The health of our hobby

This blog entry as a response to a thread I started on Trains.com.
My gratitude to the serious responses thus far, and a 'chuckle' to those less serious, but more predictable! [:)]
I don't seek to be flame bait here, nor are my thougts intended to be trivial, but to engage in some serious dialogue.
There are some facts and data that could help assess the state of the hobby's size and assumed health.
Are overall sales $$ of model railroad related items growing or shrinking? What are key economic health indicators of related suppliers and manufacturers?

1. Bankrupcy rate of current leaders U/D/S (up/down/static)
   
2. Number of new suppliers and manufacturers each (U/D/S)
3. Mergers and buyouts of existing suppliers and manufacturers (U/D/S)

Internet presence

1. Forums that are growing with new members and postings
   
2. Forums that are stagnant, dying or died in the past year
3. New forums this year
4. Same data on train blogs

Local, National and regional club health
Train shows per year, attendance and demographics
These are just a few of the metrics that I'd think would give some legitimate response to my question. The state of the hobby is not an abstract construct. It seems to me that instead of relying upon antedotal information gleaned from pundits and members of the OFC, real facts can be collected to better understand the issue.
So, Joe Daddy, who is responsible for doing this, well, I'd say no one is actually responsible, which is why we don't have clear or supportable data. But there are those who's best interests are served by knowing this. Large, leading magazines, national organizations and manufacturers themselves all need and would value this data as legitimate marketing information. Actually I would be very surprised if none or all of these people do not have some hard data on this subject. They may consider it to be highly secret or priviledged internal data; a part of their competitive advantage.
Personally, I think the known facts support the idea the hobby is enjoying at least a moderate amount of growth. Here is why I would say that, meaning these are the facts that support my conclusion.

1. Recently the evening news announced the hobby of trains is making a comeback with younger people, citing the reentry of some retailers into the business. Antedotal for sure.
2. We see what appears to be an increasing number of new and finely detailed models in all scales being offered.
3. Young faces are appearing in the pages of leading magazines, suggesting their data suggests a youthful appearance will have an appeal to their audience. (these people look at the angles trying to make it all work to their advantage)
4. Global competition works to keep prices in check. Look at the price of flex track over the past 40 years and compare it to wages. I'd say that price is muc flatter than my wages have been.
5. The baby boomers are retiring, looking for mentally and physically challenging activities that don't require further abuse to their already jog ruined knees.

This brings me back to us. It is my recommendation, based upon my conclusions drawn from the known facts, that we are best served by thinking about our hobby more in the eyes of newbies than the OFC. This means it is valueable to help newbies be successful at making their trains operate well, look reasonable and have some fun, before we insist they have 9 rivits on each handrail, 4 bolts on each timber of a trestle bent and have a fully indexed card system before they turn the DCC controller on.
A growing, healthy hobby attracts better products, research and keeps the prices low while choices go up. A real advantage to everyone in the hobby, especially the OFC who mostly rely upon fixed incomes.
For those who don't know, OFC (Old Fuddyduddy Club)
And yes, I agree, a Poll would be completely useless for this purpose.
I just got my NMRA membership card yesterday #137808 00. It seems to me that one of the missions of the NMRA should be to know the health of the Model Railroading hobby.

John Widmar's Royal Gorge & Western

Under construction

What a Joy, Friday (12/1/06), this past, I had the honor of a personal tour of the Royal Gorge and Western. I can tell you that no pictures do it justice, and few words can describe what we saw. I said we, as my lovely wife Jeanne came along. Oh, how glad I was that she came.

Mr. John Widmar, Master Model Railroader

Link to John's Layout Pictures

Here is a taste of John Widmar's amazing work! These pictures do not require Words. John excavated a hole in his train room floor to build a step down eliminating the need for a duck under! At 6'2" I only had to nod my head to easily clear this masterpiece. The Colorado Royal Gorge in N scale is the theme of John's 15' X 20'

I have included these pictures more as evidence that I have seen this place. John has hundreds of pictures of his work posted at this Site Address.

By the way, there is no fake or misleading Photoshop action in these pictures, what you see is what he built. John is the real deal.




How does he do it? Is it patience or skill? It must be both! These pictures show John's amazing Air Museum. The quality surpasses anything you would expect in any museum, and it is in N Scale. Go inside, you find a completely detailed snack bar with donuts for sale on the counter. Too bad the camera I had that day did not have a macro lens!


John's Air Museum, N Scale of course





Here we get a view of the cafe on the left. Of course, there is a roof! Joe Daddy just forgot to take the picture!








Notice the tiny Wright flier on the right. A work of art all unto itself, lost in the beauty of this piece of art.







It is hard to see, but this museum has two floors, the second being what I would call a mezzanine with open air between them.

I know I have used the words amazing and unbelievable over and over, but I can tell you they are the right words. I am going to go back with a better camera and take more pictures. What a fellow this gentile man!

The engine maintenance facilities on the Royal Gorge and Western railroad, the product and output of John Widmar, Master Model Railroader is nothing short of breathtaking. John believes the in the inside out theory of model railroading. He starts on the inside and works his way out! These facilities are as intricate and elaborate on the inside as they are on the out.

I will remind all that this is an N Scale layout. This is a layout you examine with your bifocals on full power and a flashlight in your hands so you can appreciate true craftsmanship.

Five stars to John Widmar!


The Roundhouse (my apology for this terribly underexposed foto)



The passenger car shop



The car shop


For my 2 cents, John is the master of the backdrop effects. He knows how to project 3D effectively. Actually it was this portion of John's layout that first caught my attention and was the incentive for me to seek an audience with the master model railroader. In talking with John, he had this advice for creating effective 3D backgrounds. "If you can have at least three different levels, you'll likely achieve your goal of depth." That is a lesson learned worth remembering!

His rendition of the City of Pueblo is nothing short of stunning. See for yourself. Click on the picture for crisp details.



Here is another picture of the roundhouse area with a corner of the city of Pueblo in the background.



Joe Daddy hisself


Copyright joe-daddy.com 2006

Commentary - Trains in Belgium

Meeting train people is, well not always as easy as meeting girls. . .


That's cheating, I know, but where do you find the train guys around town. Sure, they say, join a club. Clubs have their own issues, doesn't make no mind if it is a car club or a train club or a biker club, each has their own set of issues. Besides, the club scene is a commitment of time. But even worse, it is a commitment of a schedule. And, oh, do I hate schedules!

I have a friend I do Bible study with every Saturday morning, least I get my Belgian waffle! Oh, and speaking of waffles, I am in Brussels right this minute and U think I could find a waffle here? Nope! Not one, I got close last night, we went to this neat little restaurant near the office. A place called the Cook & Book. It is a restaurant and book store combined.
Down stairs, books for adults, noo, not that kind, but the intellectual types, about travel and cooking and other stuff. They have an old airstream trailer in one room, the little one about 12' long. Polished like grandma's silver it is.

Upstairs, this is where it got really neat, the floor is raised like an old computer room floor with huge, thick glass tiles about an inch or so thick. The tiles must be 4' x 6' of course they measure in meters over hear but you and I know how big 4' x 6' really is. So big deal, Joe Daddy, where are the trains, what are you talking about! Patience! UNDER the glass, all the way around the room is a huge Marklin layout! It is built on something like old Astroturf, but it has tracks running everywhere and buttons about every 8 feet along the side of the frame on the floor. Press the button and the train takes off! My grandson Brandon would go nuts, course he would drool all over the glass as he laid there trying to get there. Stefan, the man I was with had told his wife and 7 year old daughter that their visitor from the US loves trains. It was their daughter Colynn who suggested Dad take Joe Daddy to the Cook & Book! Of course I did not have my camera, not sure it would have done much good, but I can tell you it was a neat idea.

Back to the waffle, decided to forgo supper and only have a desert. There it was, Belgian waffles with fruit and ice cream! Oh, we discontinued that last month. Grrrrr. . .

I finally bought a 7-11 plastic wrap waffle this afternoon just so I could say I had one in Brussels.

Oh, should we be thankful we don't have the prices over hear, I'll never complain about the price for a coke in Manhattan again. 6 bucks a can in my hotel! Everything is outrageously high priced. Some of it of course is that I am trapped in the business man's circuit where escape even to something like a 7-11 is almost impossible. I did find a golden arches in the building next door. Hustled over there only to find it was the Belgium headquarters for Mickey D's, no restaurant at all!

Ok, back to meeting train people. Maybe I'll write about that later, back to Brussels!

This is the view right out my overpriced hotel room window. The trains run all day and three things stand out as impressive.

• They are brightly painted.
• They are clean, spick and span and it has been raining all week!
• They are quiet!

So, how to meet train people in your area? So far, I have met some very nice people right here on TrainBoard. Reach out, use the private message system, I still have to close the loop on one man I have reached out to here. It is how I got the honor of meeting John Widmar, which reminds me, I got to get back over and finish that write up on his incredible workmanship.

Copyright joe-daddy.com 2006

Commentary - Big Shop or Bigger Layout?

OK, Joe Daddy is wrestling with something. Do I make my shop smaller so I can have a bigger layout, or is the shop more important than more train? Getting more real estate (more room) is not possible.

So, my thinking is to expand my layout into my shop and build the layout over the top of my existing work table at about 50 inches or so and use the room for both.

Thanks
JDMy current shop
Like many, I got involved in model railroading as my hobby after I finished my basement. And, I did a really good job of it. I finished every square foot, into livable sized rooms. My shop is a about 14 x 18 but it has 3 doors. It is adjacent to the train room, just through the door and wall behind the work bench and cabinets on the wall.

Current Layout
This layout evolved from a plan in Bob Hayden's book Track Planning Ideas from Model Railroader; 58 Track Plans from Past Issues . It was the Enchantment branch of the ATSF, of all railroads. I liked it because it has a double mainline that allows me to run continuous operations, something I very much enjoy. And it is a type of layout that lends itself to computerization. I put a 7 siding double ended yard on the first level at 39" and the double dog bone at 51" on the top deck. So what is the issue Joe. Well, I want more places to put scenery and I want to be able to walk along with the trains too. All of my curves are minimum 30". To get the big curves, I sacrificed for the narrow isle.
Proposed Layout

To facilitate the new layout, I have been making my power tools become more portable so I can store them under the new layout. There will only be a passing track and a couple of industry sidings on the new section, all to make room for more scenery.

So, keep the big shop, or more trains?

New Layout Shop is blended
Well, my third layout, now named the Colorado and Santa Fe (C&SF) is well underway and trains are running. Certainly there is a ton of work to do, but everyday, I make a little progress. Do something everyday and stuff gets done, right?

Progress being made. The shop? Well, it is still there, underneath the layout. Do I like it? So far, so good, the only thing I don't like is that when I sit at my work bench, the layout is just a bit too tall for me to be able to see it easily. What change will that drive? I don't know, maybe I will learn to stand more.

Update 8/2008
While under construction, I used my table and chop saw in the layout room itself. While I was diligent in my attempts to keep everything clean, several things caught up with me:

1. Keeping it train room clean is almost impossible. Even a short run of the sabre (jig) saw creates a huge amount of dust.
2. Air quality is the biggest issue. Running saws without a professional grade (expensive) vacuum system puts tremendous amounts of dust into the air. Ultimately, my lungs shut down the operation.
3. Getting things out and putting them away either to get under the layout, or to chop a board became too much of a burden.

So, last weekend, I worked over my garage and moved my chop and table saw into the basement. MY 10" band saw remains in the train room. The vacuum cleaner seems to work well with it. And I added air filtration to the train room too.

Here is the slide show.

Clicking on the pictures will show a larger version!
Copyright joe-daddy.com 2006

Commentary - Using my time, do I expand or refine?

Time, we only have a finite amount of it don't we? Use it or lose it as they say. Well, the Parkdale Railroad version 2 can now run trains again! The dual mainlines can run independent trains and the ramps that make the 11 inch rise from the staging yard to the operations deck work just fine. I can pull 23 car trains with my twin F3s both powered and speed matched at a crawl, with a stop half way up and restarting with no back pedaling. I did not say no spinning mind you, but then I am all out of HO sand

The transition era diesels work fine, but my test steam locomotive a BLI Northern 4-8-4 found a couple of kinks that were hidden here and there. The root of the kinks, it turns out, is that I had gotten 'cute' and tried a new technique of leaving the ties mounted on the flex track and just cutting the tie to rail barbs. Looks great without the naked inch and a half of rail, but it still allowed the track to kink.

My first year anniversary of returning to Model railroad passed last week. At this milestone, it is time to make another decision?

Do I focus on scenery of my current layout, OR, do I do the expansion that Xpedx and I have privately discussed? Or do I do both?

It is all about time, isn't it, where do I spend it, building bench work, laying track and wiring turnouts, signals and crossing gates, Or do I get my hands into the plaster?

You know, I think I am going to do both. . . After all it is only time. . .

Joe

Commentary - What does your hobby cost?

Many years ago, I got pretty tight with RC boating. What a load of fun that was. RC race boats are loud, fast and exciting, not to mention dangerous, propellers turning 20,000 RPM will cut about anything they touch. Hey Joe Daddy, you lost your brain? This is a train web site, go to the RC Boat forum. OK, OK, I'll get to my point.

Like all hobbies, RC boating can get very expensive, very quickly. I was at the lake, having a great time and a fellow walked up and said "how much do them boats cost, like that red one over there?" "About a thousand to get it into the water", I said. "You gotta be kidding me! Fer that little toy boat? Hell, I only got 9 thousand in my bass boat sitting over there?"

"OK, I said, so, do you drive that new Ford 250 to work too?" "Heck no," he said indignantly, "that truck is special, I only use it for pulling my boat."

You are way ahead of me, you have had a similar experience I am sure. Well, that red-neck did make me do some thinking, later of course, a couple of years later, when I had tired of boats and had already moved on to RC Cars. After a trip to the hobby shop to buy Nitro and a new set of tires for my race car, that 125 bucks kinda got my attention. These were operational costs, you know, something I was going to just wear out quickly and replace again. Fact of the matter was that I could buy or build a full size street rod for about what I was dumping into the RC cars and boats, so that is exactly why I left that hobby.

Model railroading is different, you cannot build a prototype sized railroad for what it costs to build a model railroad. Even a live steam 7 inch gauge will likely run you five figures just for the engine, not counting track and property, and and and.

Someone has decided to label model railroading as the world's greatest hobby. You know, it may just be that. After a year, and I am looking at my self very closely, now, am I still enjoying it as much as I did 9 months ago? Yes and perhaps even more, no, I am sure of it. There is just so much variety, when I get tired of something, I do something else. What has been so perplexing is that some of the areas where I have had the absolute most experience and related skills have been some of the areas most difficult to execute. If you have read my blog entry on frying decoders, you may see what I mean. I have been fixing and repairing computers, and I mean fixing them for 45 years, and yet I have burned up three decoders. Go figure!

I do find myself becoming somewhat more patient, though, especially now that I am doing some scenery work. Paint, glue and plaster has to dry doesn't it?

Have a great day,

Joe Daddy