SUPER COOL HO Model Train Set-Up....MUST SEE!

SeaBreeze

Endlessly Groovin'
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Here's a very cool HO Model Train set-up with Union Pacific freight and Amtrack passenger trains, must see and hear! :cool:

 

Sweet! You can really lose yourself in your own little world with a layout like that. Lots of time and money to invest, though.

Just as an OCD-type of observation, and having been into HO scale trains for a while - he's got a few anachronisms going on, like vehicles from the '40's and '50's next to Amtraks and late-model diesel engines. He's also running that Amtrak WAY too fast, unless he's making believe he's a drunk engineer on the Hudson line. :p
 
Had a girlfriend (one of too many) whose father was a train engineer and met some of his friends with really fantastic set-ups in their homes. So cool!
 
I tried to use and set up with the N gauge but it is to darn small to work with. You can have a nice layout in a small area if you can stand working with tiny things.

Pappy, did you ever see a "Z"-scale set-up?

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Basically you have to be a watchmaker or brain surgeon to be able to work that scale ...
 
Here's a neat little Z-scale set up from Brazil, all made from scratch. We have a big hobby store by us, and it was always cool to go there and check out the trains, they always had some traveling around the store. Gary Coleman (Different Strokes) enjoyed that as a hobby, and we saw him there one day buying some stuff.


 
The ultimate train set (claimed to be he world's largest) is in Miniatur Wunderland, Hamburg, Germany. This has masive rail, road, sea and air layouts all controlled by an impressive bank of computers. The models are all OO scale and are perfect in every detail. When the vehicles move, their brake lights, direction indicators etc.. all work perfectly. It is the real world in miniature.

Have a look at this ...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACkmg3Y64_s
 
The Great Train Story at Chicago Museum

Some neat photos of the train set ups in this museum, more pictures ...http://www.amusingplanet.com/2012/10/the-great-train-story-at-chicago-museum.html


The Great Train Story is one of the world’s largest HO scale model railroads display located in the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, the US. The 3,500 square foot model depicts the story of modern day rail transportation in a 3,550 km journey from Seattle, Washington through several plains states en route to Chicago, Illinois.

With the help of corporate sponsorship, the museum's objective has been to educate the public to the key role modern rail plays in our everyday world through this working, animated and interactive display that is both highly entertaining, and fascinating. The entertainment value has helped them considerably in achieving this objective by attracting an ongoing, very large draw. In fact, this display has been one of the museum’s most popular since it opened in November, 2002.

The layout features 192 custom models of buildings and landmarks including the Willis Tower, Chicago Board of Trade Building, and Union Station in Chicago; and Seattle’s Space Needle, Experience Music Project and King Street Station.

The landscape between the two cities includes several natural features such as the Cascade range, Rocky Mountains, waterfalls and forests. Man-made highlights include small towns, tunnels, truss arch and truss bridges, a lumber mill, farms, grain silos, a fruit packing house, a coal mine, and a steel mill.


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Train set-ups are big in this area. There are a couple of model railroad clubs here and they hold a convention every year here in our city, which is attended by clubs from all over the world and they present many different set-ups. I get to it about once every five years. I had a friend that built buildings, in scale model, of course, for train layouts that private individuals owned from all over the U.S. He even built a replica of the Chrysler building for a customer.

I had a train layout that my Dad and I put up each year at Christmas time. We had a 4' x 8' sheet of plywood with a roll of fake grass tacked on it and then a box of snow to had effects here and there. Also had a mountain and tunnel and a small village. We ran three trains on it off of two different transformers. One Lionel and two American Flyers. However, this layout on the video tops anything that I ever did and comes close to being the best that I have ever seen. This man definitely loves his trains.

I have also been to Strasburg, PA, which is about 40 minutes from my home and rode the trains there and visited the museum. Strasburg also was the site of parts of the movie, "Witness" with Harrison Ford and Kelly McGillis. It is a true Amish village.
http://www.strasburgrailroad.com/
 
Martini Junction Miniature Railway

Miniature railway. More here.


In the small but densely wooded Needham town forest, outside Boston, lies a secret attraction — a miniature model railway consisting of 120 foot of tracks that wind through the trees and over delicate trestles and small tunnels.

A tiny blue electric locomotive pulls a load of cargo logs over the tracks, while a group of assorted passengers including miniature plastic superheroes, pigs, and dinosaurs wait by the station house.

The model railway, known as the Martini Junction, was created in the early 2000s by Jim Metcalf, a retired design engineer. Jim and his wife, Evelyn, discovered the small wooded retreat near a brook on one of their hikes over a decade ago.

Jim thought that it would a nice place to relax and have a martini. So he built a bench and a table so he and his wife could picnic at the spot. He even created a tiny dam in the brook that led to a small waterfall so that they could enjoy the sounds of the trickling water.

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The picture that shows the Santa Fe diesels in different scales omits 2 popular scales: The Lionel O-Scale 3-Rail (1/48), and the O-Scale 2-Rail (1/48), which is more realistic.

Here's a shot of my O-Scale 2-Rail layout: It's a "High Desert" theme, running 136 feet around three walls of my 20' x 25' Game Room.

HDH
 

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