[ferroequinologist]

I love your " digression" Simon as it's nice to know your modelling history and yes this is a "collecting" hobby as you say. I have also accumulated many engines (26 live steamers) and heaps of rollingstock over nearly forty years after starting with just one and yes where do I put them all !
You are right about buying secondhand via ebay was better in the past as the majority of my models I have were purchased that way and often I am the third or fourth owner.
I do run to a particular railway theme sometimes mixing things up that never ran together, but the theme is for the same country and scale, rather than a strict prototype region and I still have fun, when guests arrive it's "run-what-ya-brung" regardless of prototype or scale.
My interests are D&RGW 1:20.3, French 1:32 (all regions) local "Puffing Billy narrow gauge 1:19 and Isle of Man narrow gauge 1:20.3 with some one off others thrown in.
The preference for electric and indoor in the German market makes sense to me now and of course their history with Marklin, so good information from all here and I do like this forum as often discussions give good views and expand the conversations.
Russell

 

[Havoc]

Indeed, here is my oldest Märklin electric Gauge 1 train:
...
It is more then 100 years old.
Regards
Fred

Wow! And you brave enough to run it on a lamp bank.

 

[John 842]

From a European perspective, one of many answers to the OP's question is that 2008 more or less coincided with the mid point of the historical trend away from the predominate 10mm:ft. scale to the 1:32 scale as the scale most likely to achieve future acceptance - not least because of it's prototypcal accuracy when modelling standard gauge.

This not only makes for a difficult choice for newcommers to the hobby to decide on which of the many scales to adopt - but makes it even more of a challenge for manufacturers to decide on where their best economic interests lie.

Also there is a small group within the world of gauge 1 who are promoting the wider adoption of finescale standards for wheels and rail which may have the effect of further delay in the wider adoption of the G1MRA 1:32 standards.

This may be why both beginers and manufacturers alike are hesitant to commit precious resources untill the future of scale standardization becomes clearer - which, I'm afraid, may take years ....

 

[fredlub]

From a European perspective, one of many answers to the OP's question is that 2008 more or less coincided with the mid point of the historical trend away from the predominate 10mm:ft. scale to the 1:32 scale as the scale most likely to achieve future acceptance - not least because of it's prototypcal accuracy when modelling standard gauge.

This might be a UK perspective, but certainly not a Continental European perspective. When Märklin re-introduced gauge 1 in 1969 they used 1:32 and almost everyone in continental Europe followed that. As far as I know the only 10 mm:ft (1:30) locomotive was the Wilag S3/6 in the seventies. Further: the British outline ASTERs of the eighties and later were all 1:32.
Regards
Fred

 

[ferroequinologist]

I agree Fred, the 1:30.4 versus 1:32 scale is very much only a British thing and they all get so passionate about it while the rest of the world really is non plussed and view a nice model as a nice model, even if the scale accuracy to gauge is a bit out, and while most of the world follow 1:32 scale for mainline trains they are not against 1:30.4 scale ones.
Personally I have never heard from anyone wanting to get into Gauge 1 (remember Gauge 1 is a track gauge NOT a scale) where the scale was an impediment, actually the fact you have quite a few scales that are accurate to gauge is seen as a plus especially in live steam for small prototypes.
The impediments for newcomers have always been, space for a track, cost and not able to buy , anytime, "off the shelf" for favourite models. Those coming from a model engineer background are more tolerant but those coming from the smaller electric trains find it hard to understand thinking models should be available all the time.
But I have digressed off the original subject so I'll leave it alone now
Russell

 

[Pete Thornton]

The impediments for newcomers have always been, space for a track, cost and not able to buy , anytime, "off the shelf" for favourite models

I'd add another impediment - lack of remote control. In this age, when everything is a whizz-bang battery controlled toy [excavator, drone, race car, etc.,] it is interesting that there are few remote controlled trains. Piko's little diesel seems to be the only one! Bachmann has carried the Aristo pnp torch but still doesn't make/sell a plug-in board with the loco. And don't get me started on DCC . . .

 

[Greg Elmassian]

Well, maybe lack of off the shelf remote control by r/c

You can buy bachman with dcc factory installed. You can add DCC to them easily. There are tons of options in DCC, including wireless throttles, and battery powered.

You can add remote control easily to virtually any Aristo loco, with several options as above.

Adding DCC to USAT locos can be done with my "quick and dirty" method in less time than to open the shell. Again many control options.

I see that the future IS electronics, and there are many "standards-based" options as well as proprietary like Piko, RailPro, BlueRail, G scale graphics, Aristo/Crest/Revolution and there's still Airwire.

i have no problem getting people interested since I DO have the whizz-bang sound systems and remote control.

Greg

 

[du-bousquetaire]

True, Märklin, Bing and a few others did offer gauge one a long time ago, (My first live steamer was a Bing for Basset Lowke GNR Ivatt atlantic) but there was a considerable break in time when they had completly abandonned gauge one since before WW2 and only began producing gauge one again in 1968, I beleive as a response to LGB.

About ten millimeter scale there is the same dilemna in the USA with both 1/29th scale and 1/32 scale, not to mention all the narrow gauge scales running on gauge 1 track. At a steam up last week end some new friend brought in a USA trains stainless steel Santa Fe consist with both a pair of PA1 and E8 and I really would love to have them in 1/32 scale but... There we are folks! Well at least we converted this new guy to live steam (And yes he is younger)!
Here is a photo of that Bing for Basset Lowke atlantic which I owned in 1976 and restored to working order + new paint and lining job, before I traded it for my first Aster a PLM pacific with a collector (it was a LP engine with a pot boiler).

(The present owner is selling it by the way) Cheers, Simon

 

[MoToJoJo]

The hobby like many is simply going away. Collecting comic books, transformers, WW2 stuff.
Kids now have online "build a railroad" games. Think one is called "railroad tycoon". They get to play with others and connect their railroads and ship stuff through cities and towns and actually deliver products.
It sucks, but you can't stop progress. All we can do is enjoy what we have now and post pictures of our setups on here.
I'm 47 and the only tie I have to rail roads was watching westerns with my dad. Other than that I don't see trains.
I have some steam engine Bachmanns almost all Christmas versions. But I did pick up a D&RG W that I intend to build a garden railroad and maybe a garage ceiling railroad for but that's down the road and track is a bit pricey.