N Scale Rocks!

N scale these days is great. Plenty of choice for motive power and rolling stock, DCC is the norm. Stuff runs pretty smoothly. We are even starting to see sound installations in small N scale units! This is truly amazing considering how N scale was in the past.

Meagre beginnings in N scale

When I first started ins N scale as a 10-year-old, I was living in Australia (where railroads are, well, nothing special). So I didn’t yet have a strong prototype concept that I wanted to emulate. As a young teenager, I subscribed to Model Railroader magazine which had a huge impact on my interest. The articles in MR did a lot of things to expand my railroading interests. They let me know that there was a lot of people, seriously enjoying their railroading, often in a big way (I’d never even seen a basement at that time!)..

It was important for me to know that lots of people were into trains since I knew of no one who was as interested in trains the way I was, let alone interested in the particular aspects of modeling that were taking shape for me. I was very lucky though, my parents always supported me in my hobby allowing me to start a series of layouts most of which were never finished.

It’s really different in the states

In 1989, I joined an American company and was soon in the states for training. I found myself in the local train stores marvelling at all the stuff that was available and the knowledge of the people in those stores. I had been used to a single shelf of Bachmann offerings in what was primarily a bike store (Eagles cycles in Geelong). Around this time, I happened on a my first Kato unit, an SP SD9. My world kind of pivoted at this point! I’d never seen anything like this in N scale. It looked great, ran smooth and was all set up to take Microtrains couplers. That too was amazing. I’d never seen MT’s and from that point on, Rapido couplers were never going to cut it.

I bought the SD9, and SP U30C and a bunch of Microtrains cars. I thought I now own the most important part of my railroad collection! With my eyes now open to these types of possibilities, I had a lot to think about. But, the one thing that was clear now was that N scale was the way to go for sure for me.