Narow gauge scale

You have to remember that narrow gauge is not a gauge, it's a gamut of gauges; so there will be few true scale models or kits for any particular distance between model rails. And since the prototype loading gauge varied considerably for different companies using the same gauge, and even within different parts of a company (eg Penrhyn Quarry system) you will find that a selection of models will look rather odd in comparison with a standard gauge layout. You might do better to think in terms of making most of the stuff yourself, in which case a minimum of

Ken.

On 07/01/2006 21:52, Paul said,

Personally, I model the early '70s Ffestiniog Railway in S4n2, which is

What sort of narrow gauge layout did you have in mind? I find things are very much easier if you pick a real narrow gauge railway, and model that, or at least based on that railway. If you mix Talyllyn stock with FR & VoR stock, for instance, things start looking a bit silly. For the FR, Backwoods Miniatures make some nice kits, as do Mercian Models and Meridian Models. Parkside Dundas do a whole range of various narrow gauge rolling stock. For some "scratch-aid" kits, have a look at Worsley Works. That should all keep you googling for a while!

More usefully, 7mm scale on 16.5mm (or 9mm) gauge track or 4mm scale on 9mm gauge track are the "obvious" choices, as you can use the commercial standard gauge track, wheels, etc.

Having said that, I'm sure there are people who build exact scale

AF (who is still hoping to find a cheap N-gauge 0-4-0 chassis for a 009 model).

This scales at 2 ft 4.3 inches.

This is very close to the Glyn Valley Tramway (2'4.5"). Pretty close to the Talyllyn and Corris railways (2'3") and the Welshpool & Llanfair (2'6").

You don't want a cheap N-gauge 0-4-0 chassis for an 009 model - you want a _quality_ 0-4-0 chassis for an 009 model!!!

The Arnold one is good. The Fleischmann one is good and if you find a cheap and worn one you can replace it with a brand-new one when you figure out why low cost isn't a good idea!

Regards, Greg.P.

In message , Arthur Figgis writes

Quite a few brand new and boxed Kato N-Gauge 0-4-0s on sale on Ebay at the moment. About £15.00 including P&P.

Cheers.

I second that the Fleischmann chassis is good. Many 009 kits were made for the Ibertren 0-4-0 which is out of production (and wasn't that good quality anyway) and with a bit of modification this chassis can be used for many of those kits. If you go down the 009 route it might be worth posing questions on the 009-online Yahoo group.

Stu

In message , Paul writes

Join the Festiniog, Talyllyn, etc. societies. Get you hands dirty with the real thing.

Staying in the vaguely sane scales, because there are so many to choose from:

Others. And the other approach is to pick a set of track/wheel standards which provide useful facilities for your model, and then a scale to suit. Thus one might choose to use OO track/wheels, and then decide on a scale of

- Nigel

In message , Jane Sullivan writes

Best advice yet :0) Most of the larger preserved railways either have, or are associated with groups of model railway fanatics and a number of the preserved railways host club layouts of one sort or another or indeed fund and maintain their own. It's the best of both worlds.

Note!! before anyone baulks at the word 'fanatics' one has to be more than a little enthusiastic to help run and maintain a model railway open to the public every week and in addition work on the larger version, summer and winter. Jane's getting your hands dirty is a vast understatement :0) For example changing sleepers and chairs all day in the pouring rain while working in heavy clay soil can be great fun [not]. A good way to discover aching muscles that you didn't even know that you had.

We are about to go ploughing next weekend. This entails using a loco to pull a trenching plough [two foot down] and feed a cable into the trench along the side of the track. The project is to comms link two signal boxes along two miles of track. I will however get some nice pictures and maybe find the subject worthy of a model. The guy in charge of the operation by the way - the secretary of the NVR model railway group :0)

Cheers.

Nigel,

You missed out on one combination which has a large following worldwide - Sn3, or S scale on H0 track. This gives a pretty accurate representation of 3'6" gauge protoypes as used in a lot of countries, and allows the usage of H0 mechanisms and track (if you're not too worried about sleeper spacing and sizes.

I believe that it is particularly popular in New Zealand and S. Africa. I'm just imagining one of these very large African Garratts in S scale :-)

Jim.

It does. I was keeping things to the GB and Irish prototypes. I have a friend with a fair collection of Sn3 stuff of US prototype. Remarkably decent Ready to Run products at very reasonable prices for the quality.

There is also HOe, which offers nicely detailed and good running models, though at fairly high price-tags for those used to "discounted Hornby" UK pricing.

- Nigel

Isn't it 3 feet? 3 x 5.5mm = 16.5mm which is 100% accurate for the Irish, Isle of Man, Southwold and Rye & Camber railways.

Here in the US, there's a fair sized community doing Sn3, which is 1/64" to the foot scale. Of course it's all US prototypes. But the scale is a good minimum scale for narrow gauge. HO and smaller tend to be rather difficult for narrow gauge, but of course some have managed to work with it.

IIRC, Sn3 uses HO track so loco mechanisms can be rebodied and used.

In message , Christopher A. Lee writes

S is 1/64 scale, which is 3/16" to the foot, or in metric 4.7625 mm. (not 5.5 mm.) to the foot.

Nigel Cliffe wrote: [...]

NB that this is very close for 2-1/2ft (760mm) gauge, scaling out at

In general, there is so much variation in the actual size of n.g. trains that just about any scale/gauge combination will provide a "close enough" stand-in, so you may as well go with the scale that you find easiest to work with, and that gives you the better mechanisms. Thus, O (whether 7mm or 1:48) on 16.5 mm track is what I'd recommend. I'm scratching a freelance flatcar/gondola at the moment, using Bachmann's On30 bogies. Next project will be a Grasse River Logging caboose kit (originally ran on 3ft gauge, but it's a very small car, so it will look just fine on the narrower gauge.)

Of course, if you want exact prototype models, you should follow Nigel and other people's advice, and look for a r.r. that you like and for which a reasonable number of kits and detail parts are available. Two advantages of n.g. in a larger scale are that

a) you'll build a rather simple layout in what will turn out to be a realtively small space; and b) you won't need much rolling stock, buildings, etc, to make it convincing.

HTH

When did it stop being 5.5mm/ft?

OK. I looked at the S-Scale society page and it has been considered

Although somebody (Gem?) once made IOM kits in white metal to 5.5mm and claimed this was S-scale.

In message , Christopher A. Lee writes

It didn't. It never started being 5.5 mm./ft.