A Hobby Rediscovered

I'm part of a model train club which has a large HO scale layout about 5 minutes away from my house. I joined it last year after going to a local train show and meeting a bunch of the guys in the club.

Truth be told, N scale my favorite, I love the size and how much you can do with so little space. The local N scale club also had a big display at the train show. I checked out both clubs and finally decided to go with the one closest to my house, the N scale club about 30 minutes away. I also liked the fact the HO club had a permanent, fixed layout, where the N scale club a modular club meeting at a fair ground.

Over the past few months I've slowly come to realize I had become down on my club. It seemed we spent more time messing around with building repairs and mowing the lawn that we did running trains or making improvements to the layout. I eventually saw this as partly my own doing. I like building type stuff and had all too willingly taken on a bunch of projects. It also hit me that I originally joined the club as an opportunity to hang out with folks and have fun, not to add more projects to my life. With this in mind the past few weeks I've focused on finishing, or at least winding down the projects I started and not adding any more for now. A couple weekends ago we had our semi-annual open house. For the first time we made it a two day event on Sat. and Sun. I dreaded it, as it meant a whole weekend away from getting stuff done around the house, which as my faithful readers know, something I'm very keen on putting behind me.

The Thursday before the big weekend I noted our Vice-President becoming frustrated since no one giving him solid commitments. It hit me that as a member I should step up to the plate and I reminded myself the open house only twice a year. I said I'd come for sure on Sat. and left Sun. open if he needed me.

Sat. rolled around and I had a blast. Ran lots of trains, met a bunch of people, couldn't believe the time went by so quick. That night, full of energy, I got busy getting two of the locomotives I had bought a few months before into running shape so I could pull a train of my own instead of having to borrow someone else's. Sun. I showed up early with both engines in tow and quickly discovered both had problems. I spent a couple hours troubleshooting, making repairs, and come up with one good loco. Just in time to, as we needed to get more trains running for people to see.

The open house reinvigorated my excitement for the hobby and our club. Since the open house I've gotten my other two loco's in running shape, thanks to the guys next door at work showing me how to run the mill so I could shave the weights down a bit. Thanks Pete and Adam!! This past weekend I put together the boxcar kits I had bought. Took forever! About 2 hours per boxcar. Not sure if I want to go the kit route again, seeing how it's only $5 - $7 more to by the car fully assembled and ready to roll. We'll see. Today I stopped at the local hobby shop and invested in a special pair of cutters which should reduce the assembly time by 30 - 45 minutes, should I decide to give another one a try.

In hind site, I wonder if the N scale club actually has the advantage by meeting at the fair grounds and taking the modular route. This way they have no maintenance issues to deal with and each member can focus on his individual modules which doesn't seem as daunting as a big stationary layout. During the summer they get together for big meets and put 10's even 100's of these modules together and run trains all day. Due to the small size of N scale this equates to literally miles of track. Trains with 100 cars not uncommon. Sounds like a blast.


Having said that, I'm content with the club I joined. I'm getting back into the hobby, I've gotten to know a great group of guys who are a pleasure to hang out with; and despite having burned myself out at first, I feel good about helping make some long term improvements to the building which will benefit the club for a long time to come. The N scale guys have graciously kept me on their e-mail list and I've considered picking up a couple N scale loco's down the road so I can do things with them from time to time. For now I need to watch how much I spend and stay focused on the house before taking up any additional pursuits.