O/T Model Railways...

I haven't collected anything for twelve years. I've just started collecting again and bought a few train sets with coaches in them. I've found trainsets are getting cheaper. However, Locomotives, coaches and wagons sold separately the prices have gone through the roof.

When I collected before Hattons used to sell rakes of six wagons for £36. I bought some EWS MEA mineral wagons.

The same wagons are selling at £14 each on Ebay now. I bought a GNER HST train pack for £59 from Rails of Sheffield. The MK 3 coaches are selling for £50 each.

Have I been lost in a timewarp?

 

What gauge are you collecting

 

00.

 

Decent hobby to be fair

 

For some obscure reason, my Mum bought me a Hornby Pullman set for my 40th. I think I set it up once, to show willing, and it looked cute with the little lights on in the carriages. Never been used since.

However,

I saw a winter / xmas display in a garden centre before Xmas, a village / mountain scene with a train set one of the main features. Promised myself I was going to set up something similar at home, not quite so grand, to display next Xmas - give the place a bit of a mindfullness moment instead of just sticking the Youtube crackling fireplace video on.

Probably need to buy a bit more track and some features before I just spray it all with white foam. Might be a hobby for later in the year. Ideas and donations accepted

 

Sounds a great idea. If you go ahead, please share a photo on here I’d love to see you end product

 

Ahh---the hobby that I never got into. I've been a lover of model railways (00 gauge preferred) all my life but never had one of my own. My older brother Ron and I used to draw plans of layouts that might fit in our attic room when living down Cemetery Road, but that's all they amounted to. Just drawings. Couldn't afford it really. I could now, but I don't have a spare room to set it up in. I wonder if I ever will?

In many ways boys never grow up, do they

 

Yes SD prices have rocketed !!
You only have to read Hornby and Bachmann forums to see what's going on and who they think is to blame.
Did you see the series on Sky a few weeks ago filmed in and around the Hornby factory in Margate? They were made to be a loving, caring, professional set of people doing a fantastic job but you really ought to see the reviews of their latest products which bring them down to earth with a crash.
Quality control apparently is very poor, the latest very expensive models are appalling. The models are all made in China but I don't know if this has anything to do with the poor quality.
I'll leave a Youtube link for you to have a look at and you'll see why so many people are up in arms about the crap being turned out now.
I collect quite a few 00 models but only those that are very special and old .... I generally get them off Ebay or from model auctions such as Vectis. Have a look at the Vectis website and what they sell.
I also collect HO models, American steam trains. Some of those are absolute belters.
Just for your interest this weekend at the Doncaster Racecourse is the major model railway exhibition. I hope to go.
It's 12 quid to get in and will certainly keep you occupied for a day !

 

This was my inspiration, Strikes Garden Centre, Stokesley.
We barely use our cold conservatory in the winter so something like this, with lights and a backdrop would be great.

But maybe just a house, a post office, a station and a shed load of trees and hills. Yorkshire Dales ish.

 

Not my type of thing but each to their own.
However the most off putting thing about it all is the cost. Every little item now costs a fortune, from tiny figures to buildings to scenery to the trains and coaches etc. So what the cost of a scene like the one you have shown would be is beyond imagining !
It's like those fabulous Christmas trees in garden centres that are all colour coordinated from top to bottom, decorated in wonderful lights, tinsel, baubles etc, but try to work out how much it would cost, item by item, and you'd be very shocked indeed.
Fortunately a few years ago I saw an N scale layout on Preloved for sale, all made up with scenery, track etc, something I could never design or make, and it is truly beautiful. The time and effort that went into making it cannot be underestimated. I bought it and have it in our conservatory. I've added trains over the years, fitted tiny LED lights into coaches.
One day I'll try to add some lighting to the actual layout.

 

My collection started whilst I had an N Gauge layout in my bedroom. I never took to it though. I always preferred OO even without a layout. So I started my collection. My Dad catalogued my stuff for me last week and I was staggered just how much I'd got. (Although I wasn't impressed my 2 Lima RES GUV'S, 3 container wagons and 3 of my MK1 coaches had gone walkabout or been broken.) At the prices they are now.

I've watched the youtube video and that is shocking that the light shines through the bodywork. I'll ask Laura if she wants to go to Doncaster on Saturday. Then hit her with the model rail exhibition when we get to the racecourse.

 

I’ve just never understood the attraction of model railways , waving a flag shouting all aboard and blowing a whistle I can see the appeal of that but the rest of it I don’t get

 

Model railway and accessories shop less than a mile from my house called "Going Loco".

Potovens Lane Outwood/Lofthouse

 

Do you remember the thrill, the sheer excitement when Barnsley used to score a goal ? I know it's been a while but ....
Well I now get my thrills watching a model train going round in circles. At least I'm in charge, I pick the trains, I don't have a CEO or 80%ers.
I'M THE MAN in my own little fantasy world .

 

And there is probably light at the end of the tunnel

 

I'd like something like this:

 

As a nipper up to about the age of 11 i had a thing for toy soldiers and battle sets/scenes.

Can vaguely remember there us to be a shop in Scarborough where i was allowed to get something every time we visited.

 

One day the BFC loco will travel again.. just like the majestic flying Scotsman across either the Penistone or Ribblehead viaducts in full sunlight at full steam at thunderous speed with everyone watching it.
We can all but dream.

Before any any asks why the comparison with both viaducts Ribblehead has 24 arches and everyone goes mental over her but Penistone has 29 .and in my view a greater work of engineering.

 

There still is great model shop in Scarborough near decent chippy. One street back from the front. Go up all those steps at the side of Corrigans amusements.

 

I'd love to model Pontefract Baghill from the mid fifties until the late seventies before it was taken off the Main Line.