But that is only one small example. There is no reason to not expand
the scale's depth to include anything and everything HO has to attract
new modelers to it. I think this scale is by far better than HO
otherwise I wouldn't have come to it. Here's another way to look at
it. One that might actually make some sense to some of the guys on here.
What if all of a sudden we made no more new cars. None at all! No more
Fords, no more Chevys, no more Dodges, no more of anything else you
might drive. nothing no more new vehicles. For say, the next 30
years. Then what's going to happen. No more parts stores either, by
the way. So you have old vehicles with no parts to do anything to them
with. Sound familiar? Why do we need anything new to come out, we've
had vehicles built 30 years ago that are just fine. While we have been
doing this, other countries kept building new cars. There stuff is so
new and modern, but we have our 30 year old cars that still run. Why
make anything new, what we have is just fine and it runs. Not well ,
but it runs. That's pretty much where this scale is right now.
Now I'm not saying that in a few cases there isn't enough stuff out
there to build something nice and modern. I'll give you that. How do
you do ditch light detail? Unless you have a set of the old Detail
Associates ditch lights, your pretty much out of luck there. Unless Des
Plaines has mad some that I'm not aware of. The cars and locos that are
in this scale need to be updated. S Scale America has started to do
that, but hasn't gone far enough. More from them needs to come out.
Kaslo Shops has made some awesome cylindrical covered hopper kits, but
they are very labor intensive and not for the faint of heart to
assemble. Jim King, who has been a visionary in the scale, has
announced a new GP38 and GP38-2 kit with more models that will fit on
the same frame i.e. GP40, GP40-2 etc. to follow. Also his Smokey
Mountain Model Works trucks sold like hot cakes after I convinced him to
make more and offer them. SMMW Waffle side box can still be found as
well. So there's hope, but not enough being done to promote the scale
to manufacturers.
Yes, the S scale sig is a great start. 1/64 modeling magazine has gone
electronic and is also a great tool, but more need to be done. I for one
am not ok with just saying this is enough, nor should any modeler out
there that is passionate about this scale. Here is one last example.
American Models and S Scale America make the only modern style covered
hopper. They are of a design that was from the 1960's and yes SOME
still are in service today, but almost none in grain service. However,
since then there have been almost 30 different style covered hoppers
produced in the real world. Now if you're going to model the 1960's or
early 70's this would be fine. However, a modern day modeler isn't going
to be ok with this. HO scale has had almost every variety of covered
hopper built in real life made and they have sold well. S scale needs
this variety. It needs a new car every month coming out from someone.
The market wasn't there 30 years ago in HO and someone took a chance and
it worked and others followed suit. This needs to happen in S and needs
to happen very soon, otherwise the scale will be doomed to fall into
oblivion and will never be given it's fair status amongst the other scales.
S scale is the perfect scale. It can be modeled using nothing more than
a household ruler. Why must it be kept a secret? Good enough, isn't
good enough anymore. If it weren't for Jim King and now maybe Railflyer
Model Prototypes, and a few other, nothing would be being produced.
Thanks
Michael Ostertag
On 8/17/2012 9:33 PM, bbbogart56 wrote:
A branch of the I&O runs past my backyard, 2 trains a day, along the
old Hocking Valley line. It's usually powered by a GP-35 that has had
the BN painted out with black paint and numbered but not lettered. Has
been recently powered by GP30s and a GP9. Same kind of paint schemes.
Should be easy to do a modern shortline with the exsisting locos and
some of the modern cars offered lately.
--- In [email protected] <mailto:S-Scale%40yahoogroups.com>,
"ctxmf74" <ctxm@...> wrote:
>
>
>
> --- In [email protected] <mailto:S-Scale%40yahoogroups.com>,
"clipper841@" <clipper841@> wrote:
> >
> > a point missed here entirely, is that "modern" power like the u33c
> > and the sd70ace, are main
> > line power, so if your rr is not a mainline operation, modern power
> > is totally out of place
>
> Good point and why I'm not really worried about new locos :>)
> I've got American models GP-9 and GP-35 models that I plan to
weather for short line use. Might get a U25 once I get some track up
and running and maybe even a GP60 old style cab version for my coal
trains. The branch here used GP9 and SD9 for many years then GP40 and
GP38's after that , but I've seen Uboats, SD40-2 and even SD 45 pull
trains on the branch at times.....DaveBranum
>
