Garden railways

The point of using a common standard with the rest of the world is:

1) manufacturers will double their sales. 2) UK modellers can use products from the rest of the world.

Certainly I understand it - you have a scale that is out of step with the rest of the World and a scale that is out of step with your modelling gauges. For the moment you have several main-stream manufacturers supplying your market with non-standard scale models, but they are not British suppliers. As such your entire supply base could disappear overnight.

Hmmm, I buy "Continental Modeller" most months - it's full of UK adverts for all sorts of non-UK models and articles by authors with very English names ... Even the UK magazines with UK themes seem to have plenty of ads for US and European models. You must buy an awful lot of models, Jane!

Regards, Greg.P.

Jane models LBSC???

My main modelling is in O gauge/scale where....

NMRA O-scale works out to 5' prototype gauge.

NMRA track and wheel standards give a max/min envelope where you can end up with situations which simply don't work.

Gauge O Guild fine scale actually fits in the finer end of the NMRA window. American/etc manufacturers make wheels for the coarser end of the NMRA envelope, which have a narrower back-to-back and wider treads so they foul the check and wing rails on Gauge O Guild fine scale turnouts.

They also make turnouts for the coarser end of the NMRA envelope, so that Guild fine scale wheels can drop into the frog gap. This isn't usually a problem for locomotives but rigid wagon can derail when the diagonally opposite wheel rises off the track. Not just plastic but even heavier etched brass kits with white metal fittings.

Peco turnouts are a compromise between Guild fine scale and NMRA.

But since a large part of the world does not use 4' 8 1/2" gauge track for the original track, I think we are a long way off a 'common' standard? Perhaps when countries like Spain and Portugal finally switch, but I doubt that Russian models will be compatible any time soon :)

Hi Lester,

the only Russian models I know of are HO scale and run on HO track. The sets sold a while back with 0-8-0 locos used Piko track. Electrotren (Spain) and Ibertren have used HO track fot their HO models.

Those are no worse than the OO gauge/scale combination.

Ibertren did do 3 rail N gauge some years back.

Greg.P.

Jane is a woman, ladies are still quite rare as either full size or model railway enthusiasts here in the UK in my experience.

But they can do that already, 3.5mm scale (H0) runs on 00/H0 track,

4mm (00) runs on 00/H0 track, were id the problem?!

I can assure you that you DO NOT understand it. :~(

Are you seriously suggesting that because the scales are different manufactures will not make the *individual* body tooling for such models - the internals can and do use the same components - after all the tooling is different to each model anyway so the scale used is irrelevant.

You also seem to fail to understand the reason why there was a difference (3.5mm against 4mm) in the first place, try running a piece of Bern (loading) gauge 3.5mm scale stock through an average British loading gauge bridge/tunnel built to 3.5mm scale, you will soon find that you can't do it, but a bridge/tunnel built to the UK 4mm scale will allow the Bern gauge stock to pass through - this is why track and accessories are marketed as 00/H0 and not 00 *or* H0.

That could happen anyway, regardless of the scale used.

That doesn't mean that they all mix and match their rolling stock, such as having their LMS Black Five pulling 1938 German stock, as I've said, most pick a prototype to model or indeed prototypes (I used to know someone who had both a UK based layout and a German based one.

There are exceptions but they are exceptions and not the rule as you seem to be implying.

They already are compatible (they run on H0 track), what they are not is scale models but that is not an insurmountable problem to the scale modeller, to the box opener/collector or toy market they *are* full compatible though...

:Jerry: wrote: [...]

My aunt was and is a railway enthusiast (strictly steam), but to preserve her sanity in a family of railway freaks, er sorry, fans, (she says) she decided to focus on steam traction engines instead. She has been introduced to well over half the extant examples in the UK, and was thrilled to meet some Canadian ones about 20 years ago when Uncle and Aunt visited us.

Cheers!

In message , ":Jerry:" writes

I refer the honorable gentleman to

In message , ":Jerry:" writes

Please can we stop talking about *scale* models? With every model to whatever scale there are inevitably some compromises, so you can never have a "scale model".

It's just that some people (including myself) who are prepared to work with more compromises than others. What's wrong with that?

Re:

Well done!

I've always prefered full size women! ;-)

Hmmm, I've been reading UK mags since the early 1960s, have numerous UK model friends, relatives still in the UK, have been purchasing models from the Uk since 1963 ...

I'm suggesting that if the most popular scale in the UK was HO rather than OO then manufacturers would sell considerably more UK models.

I'm well aware of the history of different scales.

You're only looking at this from a UK perspective. Try running HO UK models on a European HO layout - the difference in loading gauge is immediately obvious, just as UK prototypes running on European tracks are.

Sure, but if there was a standard scale your chances of supply continuance would be greater.

There have been (small) interchanges of rolling stock since 1835. UK stock went to Europe in 1914-18 and 1939-45. Tours of Royal Scot and Flying Scotsman ... Micheline Railcars. Ongoing exchanges of rolling stock began with the advent of rail-ferries in the early 1920s. Channel tunnel.

I've set my layout in South Germany in 1932 - should I never take an interest in models outside my chosen theme?

Regards, Greg.P.

Huhh, you're saying that scale models are not scale models because they have the wheels set at the wrong spacing??? There goes the whole UK OO model industry! ;-)

Regards, Greg.P.

Don't forget that when the British settled on OO, the Americans had yet another OO standard - 4mm scale on 19mm track gauge.

And that in the early days of British OO, what became called EM (18mm gauge) was once known as OO fine scale.