Changing of scale ?

[009 micro modeller]

2 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

Sorry but I'm sensing some contradiction here. One of your concerns about O Scale is the cost of locos in particular, but you've posted about paying about £1000 for 3 OO steam locos, and you have a fleet of umpty-nine (sorry I forget the exact number) identical-bar-the-numbers OO Class 20s..... you're clearly not that averse to spending your hard-earned on locos. Is the perceived issue rather that for the same money you would get less locos in O, maybe? 

I just find the 'too expensive' argument a bit confusing given what you've already posted.

Is it a concern about spending that sort of money without having actually recovered (through resale) the full value of the 00 stock? Or possibly (a bit like this) that 00 RTR has gradually become more expensive (or is perceived as such) whereas 0 has always been perceived to be expensive.

[DevilsAdvocate]

2 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

Sorry but I'm sensing some contradiction here. One of your concerns about O Scale is the cost of locos in particular, but you've posted about paying about £1000 for 3 OO steam locos, and you have a fleet of umpty-nine (sorry I forget the exact number) identical-bar-the-numbers OO Class 20s..... you're clearly not that averse to spending your hard-earned on locos. Is the perceived issue rather that for the same money you would get less locos in O, maybe? 

I just find the 'too expensive' argument a bit confusing given what you've already posted.

To explain what is seen as a contradiction, the Class 20 fleet ( and the other loco’s I have ) retailed at approximately £130, and were purchased over a 2 year period. Some cost less, some a little more.

 

As for the steam loco’s, yes, the West Country Queen Elizabeth was £500, more than the amount for an 0 gauge loco.

However, that is more than I’ve ever paid in my life for any loco, and was very much a one off 

The other 2 steam loco’s were purchased with monetary  gifts from my family for Xmas / birthdays and I paid any shortfall.

 

So spread over a two year period this is how my collection evolved.

 

To go into the costing of 0 gauge loco’s then.

Every loco purchased will cost a minimum of £450. They on average are the cheapest I’ve seen, so that will become the norm, not to mention track, pointwork etc ……..

All the 00 loco’s I have I paid no more than £150 for, so there’s the reasoning, not a contradiction.

6 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

Have you thought about building a very small diorama or micro layout, or even just a wagon kit, in 0 first to see how you get on and if you like it? Hopefully not too expensive and wouldn’t take up too much space, but would allow you to try things out and get a feel for the new scale before you commit to too much.

This is a good idea, one I hadn’t considered, however my only space available is what I already have so may prove difficult. It’s certainly worth considering though, Thanks

 

Cheers

John

 

 

[NBL]

Ask yourself what you enjoy most about model railways then ask if you can replicate that in the larger scale.

 

I am mainly a 4mm modeller, I used to help out on a 7mm layout and thought I was used to the size of it. I picked up some cheap old Lima stock such as a shunter, some wagons and a couple of mark 1 coaches.  I was quite shocked a just how large they looked in my space, even though I have roughly the same space as yourself.  Pointwork takes up a considerable amount of space too.

 

It didn't stop me buying a Dapol 08 and some of their bogie steel wagons but I will have to seriously think about what I want to achieve with 7mm.  I'll probably settle for a small shunting yard, which is fine as thats what I enjoy, I won't sell of my 4mm stock though.

 

You mentioned that to you bigger is better with regards to 7mm, that can be debatable, especially when it comes to Heljan.  Their Mark 1's have the wrong roof profile, something is off with their air brakes vans and I think I remember the buffers are too close together on their 35t tanks.  Locowise, the class 37 whole body side between the doors from the cantrail down is far too low - I'm not a right counter just pointing these well known issues out.  Some of Dapols wagons are a bit wonky too.  Heljan loco's have also been plagued with spit gears in the past, which I understand are hard to source replacements for.

 

You also mention that you can't solder, that would be something you'd need to work on, 7mm is not quite an RTR scale yet and a lot of stuff still has to be built from brass and plastic kits, or indeed scratchbuilt.

 

Saying all that, I really like the bulk of 7mm, it has a heft to it that is hard to convey in smaller scales, and personally, I think it's the only scale where sound 'sounds' right.

 

Think carefully about jumping in at the deep end, you'll lose a lot of money on selling your 4mm stock, but you'll lose even more trying to shift 7mm stock.

 

As others have suggested, try a small shunting layout using Scalescenes downloads, to get used the the space needed.   You don't have to buy a Dapol 08 and wagons to try it out, just pick up some of the cheap old Lima stuff from eBay.

 

 

 

 

[Nearholmer]

How about you do both, thereby avoiding the agony of making a decision to commit one way or the other.

 

Take one side of your existing layout area, so 12ft x 3ft if I understand correctly, demote that to pure storage roads for 00, and 1ft above it, build an 0 gauge scene. You’d probably want to keep the 00 storage roads within the first 1ft of baseboard width, so as to be easily accessible from the operating space, but even that allows probably four roads.

 

So, what can you do in 12ft x 3ft in 0? Quite a lot, and if you go for small locos and four-wheel wagons, you can make an interesting layout. If you go for whopping great long modern diesels, naturally less, probably yet another depot scene, but either would allow you to scratch the itch.

 

 

[Jeff Smith]

A Dapol 08, 2 or 3 wagons, three yards of Peco 0 gauge flex track and a point.  Affix the track to a 6'×1' plank and try shunting.  The plank can be used on any table and stored standing up or lying behind a sofa.....£500 or so.....

[009 micro modeller]

45 minutes ago, DevilsAdvocate said:

This is a good idea, one I hadn’t considered, however my only space available is what I already have so may prove difficult. It’s certainly worth considering though, Thanks

In theory a micro layout/diorama could pack away in a box and store under the existing layout (or wherever). I only mentioned it as your 00 set-up sounds great and you’ve obviously spent a lot of time on it, so it would be a shame to get rid before you’re sure about 0 gauge. Equally, micro layout designs would potentially give you the ability to build two layouts in the space currently occupied by one, one in 0 and one in 00 to run some of your existing collection on and reuse scenic items from the current layout.
 

As a disclaimer, my experience building small/micro layouts and not really having the opportunity to build a larger long-term project means I’ve never really had to look at the possibility of completely scrapping a finished layout or selling off large amounts of rolling stock (as opposed to scrapping unfinished/unsuccessful projects to release track, components etc. for use elsewhere, or selling off unbuilt kits and random old junk to tidy up and get some more cash for new projects, which isn’t quite the same thing).

 

Edit: I see @Nearholmer beat me to the ‘two layouts in current space’ idea, although in a slightly different way - I hadn’t considered multi-level.

Edited August 2, 2023 by 009 micro modeller

[sncf231e]

4 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

How about you do both, thereby avoiding the agony of making a decision to commit one way or the other.

 

That is a very dangerous advice. I did that (avoiding the agony of making a decision on scale or gauge) and now have gauges 3.25 inch, 1, 0, S, H0/00, TT, N and Z and scales 1:16, 1;32, 1:48, 1:45, 1:43.5, 1:64, 1:87, 1:76, 1:120, 1:150, 1: 160, 1: 200 and some more.

Regards

Fred

[Dungrange]

31 minutes ago, DevilsAdvocate said:

As for the steam loco’s, yes, the West Country Queen Elizabeth was £500, more than the amount for an 0 gauge loco.

However, that is more than I’ve ever paid in my life for any loco, and was very much a one off 

 

... Except if you move to O gauge that will become your new normal.  Sure, you can sell all of your 00 stock and replace 20+ locomotives with four or five in O Gauge.  However, what you previously considered to be a one off will be what all subsequent O Gauge locomotives that you wish to purchase will cost you.  Perhaps the principal advantage of O Gauge is that you'll have less stock and perhaps a reduced likelihood of overstocking the layout if you feel you can't afford another locomotive (ie it will curtail you past desire to splash out on £150 locomotives - you'll have to think three times as hard before buying yet another locomotive that you just like the look of).

 

I agree with the other suggestions to build something small in O Gauge that sits above your 00 fiddle yard.

[brossard]

51 minutes ago, 009 micro modeller said:

Is it a concern about spending that sort of money without having actually recovered (through resale) the full value of the 00 stock? Or possibly (a bit like this) that 00 RTR has gradually become more expensive (or is perceived as such) whereas 0 has always been perceived to be expensive.

 

0 gauge IS expensive but you can get a lot of play value with minimal outlay.  Agree with Jeff, get yourself a shunting loco some wagons and a few yards of track - away you go.

 

This raises another issue, Peco turnouts are pretty expensive so you might want to branch out into making your own turnouts.  Peco supply the components (chairs, rail) although I don't recommend the timbers which curled up for me.  I used actual wooden timbers (Intentio).  Peco also supply templates and if you want small or medium radius turnouts you can scale up the 00 templates.

 

When I switched I KNEW I didn't have the time or financial resources to model both scales, so I ditched 00 (and all the baggage associated with that scale).

 

Did I mention that switching to 0 was absolutely the best modelling decision I could have made?  Never been happier.

 

John

 

John

[009 micro modeller]

15 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

…and if you go for small locos and four-wheel wagons, you can make an interesting layout. If you go for whopping great long modern diesels, naturally less…

Actually on that theme, I’ve met a few people who either model standard gauge in two different scales, or narrow gauge but representing similar prototype gauges (e.g. 009 and 016.5, as opposed to say 009 and 09). At first you might wonder why, but in most cases they didn’t model the same prototype and to a certain extent what they did in each scale played to the strengths of that scale (e.g. if you wanted a layout with very long trains running through the landscape you might do that in 009 or N, but for a pre-grouping or industrial shunting layout with short trains of 4-wheeled wagons 7mm scale (for instance) might allow more detail to be incorporated).

[Nearholmer]

Which plays to a possibly slightly mad theory that I have, which is that there is an ideal absolute size for a toy train or, put more poshly, a model locomotive, which comes out to be roughly a big mainline loco in 00, a beefy 2ft 6in gauge loco in 0-16.5, a medium-sized tank engine or small tender engine in 0, a small industrial 2ft gauge tank engine in 16mm/ft, a small industrial/dock tank in G1 etc …… all roughly the same size and heft. I’ve left N out, because no loco is big enough, and 009/H0n30, because the locos I like, tiny 0-4-0T, are more suitable as ladies earrings than on a model railway (I can’t believe I used to be able to build them, and enjoy doing so).

[F-UnitMad]

1 hour ago, DevilsAdvocate said:

Every loco purchased will cost a minimum of £450.

 

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

if you go for small locos and four-wheel wagons

As John is quoting a minimum of £450 per loco, I don't think he's going for small locos and 4-wheel wagons. 

 

Regardless of scale, this is the general policy of most modellers regarding buying trains....

[DevilsAdvocate]

1 hour ago, Dungrange said:

Except if you move to O gauge that will become your new normal.  Sure, you can sell all of your 00 stock and replace 20+ locomotives with four or five in O Gauge.  However, what you previously considered to be a one off will be what all subsequent O Gauge locomotives that you wish to purchase will cost you.  Perhaps the principal advantage of O Gauge is that you'll have less stock and perhaps a reduced likelihood of overstocking the layout if you feel you can't afford another locomotive (ie it will curtail you past desire to splash out on £150 locomotives - you'll have to think three times as hard before buying yet another locomotive that you just like the look of).

Exactly, which was the point I was making earlier with regard to the confusion with costing

 

Most of the chat has been with regard to loco’s for 0 scale

 

How much are we talking for track, points, decoders, sound decoders etc

 

Cheers

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

2 minutes ago, F-UnitMad said:

 

As John is quoting a minimum of £450 per loco, I don't think he's going for small locos and 4-wheel wagons. 

 

Regardless of scale, this is the general policy of most modellers regarding buying trains....

Nice one, how true

 

The quote of £450 has come from a visit to rails of Sheffield last Saturday 

Class 26 / 27’s they had for that price, the Class 60’s were more. Touching £500

[Nearholmer]

If you take a given area, and fill it with model railway, by which I mean to the typical density of a layout, it will cost exactly the same irrespective of scale. A 12ft x 8ft layout in 0 will cost the same as a 12ft x 8ft layout in 00.

 

In 00, you buy more locos, points, yards of track etc, and the price per item seems to sort of match many people’s monthly pocket money, which I guess is part of why its so popular*. In 0, you buy fewer of each, but each is more expensive, so you have to save up for it, you might go three, six months or twelve months buying nothing, then buy something significant.

 

But, TBH, if you are really into main-line trains, rather than branch-line trains, industrials, dockyards and so forth, in the space you have, I’d forget all about 0, and stick with 00.

 

* and why Hornby have got it into their heads that TT is the next big thing again, because they are struggling to keep 00 in adult pocket money price range.

 

 

 

Edited August 2, 2023 by Nearholmer

[Hal Nail]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

there is an ideal absolute size for a toy train

Irrespective of scale, its the size of a Castle class!

 

This superb layout is just under 12 feet which will give an idea of what can be done. Note one end of the run around loop is "offstage" which buys a couple of feet. There's a side on photo in one of the mags this month and it is much smaller than it looks in many of the photos, I think partly due to the clever perspective of the tunnel etc.

 

I genuinely think 12 feet would prove too constraining for a lot of people and that what really needs to tried before selling anything. If you buy a few points and flexi, especially 2nd hand, you'll easily sell them on again.

 

Edit: I forgot, of course, that half the bloody pictures are missing. So much fantastic resource lost.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited August 2, 2023 by Hal Nail

[F-UnitMad]

I agree O Scale isn't really a scale for Impulse Buyers, you do have to think harder about 'need' vs 'want' not that any of us 'need' model trains, strictly speaking....

Despite that, and despite being stone cold sober at the time, I'm still not sure why I managed to order myself an Ellis Clark's Wickham Trolley recently??!! Most of my American O diesels cost less than that!! - admittedly, all of them second hand.

[Hal Nail]

Relevant to trying O on a budget, I buy virtually all my stuff on eBay and by being patient (or more accurately, so tight I overcome my limited patience), I get things at good prices and its fairly easy to flip on again later.

 

Every time r-t-r manufacturers put their prices up, 2nd hand values (including the equivalent kits) jump as well, so actually any stock/stash isnt totally dead money.

 

I'm managing to make impulse buying and rational selling, net each other off.

Edited August 2, 2023 by Hal Nail

[Jeff Smith]

Check out the Peco O gauge Setrack starter pack, saves about £30 over individual items......

[brossard]

17 minutes ago, Jeff Smith said:

Check out the Peco O gauge Setrack starter pack, saves about £30 over individual items......

 

Yeah I'm not keen on the look of Setrack turnouts.  Everyone needs to choose for themselves of course.  I did a bit of an experiment a while ago to see how Setrack compares to a small radius turnout blown up to 0 gauge:

 

 

The Setrack is on the left and the blown up Peco 00 on the right (btw I use 199%, not 175%, because you have to allow for the gauge).  The blown up Peco turnout looks better to my eye.

 

I used small radius turnouts for my original crossover but they were tight for some locos so I replaced them with medium radius.

 

John

[Nearholmer]

The trouble with the 0 gauge version for most purposes is that it is 22.5  degrees. If they used 18 degrees, it would be a very nice turnout, and I’m fairly certain it can be cut back to that.

[Jeff Smith]

John, yes they do look a bit strange but ballasted and painted the same colour as the ballast would probably look ok.  Radius good for dock tanks or diesel shunters......

[sagaguy]

Yes,0 gauge is a whole new ball game,i`ve been collecting and operating Hornby Dublo 3 rail for more years than i care to remember.With advancing age,i can no longer duck under the base board so the layout is now being slowly dismantled.Have you thought about building your own locos,coaches and wagons,RTR is a bit limited still,mainly to tank locos it seems.A few years ago,i bought a DJH Fairburn tank kit,i built the chassis and there it stopped but last year,i thought it was about time i finished it and the photo is the result.I`m also building a Roxey mouldings WD Austerity 2-8-0,the nearly completed tender is also below.It brings with it,a whole set of skills such as soldering etc.It`s very satisfying to roll your own,you would be surprised at what you could achieve.

 

                       Ray

[009 micro modeller]

11 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

 

As John is quoting a minimum of £450 per loco, I don't think he's going for small locos and 4-wheel wagons. 

 

Regardless of scale, this is the general policy of most modellers regarding buying trains....

Based on how that one usually works, isn’t there supposed to be another panel that says ‘until we have ALL the trains’?

[Nearholmer]

Ward Kimball is supposed to have said of the estates left by deceased persons something along the lines “the winner is the one with the most trains”, I think because both he and Walt Disney were avid collectors.

 

Edit: found a YouTube video of him saying it “Remember the old saying: he who dies with the most trains wins.”

 

 

Edited August 3, 2023 by Nearholmer