When I started out it was pretty much one Athearn 'blue box' at a time, as the paper route and bottle returns allowed.

How times have changed.

Len

[Terry Toenges]

My dad had a Lionel layout on a wooden door when I was real little until we moved and he had to sell it.  I got wind-up train sets around the tree every year for a few years. When I was around 8, I got my very own Lionel set (That I still have, but it's been repainted a few times.)

[Ckrails]

Long after I grew up, got married, bought my house in the suburbs, had two kids, got two dogs and a six-seat SUV, I asked my mom "hey, when you sold the house what did you do with my old Tyco train set?"  She said that when she and my dad sold the house they sold all the toys too.  I've been pouting about it ever since, and that was 10 years ago.  The moral of the story -- playing with toy trains makes you feel like a kid all over again!

[Warflight]

Oh, man... remember how Tyco used to pack their sets? It would be just their regular engines, and stock, still in their boxes, arranged in the flat box, along with the track, and transformer, and a box of street signs, and telephone poles. When you opened the box, you had all of these other boxes to open!

Oh, and it was always steel track too... though, it had it's purpose from Tyco. They had this train set... I think it was called the "Super Train"... light weight materials, and a slot car engine... it would (in HO scale speed) do mach 1! (that's about 35mph in real speed? According to the box, anyway) So that Tyco train needed steel track, because the only thing that kept it ON the tracks was the magnets on the bottom of the train. (I think I still have one of those somewhere)

To steer this back onto Bachmann... the Bachmann sets I remember were usually done in Styrofoam, and always looked a bit classier in how they were packaged. They had those windo boxes, with the flap you had to lift to see the train.

[Ken Clark]

   My first train set, my Dad made an SW switcher and Caboose from Plywood and 2x4 along with 6 Sardine
Gondola's with hook and eye couplers. Wish I still had it!

 
   Ken C
    GWN

[Warflight]

   My first train set, my Dad made an SW switcher and Caboose from Plywood and 2x4 along with 6 Sardine
Gondola's with hook and eye couplers. Wish I still had it!

 
   Ken C
    GWN

Nice!

[jbrock27]

I asked my mom "hey, when you sold the house what did you do with my old Tyco train set?"  She said that when she and my dad sold the house they sold all the toys too.  I've been pouting about it ever since, and that was 10 years ago.

You need to get over it and instead, thank your Mom and give her a big hug and kiss, LOL

To answer the OP's questions, which I have answered here in the past bc someone else year's ago posted pretty much the same questions:

-First introduction to trains was an AHM set given to me for Xmas when I was 5; in addition to a loco, some brass Atlas track, some cars and a big green power pack made in West Germany, that were my father's.  Two of his cars (Gilberts) exist and are run today with Kadee #148 couplers mounted on them.  I still have many of the AHM cars and over time they have been getting Kadee or EZ Mate Mark II couplers and in most cases new trucks and wheel-sets and some weather work on some.  The AHM loco that came with the set died a long time ago, bc it was a piece of crap.  But even in that, I was taught a valuable lesson.

-I am in this hobby today when it is time for a getaway from the real world and real responsibilities.  You know, big boy stuff...It is a distraction not an obsession, for moi.

-Never since bought any "sets" bc I realized early on, what junk they are.

-Only temporary train running is around the Xmas tree; bought some n/s EZ track for that.

[James in FL]

I am in this hobby today when it is time for a getaway from the real world and real responsibilities.  You know, big boy stuff...It is a distraction not an obsession, for moi.

^^^ this

[RAM]

Ken C Thats sounds like a project My son and I had when he was in Cub Scouts some 50 years ago.  We were given a bot and told to see what we could make from it.  In the box was a 2 by 4 about six inches long, a large wooden spool, a tin can , a few nails, cork, dowel and a pipe cleaner.  We made a steam locomotive and tender, box car, 2 gons, a tank car and a  caboose.  Under the caboose is the date 1971. It was all made with hand tools, and no you would not want it on your layout.   

[Ckrails]

You need to get over it and instead, thank your Mom and give her a big hug and kiss, LOL

I do that as often as I can! 

[Trainman203]

The train set fueled my childhood railroad dreams.  Without that gateway  I would never progressively enters the adult hobby of serious model railroading.