There are several friends who via email are gently nudging me, well OK they are pushing me, to make a reality check and start building a layout As with most of us I have O Scale tastes with an N Scale space. O Scale is like a drug in that you go to a large layout and it just feels so good, operates so well, and is impressive but the reality is the real estate for most is beyond their means unless they are willing to do a switching layout.
This is why most folks end up in HO which is the not too big not too small scale for most folks. It is just right and why it is the dominant scale today even with it ceding some of its lead to N Scale in recent years. The HO market is suffering from the dual hit that the seniors in the hobby can no longer see well enough and the younger crowd wants more prototype length trains which require a lot of real estate.
The older crowd is either simplifying their HO layouts, stepping into On30 or even rediscovering O Scale. This has appeal as I am at the bottom edge of that age range though the real estate beast rears its ugly head again.
S Scale is really the ultimate solution as the best balance of size and space. It only takes up 33 percent more space than HO but it currently lacks the product depth of HO, N or O. The demise of S Helper Service as it was absorbed by MTH is a strong point of concern with MTHs real focus on the toy train in S and not scale market even as they venture into HO.
The Sn3 niche includes one major manufacturer which is PBL. They make some of the nicest locomotives in any scale but the price tag is just more than my budget will allow. Their car kits make some of the most beautiful recreations of cars in any scale as I will attest from a caboose kit that I have mostly finished before setting it aside.
The N direction has appeal for what one can fit into the space but the ability to see the product and to detail and operate it raises concerns for many and particularly for my self as my vision and motor dexterity should decline over the next 20 years as it does with most as they enter senior status. Even with these concerns seeing layouts like Mark Dance's Columbia & Western attest to the ability to operate in a prototype manner in N Scale.
What ties all these sections together for is finding the balance to operate as I want with available models in the constraint of space along with availability of models. Which scale gives me the balance? Some of that will be answered once the prototype is picked in the near future.
To use the analogy from the computer world in that you buy the hardware that runs your software in the model train world you buy the scale equipment that allows you to run the trains you want the way you want.
Great post, however, I do not feel N has challenged HO any as N has much less in terms of products. The ability to build in N is like kicking cancer, no matter how successfull you are it still hurts.
ReplyDeleteLong trains can be simple scenes that are vignette style sections that have a entrance and an exit. Design overcomes scale issues and like the software, do not buy hardware that everyone is buying for that software. It may be untested as of yet...