HOn30 questions - and perhaps a layout build?

[Chris333]

Pics showing the warp I was worried about. Not too bad. N scale archbar trucks




As small as these cars are. Out of 3 sized the Gilpin had, these are their biggest.

[Chris333]

Waiting on the Doctor. 



Truck WB is a tad long, but they are tiny!

[timwatson]

Waiting on the Doctor. 



Truck WB is a tad long, but they are tiny!

Those turned out great @Chris333. Get a string of them rolling!

[JeffB]

Waiting on the Doctor. 

Truck WB is a tad long, but they are tiny!

Spectacular as always Chris...

Jeff

[Dave V]

Oooo... I need some of those!

[Chris333]

As usual after I printed a bunch I contacted Keith Pashina on FB. He has a Gilpin layout and has a few articles out on the RR. He sent me some better photos of the trucks. So I changed them up a bit. Zooming in on old drawings is not the best and photos are old and fuzzy. Still funny to me that these tiny a$$ cars were the largest of them all.

[Beezow Doo-Doo]

If those were the largest, I would hate to see the smallest. 

[Dave V]

OK, it's been a while since I've posted. I've been working in the big RGS layout with what little modeling time I have.

However, I'm getting antsy to do something good and Wild Western, so I started working on a few structure projects for the new layout.

In the meantime, I remain stymied on a name for this railroad.

I like the idea of having everything whiskey-themed, and have already determined that the main town should be Scotch Creek. Not only am I a single-malt Scotch fan, but there was a real Scotch Creek just below Rico on the Dolores River on the Rio Grande Southern.

But as for a semi-plausible railroad name for a small but ambitious narrow gauge running somewhere in the red rocks country near the Four Corners, I'm still stumped.

When I was in high school I imagined a standard gauge line that connected Flagstaff AZ, down Oak Creek Canyon past Sedona to Camp Verde and then up to Cottonwood to tap the copper traffic out of Jerome. This Flagstaff, Cottonwood & Southern would have been a very difficult line to build as standard gauge and would have had very little online traffic, and would have had lots of competition for hauling Jerome's mineral wealth to the southern transcon.

So maybe I don't anchor it in reality at all. Just generically western. It's essentially a mining railroad that does whatever other business (passenger, mail, mixed freight) it can.

Some ideas anchored on the town of Scotch Creek:

Scotch Creek & Western
Scotch Creek & Burbon Butte
Scotch Creek & Rye Gulch
Scotch Creek & Pacific
Scotch Creek & Whiskey Flats
Scotch Creek Central
Scotch Creek RR
Scotch Creek & Mogollon (a nod to the 2-foot gauge Silver City, Pinos Altos and Mogollon Railroad) - I really like the railroady sound of this and it does anchor the railroad to a general geography without committing to specifics...but it's not completely whiskey-themed.

Thoughts? Including completely not-whiskey related names?

[dem34]

I like Scotch Creek & Pacific since it follows the common joke of Narrow Gauge Railroads with a piece of the name describing a place they would never get within 500mi of. And alludes to a pie in the sky optimism fueled by a Scotch and Whiskey bender. Maybe even throw in a little siding marked "Pacific Extension" that only goes a couple feet and is surrounded by some overgrown construction equipment and wayward bottles.

[Dave V]

I'm not gonna lie... I've run out of steam on this project. I've actually been focused back on my main effort, the HOn3 RGS First District. I have a number of major projects in the pipeline for the RGS.

Not to say I've given up on HOn30...just it's not going anywhere for the time being. I'm actually grateful for my recent surge of interest in the RGS. I expect we'll be in this house for a very long time to come. My wife and I have talked about moving someplace warmer and someplace with lower elevation, but we re-financed at 2.25% a few years back and I know I'll never see rates like that again. We have a great house with fantastic neighbors we love (not in the leave-your-car-keys-in-the-bowl sense, LOL), and we've established ourselves in this community. And this would be a great house to entertain grandchildren in some far away future.

This means the RGS either remains my "big one" or I summon the courage to tear it up and start again in that space. TBH...there are things I'd do differently for sure, but none so profound as to warrant erasing the current layout for something new. Even then I'd be torn down to my soul... Go even more prototypically RGS? Do freelanced "vignettes" of the RGS/D&RGW narrow gauge? Or, behind door #3, a much more prototypically-based freelanced San Juan Central? Admittedly, that last one has been the subject of too many daydreams to count...

So there ya go. A non-update update.

[Chris333]

A non-update update.

I could spend all week doing these 

[John]

Dave .. I tore down my layout last year at the age of 68 because of all the things I did wrong and am starting over.  I’m not the accomplished modeler some on here are, but I hope the new effort will be better than the previous attempt.   I could only hope to achieve the level of artistry that you and others show here routinely.   While I’ve not seen yout layout  in person, I’ve seen enough online on FB And here to opine that it would a shame to relegate to the dumpster.

Obviously rule 1 applies, do what makes you happy, but just remember that there is no guarantee the next project will be perfect either.    Whatever you decide will be the correct answer for you.

Cheers

[Dave V]

@John

Yeah, don't worry, as you read in the thread, the HOn3 RGS is here to stay. If for no other reason than inertia. But I'll definitely be refining it more.

Just not sure I have the bandwidth or the physical space for a third layout right now (i.e., the HOn30 project).

[Buck.H]

@Dave V, it doesn’t sound like you are ready for a rip and tear, and it also seems that the 1st district is running fine and not finished, but after watching Dave Meeks re-working of his Thunder Mesa layout, mebbe there is room some reimagining? How about a narrowER gauge interchange with your Scotch Creek idea or the Southwestern extension of the San Juan Central tying into the RGS at a point south of Rico?

Just my 2 wooden nickels worth.

[Dave V]

@Dave V, it doesn’t sound like you are ready for a rip and tear, and it also seems that the 1st district is running fine and not finished, but after watching Dave Meeks re-working of his Thunder Mesa layout, mebbe there is room some reimagining? How about a narrowER gauge interchange with your Scotch Creek idea or the Southwestern extension of the San Juan Central tying into the RGS at a point south of Rico?

Just my 2 wooden nickels worth.

Well, anything like an SJC interchange or a connection to HOn30 is a departure from the whole purpose of the layout; a faithful representation of the RGS.

The RGS layout is finished in almost every sense of the word, probably twice over. My project are improvements to the existing layout.

I appreciate the suggestions, but they'd be at odds with my vision and purpose.