Howdy, I'm not sure this is deserving of a separate thread, but here goes anyway: This is the utter very beginning of my model railroading "career", so we'll see if it becomes an epic or ends up being a short story, LOL. Today I finally ordered a starter Bachmann On30 train set from St Aubin Trains online. Ordered the D&RGW Passenger set in the "bumblebee" paint scheme: a 2-6-0 Mogul and tender, a combine, and two coaches. The set comes with an oval of track (argh, Bachmann EZ track, but that can be fixed), a power pack, etc. Very basic, but it's a start and will hopefully compel me to finish getting the room ready and consider bench work and track plan. I found the order process from St Aubin to be not real intuitive, but I did figure it out, so I guess anyone can if I can. They don't tell you the amount for shipping at order time, but supposedly it's at their actual cost (ship via UPS). The price for the order (excluding shipping) is $149.99, which I figure ain't bad for a loco/tender plus 3 cars in On30. I haven't settled on a track plan yet, and D&RGW is unlikely to end up being my main emphasis, but at least this is a start. If two or three people find any of this interesting so far I'll be amazed, LOL!
At this point, I'd not be at all concerned about the initial cost. It's the excitement of your first step, which will carry you forward. To keep momentum going, keep dreaming. Don't rush. Take your time. Explore, read, ask questions. There are so many facets of this hobby to enjoy. Researching, planning, construction, etc. Possibly the most important, will be the contacts and friends you establish. Camaraderie. In itself, bringing precious memories. Your order has merely kicked the doors wide open, to endless great possibilities! Adventures await! Boxcab E50
Jim, Good for you. Set up the Bachmann track and enjoy it running for a while, giving it a good break while you do that. I'd like to hear your opinion of how it runs. I was happy with mine but it is 9 years old now so I hope they kept the quality up that they started with. Greg
Jim, I'm glad to hear you got that set ordered. I was also looking at that set myself. It's, by far, the nicest one in the lot. What Boxcab was saying pretty much summed it all up. The initial cost of you first purchase never has any real significance when you compare it to how the purchase makes you feel....just like a kid again. That's the beauty of being a guy...we get to feel like that quite often :shade:. I also made an order not too long ago but it was only for some HO flex track and a few turnouts. I have to be careful where I order my stuff from because I have to pay alot in duty as it crosses the boarder. I ordered a set of darts from an American dart maker and paid half what the darts were worth just in the duty. Turned out to be a very expensive set of darts. If I didn't take my darts so seriously, I would've spent it on train stuff :angry:. Oh well, live and learn. That's beside the point. My point is...what was my point? Oh ya, first order. Good going Jim. You picked a nice loco to model. I think my first one will be a couple of little porters. Haven't decided if they'll be the 0-4-0 or the 0-4-2. Maybe one of each.
The cool thing with these 2-6-0s is that there are alot of dress up kits and detail parts available to make it your own. I too just realized that mine is 7 years old. Eric
Sorry, I may have unintentionally created the impression that I was concerned about the price of that Bachmann set, whereas I really think it's a pretty good deal. St Aubin's at $150 was lower than Toy Train Heaven for the exact same set at $195, and beat the heck out of Bachmann's website for the same set at $295. If all goes well with the St Aubin's experience, I may order another set with freight cars fairly soon. That would be a good jump-start on equipment (after that, one at a time with more emphasis on conversions and kits etc and also some smaller locos). Yeah, I thought so, good to hear that for sure. I'm not gonna rush into it, but I may end up re-doing the entire D&RGW passenger set into my own fictional or freelanced prototype road. I wonder how hard to convert D&RGW bumblebee to V&T? Whew, talk about getting ahead of myself, better let the first set ordered actually get here first, LOL!
Ha Ha, jim. Good to see you going full steam ahead.:thumbs_up: I wouldn't worry about getting to far ahead of yourself because right now it's all enthusiasm. If the money runs out, then just make plans and research. I'm still waiting for my first order as well, but unfortunately, the wife has got me on a very resticting allowance:thumbs_down: and I'm able to only make one order at a time. However, I'm researching my fool head off.:thumbs_up::thumbs_up: Can't go wrong with that. Jim, when you decide on (or sort of decide on) a track plan I wanna hear all about it. You and I are pretty much doing the same thing (in a way) so I feel it's important that we help each other out as far as motivation and ideas. I feel you're on the right track (could be the mainline) and headed for good things. I'm sure you'll keep us all informed. Oh, BTW, this is an epic. You should consider doing what I did. Start a blog about your experiences with the layout progress.
One thing I noticed with the prices you mentioned here Jim, is Bachmann showing as way more expensive. I think there's a reason for this. The bachmann sets you find at StAubins and Toy Train Heaven are good but the ones you find at the Bachmann site are all Spectrum, which I beleive is a higher-end set. You may want to see if the set you ordered is DCC ready as I'm sure all Spectrum sets are. I could be wrong with these thoughts, and if I am, please correct me on this as I don't want to give false information. But this is what I beleive is the main difference between Bachmann's sets and the others.
Hmmm, I was aware of Spectrum vs regular in other scales but it did not even occur to me that there'd be any difference in On30; have to check it out when the set gets here. I'm still okay with the order though, cause I'm a Luddite like JCater - almost for sure going to start out DC instead of DCC.
There are indeed differences in the items produced by Bachmann. Some of their early stuff is NOT DCC ready. These days most is. The real upper end of their "Spectrum" is DCC ready and sound equipt, especially in their new Forney's. Since I am in DC currently I will worry about all the DCC hoopla later. Yep...I am indeed a Luddite when it comes to DCC!! I still want someone to convince me that all of the DCC headaches are worth it in the end...but that is a subject for another forum John
Yep, besides this is going to be my very first layout. I'm planning on it being temporary and largely a test-bed for ideas and gaining hands-on modeling experience. I figure I'll make mistakes no matter how much I think I know or how carefully I plan. And with On30 in a room that's about 11x11 it seems unlikely I'll end up feeling a need to run 6 or 14 trains simultaneously. Keep it simple and go DC for now, that's for me. :teeth:
The Mogul isn't DCC ready but I think most of the other locos are. Here's a website on how to convert it if you want. http://www.pacificcoastairlinerr.com/mogul_dcc/ Eric
Hi Eric! Thanks for that link! I'm not currently planning on doing DCC, but "never say 'never'". Even if/when I change my mind it'll be a while before I could convert, mostly due to cost. However, I got one thing out of a quick look at that site: "Never throw anything away". That's probably a golden rule for narrow gaugers of all scales!
No matter what scale, keep it for possible future use. As soon as you toss it, oops!!! A idea comes up, or a need will arise. mg: Boxcab E50
I finally got around to doing some double-checking on this subject. (Still awaiting arrival of the train set, could be later today maybe). What I'm going by is the product number of 25014, which is the same at all three sites. So unless Bachmann uses the exact same product number for both Spectrum and non-Spectrum items, I'd say I ordered Spectrum. Again, if this is all correct, the St Aubin's price is really really good, IMHO. It's interesting that on the St Aubin site they list a D&RGW freight set as being HO scale (in the On30 only area) with a "more info" text description that specified the set as On30, and a product number (25010 IIRC) that matches Bachmann's site and Toy Train Heaven for On30 stuff. I think St Aubin's site has a couple of typos regarding scale. I'm mentioning this because if the first transaction ends up going well, and subject to further head-scratching, I may decide to stick with D&RGW as the main theme for my layout and therefore order the freight set as well (after contacting St Aubin's to confirm it's On30 and not HO for the freight set). That would sure get me jump-started on equipment, food for thought. Now, if only my order would just get here!
Let's hope that order of yours is actually a Spectrum. If it is, you need to tell me so I know where to place all MY orders.
FINALLY !!! The order got here. Okay Lorne, it is indeed a Spectrum, but this Mogul 2-6-0 from Bachmann is not DCC ready - but as stated earlier it can be converted. This is not currently an issue for me as I intend to go DC indefinitely due to costs. The train set was ordered on 7-17-07 and I could have picked it up yesterday 7-26-07 in my apartment office if I had known it was there (apparently I do have some issues with the UPS driver that has this area, which I think is very unusual for UPS, but I'm in New Mexico). The order was shipped on 7-20-07, so I guess St Aubin's processes the financial transaction on the day of shipping as opposed to the day the order was received. So, 2-1/2 or 3 days between receiving the order and shipping it (St Aubin's) and delay in finding out it had been delivered to my apartment office (UPS, definitely not apt ofc staff) ends up being a wait of 10 days. I don't think that's great, but it's not horrible either, and I did get what I ordered. Cost of the set was US $149.99 plus shipping (and St Aubin's insures it for the value) of $13.14 for a total of $163.13 !!! Since Toy Train Heaven had the same set for $194 and the Bachmann site had it for $295, I'd say this is a really good deal - and I'm very strongly inclined to order the D&RGW freight train set from St Aubin's as well. Sorry for the long rambling post, but I think Lorne will be interested for sure, and who knows, maybe others will be too?
Hey there Jim. Glad to hear it all worked out for you. 10 days isn't too bad. When are we gonna see some pics of the set in action? I'm kinda suprised you didn't do that already. Also, congrats on hitting 100 posts...took ya long enuff . Looking forward to some pics. Show a few pics, will ya! C'MON!!! SHOW ME THE PICS!!! WILL YA HURRY ALREADY?! I'm not gettin' any younger up here.:teeth: ok, take yer time:embarassed:
LOL !!! Well, unless St Aubin's is selling cameras at half price I don't know when I'll get around to posting pics - no camera at all! mg: I never realized till I started on TrainBoard I'd have to become a photographer to be a model railroader, but oh well, resistance is futile, I guess. 100 posts? Didn't even realize it till you pointed it out. So does that mean I'm contributing or just a blabbermouth, or both? Don't answer that! Anyway, setting up in my apartment is not yet feasible, so I took the trainset to my parents house and set up the oval on a table and ran it round and round several times. Result: up and running quick, everything works fine, real glad I got something, real glad I got the D&RGW set in particular, still strongly inclined to add the D&RGW freight set from St Aubin's, and already re-thinking grandiose trackplans. These things are nice and big; and all the paper or computer planning a person can do is still no substitute for "hands on" with the real thing (okay, the real model thing). My idea of a first layout being a temporary test-bed still holds - probably something like a 5x10 peninsula. But now that I actually have a trainset, that first rendition will be very temporary indeed. This On30 stuff just screams out for an around-the-walls sectional shelf layout in my 11x11 apartment room. Still working on it. At least I got something now, I feel like I'm finally started.
Hey Jim. You can still set up a layout in your apartment easily enough. All ya gotta do is make it a module-type setup. Around the walls is the ONLY way to go. By making it modules you can easily move it once you get a bigger place. That's exactly what I plan on doing. The only difference is my "modules" is bigger than the standard. Mine are going to be 3'x6' whereas the modules usually go by around 2'x4' or 2'x6'. This thing about the lack of camera being the reason for no pix....CRAP man. You can draw, can't you? :unsure8ao:
