Chuck F. rightly asks: >What's all this about "anger?" Why does >any criticism of Lionel stir up accusations of "getting emotional?"
As usual, Chuck, I was not just responding to one post. Your reply about exact size prompted my little diatribe, but the posts of others on this same thread have indeed been angry and emotional. A recent post about some poor quality control on NYC PA's was somewhat heated (with jusification) and I have read other recent and older posts that slam Lionel at every turn. I guess I was collecting all those thoughts under one response umbrella. My focused point is that although you are correct when you say "an object is either of a certain scale or it isn't", the degree to which variances from dead center are allowable, varies depending on who you are and how you model. A very good point was made in today's posts about Gilbert TOFCs, those tiny, two to a 40 foot flat car, trailers with the black wheels on the outside. If you are running trains with those cars coupled in, how can you hold a micrometer to the Lionel intermodal trailers? If you are a scaler interested in accuracy, then yes, you will hold to fairly tight tolerances. Even there, you might let a small degree of inaccuracy slide by in the interests of some expediency or other. But in the toy train world, scale takes on looser parameters. Scaling is not an "either it is or it isn't" proposition unless you are an architect doing a scale drawing that people need to take measurements from. Scaling in toy trains works a great deal on what looks OK. That is a subjective value and it varies from observer to observer. I took several tractors and trailers including the Lionel trailers, the separate sale Lionel tractors/trailers, and a variety of so called 1/64th. tractor trailers including some NASCAR racing team promotionals, a WinRoss, an ERTL, a separate sale AM trailer, and two trucks from the Tonka (1/72?) series. Although there were differences, I found them to be minor and not objectionable. My view was that they would look good together on my highways, delivering in my factory and warehouse truck bays and loaded onto my TOFC and spine car sets. I am reasonably fussy about size. I am not one of the advocates of using 1/48 buses because there aren't too many available in 1/64. I wish some of that gorgeous die cast stuff put out by Corgi was smaller, but it isn't and it doesn't fit. I don't plop various non-scale stuff around because "what the hell, it's all toys anyway." I am not a scaler, but I try to stay close to scale, so I'm not a "toy-boy" either! Maybe that's part of being a hi-railer, being a "near-scaler". Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. Chris Zizzo S-Trains list sponsor: http://www.americanflyertrains.com All the Flyer you desire...books and accessories too! To UNSUBSCRIBE from this list send a note to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
