Joe:

I'm going to firmly agree and disagree with your point...

Simply I don't want to be told that scratchbuilding is the only way to achive recognition in the hobby. Isn't this supposed to be the hobby of a million skills and for everyone? I've even taken a whack at the NMRA Achive Program over this...

At the same time the "New New" of the limited run and limited time that the needed building might be on the shelves or other cars or engines just screams for scratch building or at least extensive cross kitting. What we now have is alternative methods to achive our goals. RTV molds and casting resins, styrene and speciality tools for cutting and embossing make for a much easier time building.

The cost factor... hmmm... I started in modeling railroading in 1960, OK, MR/RMC $0.50 now MR $6.00 so times 12... Blue box car $1.29 so times 12 we get $15.50 so yes a Kadee or other R-T-R hyper detailed car at $42.00 is no bargain. So there is some advantage to building if you're up to it.

Back to issue three, good going.

It's nice to have an alternative to many to the current crop of dead tree zines.

Jim A.

I certainly agree with Reverse Running if my goal as a model railroader is to put a smile on the face of hobby shop owners. However, my goal is to build a model railroad. I don't run a charity for hobby retailers. Maybe if they stocked some paint, or other less glamorous materials they would put a smile on MY face for a change. They certainly seem to have enough boxcars and built up structures. Maybe they could sell little bottles of sweat to sprinkle around the layout room so it looks like someone outside of China had to work..

I agree that more products is a good thing.. but there is an alarming trend for off the shelf products for things that do not need off the shelf solutions. For instance.. "scenery cement". Whats up with that? Its my poster child for a product that creates a need that doesn't exist. Now we can put a smile on a hobby shop owner's face buying a product that cost twice as much as what it costs in a craft store where its called "matte medium".

I also think that focus in the hobby press is more and more on how to use off the shelf solutions when they are no better and often more expensive then  DIY solutions. Give a man a fish or teach a man to fish?

The more you can buy, the more likely
it will be that you can actually get that
dream layout to a reasonable level of
completion.

Or, the more likely you are to run out of money and know no way to build a layout that doesnt involve a big pile of cash and a shovel. We don't all have more money then we know what to do with. Most of us have to contend with far more modest means. The focus in this hobby is becoming "spend a little more to save a little time".  We don't need to go back to scratchbuilding everything, but lets get back to finding ways to make model railroading affordable.

I know thats a theme for MRH and the Model Train Videos (loving my flocker..), affordability, but this editorial gave me a chance to vent something thats been a burning issue on MY mind as I try to raise two young children in a down economy and still find a way to move forward with my layout from time to time..

Chris

So you want to achieve recognition by your Credit Card Number and the big picture of you on your hobbyshop bulletin board under the herald "This Month's Christmas Angel?"

I've seen the great railroads in the other publciations, and they are truely nice railraods.  But there;s something missing when you get to the second line where it says "The Author and Owner contracted Company X to build his railroad and they built it all.  The Author and Owner contracted Company B for all of his locomotive needs....the author doesn't actually run his railroad, but contracts a team of transportation engineers from the local railroad to operate it for him...";  there's something really missing in all of this.

I have bought a numebr of things from estates over the last couple of years.  All of the general RTR/KIT/ETC is generic and has absolutley no meaning whatsoever.  Most of it has flown right out the door onto Ebay within six months of my purchase.  The material worth of those pieces are simply nothing.

Now there are these pieces that were scratchbuilt by modelers, or at least repainted and decorated.  THOSE peieces mean a heck of a lot more, and tell a far more intimate story about the life of that modeler.

Let me put it blunt.  Your legacy, your reputation, your recognition will be by those items that have your firm signature on them.  Everything else will be "made in China by someone else' and thus REMEMERBED AS SUCH!

Your entire empire doesn't have to be scratchbuilt.  This has never been the case, in the event a couple people missed this little detail.  Your reputation, however, must always be scratchbuilt, and it is built upon every little action you do in this hobby.   Now if you wish to scratchbuild your reputation with a credit card, so be it.  I guarantee you, however, that a plastic backed reputation wanes as quickly as the setting sun. 

No Guts, no Glory.

No shortcuts to success.

You reap what you sow.

You get out what you put in.

If you don't put much in, why are you mad?

Ready to run has been with us in this hobby since the very beginning.  Let's not forget that all our hobby roots lie in our toy train past.  The first model railroaders all used ready to run products from companies like LIONEL.  If you truly yearn for the good old days, go buy a Hell Gate Bridge set, not paint or styrene!

Drew

Um, Drew...most people couldn't afford the pretty Lionel stuff - or not a lot of it.  They had bridges and such made out of card and other materials scrounged from around the home.  It wasn't all pretty, but it told a tale we no longer understand today - or no longer wish to linger in understanding.

RTR has been available and it is perfectly acceptable to embrace it.  There's something missing from it, though...

Your comment really struck me back "Sooner or later........all scratchbuilt modeling and large finished layouts don't go together unless you're independantly wealthy and can do your modeling full time."

I think this is way off the mark.   I am far from fitting your description above and I scratchbuild for enjoyment and cost savings.  The $300 for a crafstman kit is beyond my reach and why would I want a building that looks just like everyone else's.   And I can build something that is exactly as it was/is in part of my life.   And the time involved is no longer than assembling a quality kit.   Some times faster because there are no directions that have to be followed.

Scratchbuilding is not difficult as will be evidenced by the number of scrathbuilders on the various forums.   And help for the new scratchbuilder is only a internet message away.   The availability of drawings and diagrams on the internet enhances the abilities of all scratchbuilders and time will only prove that scratchbuilding is not dead, but actually growing.

Dave Mason

I read your editorial a second time because I thought I might have missed the point first time around. Other than stating the obvious that more and better models are available, the article does nothing more than trivialize the artistry of those who choose to scratchbuild as being outdated and redundant. What I personally got from this editorial is that, "All this new stuff is available, so we don't need scratchbuilding any more - R.I.P."

I agree that scratchbuilding is no longer necessary. It is amazing to see what is available in ready-to-run, and modellers can create competent results this way. However, recreating reality at the highest level is an artform that stands out from the crowd. Scratchbuilding is that level of achievement that raises the bar for all modellers.

Hopefully I have missed the point of the editorial, but by the looks of it, so have others.

Joe, and all involved:

First let me say, I am really enjoying the Magazine.  I can get enough on my Mac to really sink my teeth into some of the articles.  I have been reading pretty much all of it, altho I may skim some articles that are way out of my interest.  (Can't please everyone, all the time)

In regard to the editorial, I think what you say about the availability of RTR is a real boon to us old guys, who don't have years and years left to scratch build everything.  I still love to scratchbuild or kit bash, but it's sure nice to open a box, file off a few pieces of flash, maybe change the couplers and add metal wheel sets, put it on the track and to quote Jackie Gleason: "And away we go!"

The best thing to come along in quite a while, in my opinion, is DCC.  Maybe not for the same reasons many of you like, but because I have 5 grandsons.  All of whom are way into Pokeman, Nintendo, WII, etc.   They won't build a model (takes too long), had no interest in trains, whatever.   My wife and I had the boys over for something or other, and I asked, mostly to be polite, if they wanted to go out to the shop and see what I'd been doing.   We went in, they were suitably unimpressed, as would be expected of Nintendo guys.   But when I fired up the DCC and sound,  selected a loco and handed them each a throttle, they saw it in an entirely different light.   The idea of something electronic, involving trains, was a whole new ballgame.  Instaed of hanging around for 10 minutes, they stayed all afternoon, making up trains, double heading, and trying to see just how many cars they could pull and push up my 4% grade.  They had a ball, and I think it's all due to the onset of DCC.  Like all teenagers, they immediately started reseting CV's, changing the sounds, and generally doing things I'd taken weeks to figure out how to do.  Go figure.

My main point here, is, if the hobby is going to survive, maybe even grow, we must address the issue of getting and keeping youngsters interested.  I think DCC will do it.  And, having the "Instant Gratification" of good quality RTR will have far more appeal to this younger age group.

Thanks for listening,

Mike Van Hove

Reverse running is intended to take something of a contrary, perhaps even controversial view on a topic. Looks like it's succeeding ...

Having been in and out of the hobby for most of my 70 years I seem to recall that back in the 50's people scratch built what wasn't available. Which was most of what they wanted on their layout. Scratch building was almost a forced part of the hobby. Today we still "scratch build". But more of that time is spent on areas other than rolling stock. Because we can. Until recently the average income model railroader had more discretionary funds available for his hobby than did his predecessors. This of course allowed him to purchase rather than build.

One of my varied occupations was a "craft" store. When times were good business sucked, when times were bad business boomed. During good times the customers bought finished items and during recessions they bought the material they needed to build their own.

I expect we'll see the same thing happen with model railroading.

I do enjoy scratchbuilding, industries and railroad related structures that define my layout where it is and what the railroad does.  However ready-to-run is fine with me, I don't want a storage spaces full of unbuilt kits of the same old plastic cars.  I put one kit together is not as fun putting the second, third and the rest of the kits stay in storage for another ten years.
I like not having to install handrails and scraping off old grab irons then adding metal ones on every diesel in my fleet, just have to put the SP light package on and weather them.  Thats fun for me!  Compared to to the model diesels we had to work with back in the 1960s and 70s, it has been a big change. Anyone still remember trying to make a decent SP, GP20 from an old Tyco shell? 

It looks like a number of people have missed the point of Joe's editorial. The hobby's not an either/or proposition but a continuum from those who remove items out of the box and plop them on the track to those who scratchbuild everything (well, maybe not everything, but a lot). You gotta start somewhere and pulling a model out of a box and plopping on the track gets your foot in the door. I won't say nobody gets into the hobby by first scratchbuilding (there was a guy back in the 60's who did just that by scratchbuilding a 4-4-0), but it's extremely rare. And Joe's right in that having all the goodies on offer from the trade makes actual railroad building a lot easier than it would be otherwise. The only real downside is that so much is available it's like being the proverbial kid in a candy store with a nickel (I was a kid in the 50's).

Jack Burgess not only appears in the current issue of MRH, but also in the August MR in with a loco re-detailing project. He starts out with a couple plain vanilla Spectrum 4-4-0's and cobbles up something that bears a much greater resemblance to YV #'s 22 and 23. Still, under all the new paint and detail, there beats the heart of a RTR Spectrum engine. I visited Jack's layout in the early 80's and at the time he was running a Hallmark Frisco 4-4-0 (still unpainted IIRC) and a PFM ATSF 1950 class 2-8-0, neither of which resembles anything the YV ever operated. However, his scenery and buildings were superb.and looked "right" and his execution of the design for the model YV set a standard that raises the bar even today. Having said that, his loco roster consists of several Beaver Creek imported brass models which, curse them, were ready-to-run.

I will admit that one of the thing that surprised me about the article on the YV 4-4-0's was Jack giving up on the tender flare around the back of the engine. It's even more surprising in that another modeler, using the old MDC version of the Ma&Pa tender went ahead an did it successfully while working on a totally different prototype. Go here http://markschutzer.com/ , click on the words "SP Consolidation" and you'll see what I mean. You'll have to page down a bit. Jack mentions trying to replicate the tender flare with a CAD drawing. Apparently, Mark Schutzer just went ahead and did it without the computerized folderol. Sometimes a computer can be a hindrance rather than a help, I suppose. Mark Schutzer and Jack Burgess live less than an hour apart in the SF Bay area. I don't know if Jack ever looked at Mark's website.  It would seem not, however, since he might have been able to figure out the methodology just looking at Mark's pictures. I guess even a master modeler sometimes gets flummoxed by a modeling challenge, so there's hope for the rest of us I guess.

Mike

Hopefully we'll continue to see people comment and share their opinion on all the articles.  This is what really makes MRH stand apart from others - we can all read and comment on the articles instantly, and if we have something to say, say it!  Its great that everyone is throwing in their two cents, whether you agree with the article or not.  We all benefit when people state their case for their point of view.  Let's keep this thing rolling! 

 Ahh! Scratchbuilding brings back memories from as far back as Christmas, 1950 when I awoke to an oval of track set round the base of the decorated tree. The station was scratchbuilt by my foster dad as was the stand alone tunnel. The station even had a light inside! The train was Lionel, if memory serves, and it was so much fun to play with.

Zoom ahead to 1983, Christmas again, when, as a joke, my wife bought me an N-scale RTR starter set. She said I could go back to the hobby shop and pick out a few more things to "trick it out" as she put it. "Everything costs just a few dollars and it's already built." So I went. That did it. Heck with gardening, from that Boxing day onward I was a hooked model railroader. The first building I added to the RTR stuff was an N-scale church I scratchbuilt from plans I found in an issue of Mainline Modeler magazine. I worked very long and hard on that project and was so proud of it. I still have it, but it's not on my layout as I since have switched to HO scale. It makes me laugh out loud whenever I get it out to have a look. It is pretty rough, but the memories of building it are priceless. Years later Atlas produced kits of the same church in both N and HO scales. I prefer my scratchbuilt church.

Zoom ahead to today. I have many scratchbuilt buildings on my HO layout, all but one built by other modelers and I love them all. Today with eyesight not what it used to be I appreciate the ready made items available. And like another gentleman stated, younger people probably appreciate the instant gratification of the built-up items. That along with DCC may be what saves this hobby. There is room for both RTR AND Scratchbuilding, plus let's not forget my fav: kitbashing, a great way to save time and capture detail while exercising the old brain in the same way that scratchbuilding does. I believe I like the results of a clever kitbash best of all.

Is it necessary to put things in boxes to give it a label ? Over time, the complete experience of the hobby has changed. A good thing, as progress is needed otherwise it surely it will be a dead end alley.

It is a matter of the builder's evolution. I don't invent the wheel anew each time I need one. But I build one from scratch when available ones are not accurate enough to the STANDARDS and QUALITY levels I set myself.

Presently I am building a large sawmill diorama in O scale, where a mix of bought, bashed and selfmade parts are being used. The scale accuracy and quality of what I am building helps here to achieve the feeling of realism. This counts for the COMPLETE diorama/layout and not only a focus on a building, locomotive or car. For this mill only basic materials are available and most only in the US.  Special sawmill machinery is made by Sierra West Models and Western Scale, but not in the sizes as used in the average Californian mill like Pino Grande, Madera Sugerpine or the Hume mill.  With the use of these parts, accurate machines are scratchbuilt.

grading experience and talent into certain levels is in my opinion arrogant, it creates an elite. And the hobby is not benefiting as it creats a large hurdle for the beginner or the average modeler.  Giving these modelers a feedback they can use will help them more than the "attaboy, very nice " approach" seen in so many fora. Here the experience with all aspects including and special scratchbuilding and where to get the materials is helping, including the local stockist or manufacturer.

Jacq

Is it necessary to put things in boxes to give it a label

Everything must have labels! My wife told me so.

Chris

Well, now that I have been informed that I'm dead I hope they bury the 15 boxes of scratch building supplies in the same Box with me so I'll have something to do while waiting for my bones to rot.

and don't forget the box of glues, my X-acto & Dremel!!

So, the bottom line may well be:  I'm tending toward breaking the back of the hobby shop, with my purchases of only stripwood, styrene, glue, and paint, because I can't afford the expense of many of the kits.  But, the folks who can afford to make those kind of purchases are keeping the hobby shop in business.  Good thing.  I imagine that that's why many shops are more planes and cars, with trains down the "other aisle". 

Scratch-building for me has always been a budget-induced activity.  I am historically a 2x4 craftsman, with anything smaller being a struggle.  But I've had 40 years of practice, with a lot of encouragement from fellow modelers both in clubs and individually, even in N-scale.  So now, can I say I'm a scratchbuilder?  Sure.  Am I a contest participant, or even going to post photos of my work.  Don't think so.  But I can build a trestle or tunnel portal or turntable with wood or styrene.  I can cobble together a building with evergreen sheets and Grandt windows and doors.  I've even learned to go slow enough and patiently enough to tackle a tough kit:  30 years ago I built the Gould steam crane in N-scale; yesterday I started the HO version (now Tichy kit).  Oh boy!

Labels:  my wife has offered the use of her label maker, because "everything must be labeled.".  (She keeps throwing threatening glances toward my workbench.   )

Do we, that is, model railroaders exist so hobby stores can exist or do hobby stores exist so model railroaders can exist? For me, modeling is a creative endeavor, not a entity to provide a market to commercial endeavor.  I build from scratch by necessity and I enjoy it immensely. I also build kits and DO have a layout to display my work on.  I built my layout to be “operational” only to find out that “operation” is too reminiscent of work (I spent 20 years as a motor carrier dispatcher). I will soon start to simplify my layout to do a better job of displaying moving trains. To participate in this hobby requires a certain degree of craftsman ability. Without it, you cannot build a layout. But these skills can be learned. I just finished putting a new floor down in my bathroom. I had to replace two levels of flooring and then lay a new tile floor using skills I learned building my railroad. What is killing this hobby is not scratch building but the change in culture. I grew up with tinker toys, Lincoln logs, and erecter sets.  Today kids grow up with computer games.  When I went to school I took wood and metal shop. Today kids do not have that option. I went home to Mom. Today kids go to a sitter (the lucky ones), the TV, and the computer. In short, this new generation has no tools or set of values to be even interested in building a model railroad, much less able to.

I hate to break it to you but the fact that kids not developing basic skills with lumber and metal isn't a new phenomenon.

I was latch-key kid starting in the early 1960s when my mother went to help my father at his store in Brooklyn, NY. Add to that the fact O never took woodshop in high school because thse who wanted an academic diploma back in those days didn't have room for it in their schedules in NYC public high school I started attending in 1962. BUt I did learn about wood and tools and everything that went with them when I would help my father build shelving and other stuff in the store he opened that year. I have learned more since but I still can't drive a nail in straight. I don't need nails anyway as I use screws for the most part having been influenced by Lynn Westcott, a former editor at Model Railorader years ago when I built my 3rd layout.

However, one keeps learning in using new materials is a great introduction to any kind of building. Curreently, I used foam plastic for lots of model railroading activities. If you support it correctly it makes a great building material. I model in N-SCale so I don't need beefy support but what I think is great about it is that I don't need a saw, power or hand, for most of what I need to accomplish. But if I need one I have a couple of those should the need arise. I don;t have access to a table saw so I do need to use a friend's when he is home which isn't all that often in the summer ytime.

Irv

Right on, railman...

Although I do think the imaginaiton of our youth, in those that have it, show great promise for the future.

I have noted the decline of scratchbuilding in an interesting way. I've been a steady customer of a hobby shop in Westmont, NJ (Satler's) for the last 50 years. Originally, they had a special container of wood shapes for scratchbuilding in the front of the store. As the years went by the container moved further and further back to where it became located at the rear of the store. Now it has the cover closed and ready to run objects sitting on top of it. You have to make an effort to even get to it now.

Even my scale has changed. Scratchbuilding was once synonymous with S scale, but now one can have a nice layout without resorting to it at all. However, I'm with those who still do it for the shear enjoyment and creativity.

Joe

I am a Brit returning to model railroading after 30 years raising a family and I am astonished at the quality of RTR. North American models were always miles ahead of Briish OO gauge, but some of the models produced by Intermountain, Proto 2000, Atlas, Tower 55 etc are just gorgeous. Using DCC, Kato Unitrack and cheap modular tables from IKEA I have assembled a functional prototype layout that I can operate and learn from in a matter of weeks. And the trains I run look and sound fabulous, if perhaps rather too clean as yet. But I am getting 90% of the satisfaction for 10% of the time spent - and I need no longer regret the 30 lost years. Now I can start building my permanent layout, and I can assemble/kitbash/scratch-build the elements I need, in my leisure time, but I honestly believe I am already a model railroad operator. Scratchbuilding is immensely satisfying - my father builds model sailing ships to museum quality and happily invests up to 1000 hours on each one - but it's a complementary activity not a goal in itself. The scratchbuilding will take 90% of the time but will yield the final 'signature' 10% of the layour which makes it uniquely mine ... one day.

And yes MRH is absolutely superb - how long must we wait before you can manage to produce it monthly?

Very Best Wishes

Steve

Steve,

I enjoyed reading your post. It's great to see someone so obviously enjoying the hobby for what it is.

Thanks,

BCK

Bernard Kempinski

​

 www.alkemscalemodels.biz

 

Personal Layout Blog: http://usmrr.blogspot.com/

 

Steve:

Great post!

To answer your question about frequency, we're going to 6 issues per year next year - so we will be every other month.

As to when will we go monthly? We need to get enough advertiser support first. Don't know how soon that would be, but if word of mouth takes off and our circulation has strong growth, we could go monthly as soon as year 3.

But we'll see ...

Steve, I wholeheartedly agree.  Unfortunately, time is one of the things I have the least of, so anything I can get to save me time and get me closer to having an operating layout is well worth the money spent, provided it is what I want.  When I retire in 20-25 years, then I may have more time and prefer to do things differently, but right now there is so much stuff that saves me a lot of time and I can still get a railroad running in a fairly short time comparitively.  I'm certainly impressed by other peoples' work in scratchbuilding and things like that, but its not for me right now.  And I'm perfectly fine with that.  I'm not concerned about comparing my layout to Joe's or Charlie's or George Sellios' or Pelle Soeborg's or anyone elses.  Its mine and as long as I'm having fun and hopefully having some family involvement in the project, I'm good.  It is a great time to be a model railroader.

For me, scratchbuilding is pretty much the only way I'm going to produce an operational model railroad at all. That's because I've become hooked on modelling NZ railways in HO scale. This translates to something called HOn3.5, as NZR track is only 3' 6" in full size, which translates to 12mm track gauge in 1:87. I have to kitbash, scratchbuild, adapt & sometimes invent ways to produce the results I want. Having said that, I'd dearly love to be able to purchase equipment RTR, but it's not going to happen anytime soon. Scratchbuilding ain't dead, it's just moved sideways into those areas where commercial production can't realistically go.

Regards to all,

Greg

http://waikikamukauchronicles.blogspot.com/

Greg wouldn't it be easier for you to model in On30 ?

30" is not 42"...

Greg

Just a thought ... I read that you are committed to HO scale, which I guess gives you a fair crack at commercial stuff for everyhing that is NOT locos or rolling stock, but I had a thought and run the numbers on my calculator ... if you were to model in S scale and use commercial 16.5 mm track and mechanisms, 16.mm times 64 gives a track gauge of 1056mm which is 41.57 inches which is pretty darned close to 3'6''.

Cheers

Steve