Well, its that time of the week to sit back with the morning cuppa and have a ponder.
This week brought a surprise visit from the chairman of Cabbage enterprises. It appears that I'm not the only one afflicted by excessive work at the moment. A wide ranging discussion was had covering a variety of topics. I can also reveal that an unnatural interest was shown in GWR broad gauge books. I was also shown some very nice etchings for an Om wagon.
From the wandering brain files this morning, why are their not more small shelf layouts built in the scale? For some odd reason any man (or woman for that matter) that moves to NZ120 seems to automatically think that they need to build a large layout to showcase the scene. I'm as guilty as the next man unfortunately. In England you get guys who happily model on a bit of 3 by 1 from IKEA and construct a small shunting layout, often in less time than it takes to say 'I think I could fit a layout on that'. OK, so its all RTR but they just plunge in with gay abandon to run trains for a couple of months, learn some stuff and move on to the next one. Contrast this with my 10 year project that is Paekakariki (and I'm 3 years in I think....). its going to work out in the end (I think), but there is a lot of water to go under the bridge before that happens, and it is hard to stay focused (and Imust take a trip out today to do some more on the coal yard. must get that wip cracking app, or indeed a phone that runs apps).
Maybe its time for another scale challenge; build a small layout in a year (2013), with a set maximum size etc? Its worked well overseas in slightly larger scales. Maybe for something a bit more left field that I did come across is a 'flexible' layout with removable scenes and a common base. With a standard size scene base everyone could have a go. Maybe small layouts have a hard time getting traction here because they don't look 'New Zealand ' enough (a comment I've heard about the currently stalled 9mm shunting layout in Auckland), or because its not overly easy assembling a collection of rolling stock and a loco to run (though that seems to be getting easier)
To charge off into the other side of the coin ie big layouts I have been thinking about designing larger layouts for operations. It helps to pass the time in meetings of the 'Just why was I invited to this when i have not been on this project for 2 months?'I missed a chance when I was asked 'So, what do you think?' to which the correct reply would have been 'Oh, I was just wondering how to feign my own death so I could escape and go home...'. Anyway, I was trying to work out how to do a 1950's west coast layout featuring a couple of branch lines and a loads in-empties out set up between a port and a coal mine. This very quickly got out of hand, but its left me wondering how much more people want to do in the scale, or if we are happy with a roundy-roundy set up to let the trains run.
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2 comments:
Awesome look at those other sites you link too! Yes, do we tend to think we have to model such a big area, when realistically a small yard or scene could be completed in a short amount of time. Ah...but now I have the base boards I might as well push on with the layout(eventually). Keep the progress going on Piecock. A little at a time, and it will be completed.
Russ
some really nice layouts on those links.I still ponder on a shadowbox type module or two depicting some type of bush tramway. My initial idea was to work on each module of my Picton layout separately, so i would have plenty of variety of jobs and keep the interest up.so far i have 6 modules connected up and none even close to finished. However i certainly am more disciplined than in the past and when time permits i am making progress,as Russ commented, a little at a time .biggest distraction is this jolly internet thingy! Its a great resource, but boy does it create a lot of paralysis analysis.
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