Tawe_TMD
Saturday, 21 March 2015
New Blog!
I've begun anew on Wordpress. Link Here: https://tawetmd.wordpress.com
Friday, 6 March 2015
Lee Moor, 2nd of her name
Tawe TMD's Shapeways
Page. Looks pretty barren, does it not? I reckon it's about time I
did something to rectify that.
For whom it
concerns, yes, the SLA 3D Printer Project is still underway, painting
is taking a lot longer than expected, even with the convenience of
aerosols. The good news is that allows me to take on a new, shorter
project while this one pans out. Looking over the Hornby L&Y Pug
I reviewed last time, I began to have an epiphany – the harder I
looked at it, and the Lee Moor Tank Engines, the more convinced I
became that I had a perfect beginner's kitbash on my hands!
Behold! |
Hope comes to me in
the form of The Lee Moor Tramway: A Pictorial Record by Roy E. Taylor. This is a collection of photographs, mostly
from 1900 onwards, of the tramway in operation; diagrams of the Lee
Moor Locomotives, perchance? Sadly not. I'll probably find more use
for this material when I get round to building a layout on the
subject, for in terms of the line itself, it's an unbeatable
resource. It's also an invaluable authority on the details present
on the Locomotives themselves – I now know that they carried screw
jacks aboard the running plate for re-railing, as well as an
excellent way to hide the motor in the form of tarpaulin sheets
around the open cabs.
Of course, in spite
of this, there is a distinct dearth of research material relating to
the Lee Moor Tramway, even at the time the locomotives were around
from 1899 onwards. The thing is, though, that it doesn't seem to
stop most modellers, particularly the S Scale brigade, from modelling
historically obscure and fascinating subjects. Is there a method of
designing a working drawing from a plethora of photographs, or do you
go by instinct? That alone will probably make a fascinating learning
curve.
My trip to the South
Devon Railway last Saturday, on which I intended to obtain research
images of Lee Moor No.2 and the last surviving Lee Moor Tramway
Wagon, didn't go nearly as well as I'd imagined. Think of what you
do for fun, does it involve being stuck on a train for a solid hour,
due to some retard who crashed his lorry under the line into Bath
Spa, delaying your already late train just enough to make you miss
the first train? Of the only three running that day? Of course not.
I did manage to get to Buckfastleigh by bus, so that was the day
saved, but unfortunately the SDR had been keeping Lee Moor No.2
“under lock-and-key” as they put it – for the right reasons,
winter protection and all, but still a downer upon an otherwise fine
day.
Damn you Lee Moor No.2, you escape this time! |
Having grown up in
firm Southern Region territory, it's always nice to escape to another
region. The stylistic prowess of GWR Stations, regardless of how
many times the “Western Branch Line Terminus” layout has reared
it's clichéd
head, make it plain to see why they are so keenly modelled by so
many. The creamy orange of GWR No.2 "Light Stone", contrasting so neatly with the comparatively leaden No.3 "Dark Stone", blends so well with the cottage stone, as well as the red soil so often found in Devon, particularly around the Dawlish Sea
Wall (which by itself made the trip worthwhile!); best of all, this
is all achieved without lazily copying the soil colour
verbatim. Even the toilets looked better appointed than my
bedroom!
Tiny House Inspiration? I reckon so. |
Confession time.
I've always dreamed of following in the footsteps of Stanier,
Churchward, Bulleid and the like in model form, my ultimate goal in
the hobby is to design Live Steam locomotives. Okay, perhaps I'm
cheating at this point, taking a chassis from an existing model, but
you've got to begin somewhere, eh?
Sunday, 1 March 2015
Tawe's Testing: The Hornby Lancashire & Yorkshire Class 21 0-4-0 Pug
It's rare that I buy
something worth more than £20 on impulse. At Doncaster I'd
originally intended to buy a Branchlines 0-4-0 Chassis Replacement
Kit for one of my Hornby Pugs, but failing to find a Branchlines
stand at the event, I decided to pursue other review material
instead. It'll have to wait 'till London, but Desmond will get his
new chassis yet!
But for now, more puggish pugs! |
This Pug is a
distinct exception, it's dumb buffers, tiny boiler and plates over
the slide rods making a unique specimen among tank engines. Costing
around £50, it's damn cheap, too – many points will cost
you more than this! For that shellout you get an exceptionally
compact locomotive ideal for the most compressed of micro layouts,
the dumb buffers and truncated wheelbase making it a dyed-in-the-wool
dock tank.
For such a cheap model, details are abound |
I can only assume
this locomotive is of 2010 production, since lettering is crisp and
accurately positioned. The details don't stop there, either, there
are many accurately moulded auxiliary parts and separately-fitted
handrails, rivets are plentiful enough to make a convincing
impression; even the plates over the slide-bars are well done, giving
further charm to this already charismatic model.
Upon unboxing you
get a very simple spread: The Pug, a man pointing, 4 lamps each of both LMS and BR design, and 4 indicator discs. Okay, I'm being facetious, the pointing man is
the driver according to the excellent service manual, and his arm is
intended to partially cover the motor; kind of like the set models of
the old Thomas the Tank Engine TV series which had model drivers with
pose-able arms. Getting him into the cab to position him couldn't be
easier since the cab simply clips onto the chassis, a neat
arrangement that saves a lot of screw trouble when running in.
It's rare that the instructions for budget things are this good |
Speaking of screw
trouble, my example came with the motor screwed in too tightly,
causing the motor to lock up – a condition known as “stall”,
and it's infamous in the R/C world for burning motors out or even
starting fires in extreme cases! It should be said at this point that a
tight gear-train is never a good thing, even if it runs; over time,
the gears will be ruined. Thankfully there's only one screw holding
the motor on, so it's a question of undoing the motor just enough to
make it turn freely.
It may look loose, but it's infinitely preferable to a burnt-out motor |
Me and my testing, you and your shed… So pipe down, you... |
My test circuit is
very rudimentary at present, since I've yet to build a layout
(Folding Test Track? Hmm...), thus I'm using a hornby trainset with
two track packs installed to test point operation. It should be
noted that I presently lack DCC equipment, so I can only test the
loco using a standard hornby DC controller from the trainset (nothing
but the best at this house!). I'll be sure to add a corollary post
once this situation is seen to.
I need a Gaugemaster DC unit at the very least, but it'll do I suppose |
Once it is adjusted
and run in, the 75g pug gives an amusing sight at full speed, as it's
chihuahua wheels whirr and whizz whilst producing not all that much
speed. Is this a deal breaker? Maybe for some children (I reckon
Smokey Joe is an icon because
of his Scalextric swiftness!), but for those who want a yard pilot,
it's a glowing sign. The Pug delivers; it
is adept at low-speed maneuvers even on DC power, although maybe not
quite as glacial as DCC should make it capable of.
Trouble
reared it's ugly head once points were encoutered, however. The
0-4-0 curse struck again with the train-set's insulfrog points,
making low-speed shunting particularly perilous. Again,
DCC can probably come to the rescue here, along with electrofrog
pointwork. Those who stuck with insulfrogs should be prepared to
reason that their driver is under training to explain the lurches
necessary to prevent stalling, failing that the humiliating intervention of
the “hand-of-god”. One
saving grace is that the momentum of heavier wagons does help to keep
the pug going through these momentary lapses of power, though you
can't rely on that all the time.
Enough
about how it runs by itself – an engine is useless with nothing in
tow. Let us delve into it's pulling power, it's all important
Tractive Effort. I have here a line-up of suitable wagons for
testing:
Rolling Stock |
Weight |
Hornby L&Y Pug |
75g |
Lima Mk1 RBR |
135g |
Tri-ang Mk1 FK |
100g |
Tri-ang Mk1 BSK |
100g |
Hornby 4-Wheeler |
45g |
Hornby 7-up 7-plank Wagon |
25g |
Hornby Pepsi Tank Wagon |
35g |
Hornby Tango Box Van |
35g |
In pulling tests, we
were greeted with a sad, but not entirely unexpected sight. The
usual 3 carriage Mk1 rake I use to test new locomotives (Tri-ang Mk1
FK, Lima Mk1 RBR, Tri-ang Mk1 BSK; 335g in total) proved too much to
even start; the two Tri-ang Mk1s (200g total) can be started
carefully, but do show wheelslip under acceleration. Replace one
Tri-ang Mk1 with the heavier Lima (235g total), and wheelslip is
inevitable when starting. On the plus side, the Product Placement
Train (Hornby 7-up, Pepsi and Tango wagons; 95g total), as well as a
trio of 4-Wheelers (135g total) can be pulled without a hint of
drama. Those who'd like to model a small preserved line not unlike
the South Devon Railway or the Lavender Line will not be let down.
Childhood... |
Branch Passenger, anyone? |
You can't tell in a still image, but the pug is whirring away without result |
All in all, I cannot
recommend more than 200g with this loco in any case, much less when
hills are involved. Then again, the pug was never expected to handle
more wagons than can be counted on one hand, the real pug in
preservation slips when pulling two wagons and a brake van:
The final thing I
ought to mention is the couplers – don't get me wrong, they work
just as well as you can expect any tension lock produced by Hornby,
but this is a 2010 model, right? NEM Pockets? Surely these made it
into 2010? Given the attentive detail on the model itself, it seems
really out of place to omit these ever-versatile sockets; probably
the one innovation of our time that did more to solve operational
issues than any other, besides DCC. Maybe it won't be too hard to
retrofit them, and with a £50 model not much capital is at
stake, but it's a very simple yet curious oversight.
Those big hideous hoops characteristic of train sets... |
If you want to know the exact procedure of my review scores, check
back with the Maplin Pin Vice Review for a full summation. I
shall now pass judgement upon this humble saddle tank:
Detail 5/6
Stellar for the money. Granted, it's only a little tank engine
smaller than many trucks, but this isn't just the Dapol kit – this
is the real deal with motor, couplings and details.
Quality 5/6
Another great score. I keep coming back to the money thing, but it
is rather excellent that you can have a proper enthusiast's
locomotive for just double the price of the standard Hornby 0-4-0.
Function 4/5
For precisely what it's designed for, shunting a handful of small
wagons around curves almost too tight for them, it's ace! Maybe
it'll be of limited use when carriages come into play, but if you've
got the preservation scene in mind, you'll probably need another pug
of some kind to double-head anyway.
Value 3/3
As I've said before, this is easily the cheapest way to get a proper
enthusiast-grade locomotive. Not only is it detailed but it also
runs well and slow. Ideal starter locomotive for getting into
weathering or practicing fitment of DCC decoders to old stock.
Overall 17/20
When I found this little gem, only the wheel configuration reassured
me that this wasn't another slot-car pug. I don't really know why I
feared those tiny wheels could somehow propel it to warp-speed, but
there are way too many scalextric-derived 0-4-0s on the market for me
to feel safe.
Rest assured I feel safe now. This is an ideal locomotive for those
who want a high-standard starting base for their first
kit-bashing/Shapeways project – speaking of which, isn't there a
couple of Peckett Saddle Tanks with roughly the same wheelbase out
there? Perhaps we could gloss over the Dartmoor Gauge and
Immortalize them in OO?
Tuesday, 10 February 2015
The Festival of British Railway Modelling: A Highlights Reel
Choosing a
favourite... who knew that a task that
sounds so natural to do becomes a torturous, self-flagellating exercise in
choice? Perhaps this is why those whohave recently fallen under a dictatorship chant “we are free from freedom!”
Of all the
BRM shows, the Doncastrian event has a distinctly British flavour (with the
horrendous grease thankfully remaining in our nation's food); they say that
when you participate in a Smorgasbord, you leave hungry; and with that in mind,
Tawe TMD brings you it's top 5 picks from the show. When you consider that the TMD is focussed on
railway modelling, the funny thing is how my favourite layout of the show celebrates
the simple trainset:
1. Newbie Bridge
Setrack all around, not a gradient in sight; yep, it's a trainset all right! |
No gradients doesn't always mean no verticality :) |
A train made up of trainset product placements? How do I know I'm not in childhood again? |
Metcalfe Buildings look damn good considering they are made of printed card. |
Newbie
Bridge seems to be everything amateur condensed into a small room – all that's
missing are the standard hornby controllers!
But look closer, what is the objective of our hobby? Why do we put months and months into
incredibly thorough research and construction, in between our jobs and social
lives, mind, to put some plastic things on a table? Why, to capture the spirit of railway life in that
region at that time! We fuss and fuss
over grains of dirt on the springs of our wagons, to condense the atmosphere of
life onto an 8x4. Why can't we do this
with the essence of a trainset? Arguably
the number one fixture in our childhood homes that propels us into the hobby to
begin with.
Here's to
Newbie Bridge, for showing us that sacrificing atmospheric charm to the altar
of realism does not a great layout make.
2. Stoney Lane Depot
And now back
to reality! Or at least, with us at
144:1 Scale!
Did I tell you I have a soft spot for 3rd rail? |
Flapper Board Clocks win an instant gold star ;) |
If OO gauge 3rd rail uses Z gauge Code 60, what on earth does N gauge use? |
Jaffa Cake :D |
Takes me
right back to my childhood, this; riding the 'Greyhound' units to the then-new
Eurostar terminal at Waterloo to go to Disneyland. The 4-CIGs, 4-VEPs and other Slam-Door units
always reminded me of a rake of redundant carriages with motors jammed in and
cabs stuck to the ends; recycling at it's finest. Major kudos goes the the fine 3rd
rail work, makes you wonder how much effort would go into a similarly fine
catenary system, especially one that transmitted power! The thing that nudges it into 2nd
place for me is the Flapper Board Clock, and with that I've shown my cards – Nostalgia,
plain and simple.
3. Penpoll Quay
In the sea
of greys, browns, blacks and greens that makes up pretty much all of the steam
layout pallette, the brilliantly subdued white of China Clay is always a
pleasing sight. O gauge is gaining major
traction in the hobby since RTR manufacturers began to inject the market with
affordable, robust, highly detailed models.
The main attraction? Pick up an O
gauge model of any kind and you'll feel why, there's an immediate sense of
weight and presence with these models that often makes up for a lower overall
detail level!
Speaking of
detail, the same size wires and powders for OO or even N make much finer
additions to O gauge models, and with China Clay being a notoriously obnoxious
commodity that lodged into crevices in anything that isn't mirror-smooth, hence the spectral appearance of any wagon that ever carried the stuff, this
has never held more true.
Cornwall was certainly Pannier and Prairie territory, away from the main lines, at least. |
I bet this sight at night frightened many ramblers! |
If you want
a layout to stand out, a specialist freight operation is a sure-fire winner,
even more so if there are working mechanical functions... Now that I think about that, what's to say
you can't transport household commodities by model railway? Perhaps we could have a Coffee train with
insulated hot water tankers, followed by milk tanks, coffee hoppers and sugar
cubes on a flatbed? Just something to
consider...
4. Oldham King Street
That class 40 looks like it has four eyes. |
The Blue
Diesel Era; a time of corporatisation, dieselisation, and bastardisation (Checkout the aesthetic debauchery on this 5-BEL. Ghastly.). Thankfully we are
spared the cold sight of blue and white on an ornate, classily-appointed train
and are instead treated to some more humble machines.
Gronk does Gronky things... |
A 33 passes a Derby Unit by with a few CCTs |
The leviathan character of the Class 40 is captured superbly with this voluminous clag and laborious acceleration. |
It seems
strange to see such large machines on such small layouts other than Motive
Power Depots, but they can add that crucial dash of immersion by implying a
greater world outside of the track on which they reside. Not everyone can make a Leamington Spa, but
that doesn't mean you can't make a nod to a larger network, just as long as
there is a suitable justification for the interloper being there; we can all
thank Oldham King Street for showing us that.
5. Three Mills
This one
wins 5th place, if only for this notice:
“Cinders and Ashes!” cried Thomas, “That's morbid!” |
Aside from
the crude-oil humour and obvious pun, there doesn't seem to be much to this
layout, but let me tell you this – I thought it was OO when I first saw it!
It even looks like OO now, trust me, you have to get close to notice it! |
Classic Control Panel :D |
Just in case you were still in doubt as to whether this really was Fine Scale 3mm. |
If anything
this layout made the top 5 due to it's scale, if it were just another OO or N
layout it would be a fairly standard branch line terminus; sometimes a fresh
gauge all you need. The fine scales
require a lot of work – building your own track, re-gauging rolling stock and
locos, and generally pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. In layouts such as this you can see the
grease and effort put in, as the rolling stock and track takes on a hand-built,
more organic form which injection moulding and CNC cannot replicate.
Closing Words
I chose this
selection from the layouts I observed, that being pretty much everything on the
ground floor; before I fail to mention it, I'd like to express my humblest
apologies to the people behind Border's Reach, Minories, Bankfield Road and
Imperial Yard. Sunday train services
meant I was short of time, and I only had, at most, 3 hours to explore and take
photos of the stuff I fancied, and in an embarrassing twist of busyness, I
neglected to explore the food court. Hopefully
some of you'll be at the London Festival of Railway Modelling, I'm pretty much certain to be there given that my good friend Matt Wickham of Bluebell Model Railway will be present.
I have to
say that taking the trouble to travel by train on Sunday to a city I've never
been in has been well worth it for me.
The Doncaster Racecourse venue proved smaller than anticipated, but
still more than enough to provide a plethora of fantastic displays, as well as
some innovative trade stands. I am
awfully disappointed with myself for not allowing more time, even an hour would
have let me explore the food court and perhaps squeezed a video in! Fear not, for I only live 1½ hours away from
Alexandra Palace, so let these unfulfilled desires be avenged!
Wednesday, 4 February 2015
SLA 3D Printer Project Log 13: Paint with the colours of the Wickes
Oh
dear... It had to be crossed
eventually... This is a skillset I'll
freely admit I have dishonourably neglected...
Painting.
For someone
who is in a hobby all about making faithful recreations where razor-sharp
details abound, I need some serious work on this skill, and what better place
to begin than on a project that technically doesn't even require painting if
the printer is kept indoors? My original
plan was to hang up the panels, spray them glorious, and have done with it; so
far, it seems to be going well:
Apart from it resembling a grey-scale map of German Mottled Camouflage; economy or consistency? The agony of choice... |
I'm greatly
enthused by the idea of spray-painting, if not because it's the only way my
gibbon hands can get a decent coat down, it also has these goodies:
- More rapid application, also dries faster
- Cleaner in application, also leaves the work surface free from ghastly lumps of paint
- Thinner coat means paint is less liable to be chipped off
- Greater consistency is achievable with lower skill level
- Minimal equipment is required – I probably should have hung the panels up with a wire but this isn't strictly necessary
All promising
stuff, but alas it is tempered by these here bugbears:
- Terrible with thin edges – you can either underspray the edge or overspray the sides, unless you have an adjustable airbrush or a spray can with multiple nozzles
- Expensive per area covered – Standard outdoor paint cans promise 10m^2 per can while you'd be lucky to get 5m^2 out of the same money spent on spray paint
- Solvents released to atmosphere, requires a well-ventilated area (or a shed full of panel gaps!)
Just to
illustrate point 1, I have evidence of both cases, as if that's something to be
proud of!
What is this “consistency” you speak of? Do you think it'll ever catch on? |
For the sake
of comparison, by the way, I painted the rear panel with outdoor white satin
paint (sans primer for speed reasons); am I so stoked by these results?
Short answer, no. Long answer,
very much no.
Too embarrassed to paint my Airfix models as a child, can you tell? |
The worst part about such blobby edges is the fact that less is more when painting; specifically, the blobs are always the first paint to chip off. |
The black lines are brush bristles, go me. |
The coat does look thicker at least; don't worry, I was planning to drill the holes out from 4mm to 5mm anyway :) |
Enough
depressing spectacles of incompetence, here's a beautiful image of what happens
when you immerse a stainless steel offcut rod (used as a paint stirrer) bathe
in a tub of water and eco-turps:
Keep your
skills high and your pomposity low...
Wednesday, 28 January 2015
Is Scale Inaccuracy a Cardinal Sin?
Is scale
inaccuracy a cardinal sin?
3D Printing
has limits, some quite strict limits, I'd like to add; Shapeways' most detailed
material (Frosted Ultra Detail) has a lower detail limit of 0.1mm, yet in N
gauge I've struggled to model the wheel springs underneath the Metropolitan
Twin Brake Van – I had to resort to stepping the springs into the sides to give
the illusion of a multi-layered object.
A fine solution to a pervasive problem... |
Probably not the best example given I've added no primer, but if you squint... |
It's not
just simple resolution either, definition is also a problem. The Shapeways minimum detail level of 0.1mm
is actually made up of four 0.025mm laser pixels in the printer; this is to
ensure the position of any details that small will be reasonably accurate,
which they are. However, this means that
if you go this small (as anyone has to if they deign to model N gauge), there
is a 25% directional variation in the X and Y axes (god forbid both!). The upshot is that your “super-fine detail”
will often have poor definition, giving it an almost abraded look; to make
matters worse, Shapeways uses Netfabb Professional to nest the models in the
most efficient way possible, which will allow the most models into any one
printing operation – This means your magnum opus could be printed at all kinds
of unfathomable angles!
Looks like it hit a sandpaper block in a hurricane! |
Let me introduce you to what is on the left: That is a mid-2000s model of a Class 08 from Graham Farish. It clearly displays all the hallmarks of the early chinese production (apart from the split gears, thank god!); This one was evidently designed in Poole and thus can trace it's roots back into the 90s at least. The major manufacturers in N, Peco and Grafar, had some pretty low standards
of detail compared to what even Hornby was capable of at the time, a fact I can
verify by way of a 2005 Hornby Catalogue.
N gauge at the time was only slightly better than what FUD is capable of
today, as can be examined below:
Circa 2005 I believe, got it as a birthday gift :) |
To examine models, I like to ask “Could this model be blown up to full size and be switched with the original for a few days before being noticed?” |
Lettering is in an examplary state for the time, but as you'll see in a minute, still a bit wibbly compared to modern efforts |
A bit wide, perhaps, though if gave it a suitably proportioned etched grille, all but the most eagle-eyed would give the nod |
Grafar ought to be proud for making it's 08s look like this in N! |
What can be
ascertained from an inspection? Pretty
much all moulded handrails with not a wire in sight, no cab glazing, it's clear
that most of the effort was focussed on the lettering and other lines (which
are still a bit too watercolour for my taste).
A folorn state when compared to the OO gauge models of the time, and
sadder yet when you consider how even wagons have progressed in this day and
age:
Lettering is razor-sharp even when weathered |
Rail-Thin details all over from 2013 |
Underframe Pr0n :D |
Yet in spite
of all this progress, the Grafar 08 still has the basic shape of an 08 right,
there's very few things about it that can't be fixed by detail etches and added
handrails; even advances in adhesive technology such as the glue 'n' glaze can
provide a superbly simple solution to it's window-related ills. I think our attitude towards N gauge back
then speaks less about the potential for psychotic levels of detail and more
about the amount of effort we'd like to put into it, not to mention the
comparison point of OO gauge we had back then.
If it weren't for Grafar moving its manufacturing to China and
subsequently re-invigorating their models in a big way, N gauge would have
indeed become a fairly large cult gauge, full of fanatical wizards etching and
bending and soldering their way to victory.
Today, we've
reached the point where unless you're doing a strict time and place – and thus
need to re-number rolling stock or add appropriate dirt (such as china clay
operations) – chances are an off-the-shelf model can be plonked on your track
as-is and look great. The kits of today
are excellently appointed too, and with advances in design and tooling, they're
not hernia-inducingly hard to get right.
The main case for improving detail is in the 3D Printing sector, as well
as the material properties to make a decent chassis. Let us further peruse The Metro Twin Brake
Van:
Details are a bit dulled by the black paint, makes me sad indeed :( |
A clear progression from right to left, though my Metro Twin Brake seems to have sprouted fluff whilst in storage! |
If anything,
comparing 3D Printing to these models has made me realize something about my
craft: with 3D printing in it's current
state, it is essential it looks good out of the box – the fragility of these
models is easy to underestimate if you're it's daddy and you're handling it
like a baby, but real modellers won't care to be so careful. The 08 has superior definition to the Metro
Brake, of that we can be sure. The
details are also cast in metal so it's far more durable, and therefore more
receptive to re-working. If you play the
cards right, you could probably turn this 08 into a reasonable representation
of the real thing, as long as no recent Grafar models pull up alongside, of
course!
So is it
right to expect surgical precision?
Could an obsession over micrometres really have spelled the end of an
entire scale? If you ask me, it all
depends on context: Ask a Shapeways
modeller to re-create the modern Grafar 08 and... he's fled! Too much in the way of technical hurdles and
that's before we even attempt to recreate the etched ladders and fitted
handrails. Perhaps this is why 3D Printing is the preserve of the most obscure wagons - wagons that only exist in highly-researched books on quirky and largely forgotten avenues of railway history. An admirable intention, to effectively catalogue all of our railway's forgotten history in model form, but if you want a hand at this yourself, I recommend sticking to OO where you can fall back on WSF (Polyamide to other companies) and still have a reasonable amount of detail; N gauge 3D Printed rolling stock has yet to come of age, but I'm confident it will in the next 5 years.
Consider
the Madder Valley Railway (Vid here), it's models grind and groan as they traverse the layout, and the style
seems to make no sense with Beyer Peacock locomotives hauling distinctly
American coaches; but it is a true survivor among layouts, it's visual appeal
has failed to be quenched even as it's flock materials fade in colour and the
wheels look comically disproportionate by modern standards. This is how we ought to treat the hobby, not
as an egotistical scoreboard, but to approach it with the aim to create an
atmosphere; to immerse the viewer in a frozen sliver of time, or even just to
amuse them with quirky cameos or even mechanical functions!
As for the
debacle over “The end of N”, it was right to condemn Grafar for a lack of
progress; you start a company to pool resources, to purchase industrial tools
and manpower to surpass what an individual modeller can be expected to
achieve. The old Grafar 08 strikes me as
a model that could have, potentially, been cast by an enterprising modeller in
whitemetal. My point is that we should
not let detail take hold of us like money does to some people, because it produces
the exact same sad result – a loss of humanity accompanied by a loss of
compassion (we all know the rivet counters, do we not? Who likes their company? Silence...)
To follow
your heart, is it worth losing your mind?
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