Thanks to MRH for giving us a glimpse of Tom's live steam operation!  I'm looking forward to segment 2!

Supposedly there is live steam operation out on Long Island because it gets advertised every so often in the model magazines. I haven't gone to one yet but we'll see. I have to convince the wife and the grandchildren to go with me so we'll see.

Irv

Awesome video, large scale/live steam does not get as much coverage in the "other magazines"  Nice to see the content mixed up a bit. Monday movies are the best by far.  Keep up the nice work Tom and MRH

While a lot of MRH's content will be HO, we don't want to be known as an HO magazine. We want to give the other scales some press since we believe even the HO guys can learn a few things from these other modelers.

And we also want to be known as a magazine that will print your non-HO article.

Often a modeling technique is a modeling technique and it can be adapted for use by most of the other scales as well. I'd like to see the HO guys be more aware of what the N scale guys are doing for instance. I pick up the N scale magazines even though I model in HO because some of the most innovative modeling being done these days is being done by the N scalers.

So yes, we'll continue to mix it up - we're more than just another HO magazine - we're a full spectrum model railroading magazine.

I still subscribe to MR and RMC even though they don't publish alot of stuff in N-Scale. Many of the articles they publish are for HO Scale layouts but they are still interesting because they do cover topics that apply to any scale. I also subsribe to N-Scale magazines that are for my chosen scale, but if you think about it, anything in a particular scale has to appply to all of them.

MRH is a different approach in that it publisahes stuff that applies to all scales. It is a slightly different approach that I like. And the fact that I can print out articles I want to read without a computer is helpful as well. I know doing it this way loses the benfit of all the embedded features, but it isn't always convenient to shlep along a computer even if it is a laptop.

Of course if the develop things like the Kindle to the point where they are capable of handling MRH, that kind of device could open all sorts of doors and create a market for magazines like MRH.

Irv

Irv:

Issue 3 is going to have the most HO-specific content we've had so far - but the HO content we're publishing can be adapted to other scales so the "HO-ness" factor is fairly low. That's one of the things I look for as the publisher - to balance an issue so the articles have broad appeal.

I believe the personal media device is almost here ... the new "full size" Kindle is getting close. To be fully "here" it needs to support full color and allow for rich media video playback with sound. I think the first such commercial version of this device will become a consumer reality in the next two years.

Once such a device hits the streets and the price drops so its affordable - taking MRH into the layout room or into the "throne room" will become a reality. You'll be able to read MRH while sitting comfortably in your easy chair!

When that happens, print publications of all kinds look out! Print won't disappear, but with the availability of a lightweight reading device that's about as thick and heavy as a thin pad of paper and that has a battery that lasts for a week or more - then hard copy printing will seem to be expensive, bulky, and wasteful.

At that point, MRH will seem to have been ahead of its time - and I expect Kalmbach will counter MRH with a publication of its own that's similar in many ways.

We'll see how good my crystal ball gaze is ... if nothing else, it's gonna be an interesting next couple of years!

I agree. But if you look back, model railroading has always been involved in that kind of thing. I put the hobby on hold for 21 years and when I came back to it in 2008, things had change so much that I could easily have said "Forget it." I didn't and upgraded to better locomotives and DCC. Now I could finally run more than one train without having to deal with playing with separate power blocks, and all sorts of complicated wiring. Anyone who has ever built a DC layout will understand what I am saying.

Irv

He sure put a ton of effort into that railroad.  Several switches, perfect grooming of the ballast and yet...

He put the wrong flying "RIO GRANDE" on the tender.  The lettering should slant forwards, not rearwards like the rolling stock. 

Kind of a wierd observation, but wrong nonetheless.

Josh

Since I'm building a Colorado RR I noticed the lettering too and it just didn't register what looked wrong just that something didn't seem right. Josh thanks for the heads up it really had me puzzled what looked so different about his K36 compared to mine.

Dan

I mentioned this to Tom via email and got back two responses...

Well, someone had to notice eventually. I used one decal for both sides of
the tender. So, the engineers side slants forward and the fireman's side
slants backwards. Rivet counters.....bah.
It took 8 years for someone to pick up on it. Of course if you only saw one
side you would never know the difference.

Tom

and

Actually, I just rewatched the video and the Rio Grande faces backwards on
both sides of the tender. I must have used the same decals that I used on
the cars.
Tom

Sharp eyes there guys!

Charlie