Quote from: charon on August 30, 2014, 11:36:14 PM
Dear Mr. Scarloey,
Please stay on your side of the big pond.
Thank you.
Charon

Too late.
June 82 Landed at Colorado Springs, took the Pike's Peak Cog next morning, slept on some guy's floor, next day headed south by Big Red, saw the old mixed gauge tracks at Alamosa(?) then onto Durango. Rode the train, then hitch-hiked south and east toward Chama. Night fell, camped overnight in a park in Dulce, hitched with an Indian family into Chama but missed the one and only departure by twenty-minutes. Hung out in Chama for three days staying with a guy who worked on the RR in his and his wife's cabin in the hills, rode the train all the way to Antonito and hitch-hiked back. Then onto Silverton for three days, rode the train again and walked some of the old railroad grades north of Silverton, then  hitched to Montrose and saw the Black Canyon, hitched to Grand Junction and rode the RG Zephyr to Denver, Big Red in the night out of Denver to Silver Plume and spent the night on a seat in a passenger cars on the Georgetown Loop. Next day rode the train (No Devil's Gate back then) then hitched north for three days at Granby near the Rocky Mt Nat Park, then hitched to Denver and flight home.

That was when I was young.
So, already been your side of the pond  

Quote from: hminky on August 30, 2014, 11:06:00 PM

Quote from: Skarloey Railway on August 30, 2014, 10:32:41 PM
I just don't understand how people can praise the loco as a great model and then run it on toy-train-set curves.

You just don't know anything about real narrow gauge do you?

That is what narrow gauge is really about, sharp curves, lightly built right of way, etc. just like model railroads.

http://books.google.com/books?id=nJUpAAAAYAAJ&dq=narrow%20gauge&pg=PA1#v=onepage&q&f=true

Harold

Actually, I know a good deal about narrow gauge. A 15" radius curve in 1:48 scale is more severe than anything found even on the Uintah. The severest curve on the Uintah was 66 degrees which scales at 88' radius. At 1:48 88' radius = 1'10" or thereabouts. Therefore this 15" radius is much more severe than even the severest curve on a railroad notorious for its severe curves.

I get that in a model compromises are necessary, but often people are trying to squeeze the maximum amount of track into the smallest area and it ends up looking like a train set.

Incidentally, sharpest curved on the Mt Gretna Railway whose 4-4-0s are the prototype for Bachmann's model were 120' radius. (http://www.steamlocomotive.com/american/?page=mg) which at 1:48 scale is roughly 2'6"

I just don't understand how people can praise the loco as a great model and then run it on toy-train-set curves.

Probably not, and even if it does it will look ridiculous doing it.

There is no single "right" radius. It depends on the equipment you plan to run, what type of layout you are building and how much space you have. And most importantly, what you like the look of.

The recommended by Bachmann minimum radius for most Bachmann On30 stuff is 18 inches, but a few, e.g. the 2-8-0 and the 2-4-4 Forney have recommended minimums of 22 inches. However some people report successful running with less than the recommended minimum. The Porters and Davenports will run well on quite tight curves. Some models of large Colorado etc. prototypes by other manufactures require minimums of 26 inches or so.

Type of layout? narrow gauge "main line" (e.g. major Colorado narrow gauge routes), small "backwoods" operations, industrial (e.g. mining or logging), or something else? For main line type operations many people would say the largest you have space for - even in narrow gauge most real life lines had curves that scale to larger than most modellers use. On the other hand some "backwoods" and industrial lines did have very tight curves, so the minimum for your equipment can look good.


http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/board/index.php?action=printpage;topic=12428.0

If you want 15" radius use the shay, heisler or any or the Porters. They were designed for lightly laid track with sharp curves.

That was mesmerising. Boy, that is a hard job on the mine railway, but the works uniform is great. Thanks for these Fred. They don't  get enough attention.

Quote from: jward on August 24, 2014, 08:37:38 AM
while 4% is steep, the 2 ft radius(24r) curves are not particularly sharp, and are well within the capabilities of these small locomotives.

since my experiences using these same locomotives on 4% and 18r curves is markedly different, I am wondering of there are other issues here such as the use of a lubricant type track cleaning fluid on the rails.

I agree, 2' radius isn't a problem for the loco, but it will increase rolling resistance on whatever it's pulling.

It's pretty clear from Bachmann's products that they see large scale as simply a bigger version of HO: that is, for the most part they're in the business of model railroads and there's been a shift toward more detail and more accuracy from all manufacturers in all scales.

It's pretty clear from your preferences that you see model railways as 'toys', with locos and stock little better than caricatures of the real thing.

Nothing wrong with that, and Bachmann cater for the market in their Li'l Big Haulers and 'Thomas' range. But Bachmann also want to cater for the model railroader in large scale and they've done okay doing it.

I swear some folks expect their model engines to pull house bricks up ladders. 4% is steep. 2' radius is hardly generous.

Aren't they blackened so the look more like the real thing?

I'm not entirely clear why the loss of tractive effort as coal and water are consumed should be such a drawback in the garratt design when in tender engines coal and water are never over the driving wheels. Seems like garratts are being criticised for not always having something that other designs never have.

I suspect the main reason garratts never happened in the US was the technology to produce flexible high pressure steam pipes was slow to develop; thus, by the time garratts really proved themselves the mallet was very well established in the US and any subsequent improvement in locomotive design came through early dieselisation.

Over a million passengers on the WP&Y?

http://www.travelperch.ca/cruise-travel/alaskas-spectacular-white-pass-yukon-route-railway/ makes it 450,000, which is still a hell of a lot.

K-27 with Vauclain cylinders would be an interesting variant.

They are great looking locos. There are a few of them preserved in the UK: this one isn't far off being operational. http://www.whrsoc.org.uk/WHRProject/ng15.htm 

Eight HP films has proved a nice little earner for Olton Hall and if you look at the engine on the cover of the first edition of the first Harry Potter book http://boingboing.net/assets_mt/2011/03/22/harry-potter.jpg I'd say Olton Hall was a massive improvement.

I think it is a little unfair to lay the blame for the inaccurate portrayal of railways wholly on the film makers. Any film set in the SW of England circa 1930-50 is going to be spoilt for choice for appropriate stock and locations, but there are massive gaps in the preservation ranks when it comes to other regions and time periods.

Mind you, I do recall watching a documentary on the building of the Central Pacific that had a shay in one shot.

For whatever reason, despite being a better runner than the 4-6-0, the 2-6-2 was much rarer in the UK post WW1. Ten of the 4-6-0s operated on 4 lines different lines between 1920(ish) and 1950(ish), whereas only one line operated the Baldwin 2-6-2. The Penrhyn Railway, a N Wales slate hauler, bought 3 of them but didn't get much joy out of them. Eventually two were scrapped (I think) and one, named Felin Hen, found its way to Australia where it did good service on a sugar plantation line and ended up in preservation, albeit inoperable. Bizarrely (and I didn't know this till googling), it was then shipped back to France and has since been completely restored and is now running on the Tacot des Lacs http://www.tacot-des-lacs.com/ near Fontainebleau alongside an Alco 2-6-2 and several other US built WW1 locomotives.

http://www.fdelaitre.org/wp2/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Baldwin_1.jpg and looking very smart as well.

http://marc-andre-dubout.org/cf/baguenaude/felin-hen/felin-hen-english.htm has its full history

Both Alco and Baldwin 2-6-2s fared rather better [/pre] post WW1 in France. One of these was brought back to the UK in the 1960s and became Mountaineer on the Ffestiniog Railway.