What I love about N Scale

[Ed Kapuscinski]

You can actually have and use a fleet of 86' boxcars.

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Thank you @Bluford Craig

[learmoia]

Hell Yes.. Craig has done a great job filling my auto parts facility with big.. long..  boxcars

[bnsfdash8]

I see the models, kits, and parts available to HO scale and think that sure would be nice.

As an owner of many 86 boxcar and similar sized cars I realize if I wanted to have what I have in HO it'd take over the room instead of just a couple shelves and bookcases.

[thomasjmdavis]

You can actually have and use a fleet of 86' boxcars.

And here, all this time, I thought N scale was so I could have a fleet of 85' passenger cars.  To each his own, I guess.  (I do have a fleet of Bluford hoppers, although no 86' boxcars)

Too bad we are limited to one up-vote, Ed, because you deserve one for the statement, and another for that late autumn scene. No, make that three, with one more for the weathering on the boxcar.

As an owner of many 86 boxcar and similar sized cars I realize if I wanted to have what I have in HO it'd take over the room instead of just a couple shelves and bookcases.

Many years ago, I looked into purchasing an N-scale focuses small manufacturing company from a couple who were moving on to other things. The husband told me "we have $37,000 in inventory, do you have an idea what that looks like?"  I answered "it would depend on how many locomotives, but I figure a 30" wide bookcase about 5' tall."  He laughed and told me I was close, and that most of the potential buyers who came to look had assumed it would fill a garage.

[Cory Rothlisberger]

Always knew you liked 'em big and long Ed! 

[flight2000]

You can have those in Horribly Oversized scale too....just need twice the space to pull it off....

I get what you're saying though.   

I forgot, how big is the layout you're working on?  For comparison, I needed a minimum of 36" curves to realistically pull off the 86' boxes, 89' flats, and autoracks without having crazy amounts of overhang.  Big, long trains running in smaller footprints is what I miss about N Scale.  My oldest son continually reminds me of the N Scale empire I could have had...lol!

Cheers,
Brian

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[learmoia]

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They look pretty good at 15" R or more

[C855B]

You can have those in Horribly Oversized scale too....just need twice the space to pull it off...

4X the space. Square of the difference.

Ed captured my sentiment. A very large layout - mine is currently a "pink foam prairie" - does those big cars justice. And here you go:

[Wlal13again]

Yup I have several and no use for them on the layout . 

[bman]

Looking good Ed.. Mine arrived yesterday. I hope to have them on the rails in a month benchwork is 1/2 done. Slowly but surely I am getting there.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Yup I have several and no use for them on the layout . 

Time for another layout!

[randgust]

Yeah, exactly.

In HO, I remember thinking 50' cars were 'big', and with 22" radius curves, 85' Rivarossi heavyweight cars looked absurd

A long train was 10 cars.  An MU consist?

So here I am in N scale in 5'6" by 8' 'big' layout, running 30 car trains with up to  4 units, auto racks, piggybacks, passenger trains, and 15" curves and still loving it.   Signalled two-track main line. 

Or I could be doing a weedy branch or logging railroad in the same available space in HO.  Nope.  My portable logging railroad modules are up to 21x42 inches and have carrying handles and fit right in the back of my SUV.  See ya at Altoona.

[jdcolombo]

Nice work, Ed!

But it's not just 86' box cars that work in a reasonable amount of space in N scale.   As an earlier post noted, those 85' passenger cars are another example.  But all prototypically big things are just better done in N scale unless you have an 80' pole barn for your layout.  The Big Boy is 19" long in HO scale; it's less than 10" in N scale.  Say you wanted to re-create a prototypical train from the mid-1950's with the Big Boy in front.  Say 50 cars, averaging 40' each in length.  A 40' box car in HO scale is about 6" over the coupler faces.  So you're talking 25 feet of cars and another 2 feet roughly for the engine, so 27 feet total.  In N scale, that becomes about 14.5 feet.  You'd need a REALLY big space to put that train on one section of tangent in HO scale.  In N, not so bad. 

My steel mill scene on my layout has buildings that are really scale size in N - but they were marketed as HO scale buildings (the Walthers steel mill buildings) because real steel mill buildings are huge, and a real scale steel mill scene in HO would take up an enormous amount of space.  So Walthers "selectively compressed" them.  In N scale, that's not necessary.

What depresses me is how many folks still think N scale is simply poorly running "toys."  Nope.

John C.



John C.

[jwaldo]

Discovering N scale pretty much kept me from abandoning the hobby. I had no room for any permanent HO setup, and the oval of EZ Track on the spare room floor was getting old faster than my locomotives' drivetrains were filling up with carpet and cat hair. By high school I was at the absolute nadir of model train interest. Then I found an N scale set at the LHS. The equivalent to my HO oval fit on a board I could stash with (and set on top of) my family's folding card table, with room to spare. Suddenly I had a 'real' layout. And the rest is history.

[lock4244]

You can actually have and use a fleet of 86' boxcars.

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Thank you @Bluford Craig

Agree 100%!

With an assembly plant on the layout as the focal point of operations, I have more than a few of the 86' boxes and 89' racks. Fortunately the yards and plant trackage are spread out along a 33' wall, which in N scale can is more than enough to represent this type of operation, and the long cars that serve them, justice.

And I'm VERY relieved to have stocked up on racks before they were $50-60 a pop, and the 86' boxes around $22 ea...