Page 15 - NMRA Roundhouse January-February 2020

Back2Basics
PART 18 – Narrow Gauge Modelling in HO Scale
Section I – Getting Started
By Mick Moignard
Introduction
Narrow Gauge modelling comes in many flavours, just as modelling standard gauge does. Modelling in HO scale, but on narrow gauge offers many attractions, not the least being that all the regular HO scale scenic items such as buildings, road vehicles and people are exactly the same. What’s different is the track gauge and the size of the equipment.
Narrow gauge railways the world over can be classified into several groups. Firstly, there are the small factory-based plant systems that provided internal transport within the facility and its immediate environment, such as a quarry railway. Modelling these is very common in the UK 009 modelling scene. Next larger were the railways that were built primarily to move the output of a quarry or other extractive industry to a port or railhead. The Talyllyn Railway in Wales and the Monson in Maine are examples of these, both being slate railways, in 27 inch and 24 inch gauge respectively. These single-purpose railways were in some cases very extensive, such as the logging railways in the western and southern USA and the sugar cane railways in Cuba. Most of these extraction railways, where built as narrow gauge, were 3 foot gauge. There was one oddity in California, the Kimshew line which was built in a very odd, for California, gauge of 3’ 3 3/4” inch – a gauge of course better known in Europe as meter gauge. There were a few others in the north-west built in 42 inch (3’6”) as they used cast-off steam street railway equipment as towns either abandoned such street railways or converted them to electric tramways.
Photo: Part of the HOn3 modular set up at the Derby Convention 2018 (Mike Arnold)
Lastly, there are common carrier railways. These are the ones that carry, in most cases, both freight and passenger, and which are obliged to carry any freight offered to them – the common carrier obligation. Such railways tended to have a larger variety of rolling stock than the single purpose extraction railways, and that in itself may well be an added modelling attraction. The Denver & Rio Grande Western’s narrow gauge operations, lasting until 1968, is a classic example. But many of the west’s early railroads were built in 3’ gauge as a way to get them up and running quickly, and later converted to standard gauge, so there is the choice is to model one of these early roads before conversion. The Maine two- footers are another example of narrow gauge common carriers,
with the largest of them, the Sandy River system extending for well over 100 miles north of Farmington, Maine.
What to model?
The first choice is to decide what you want to model, be it a plant railway, logging or mining line, or a common carrier, and in what gauge. There is a number of factors here that you’ll want to consider, just as with any new modelling project.
Photo: DRGW #476, a reworked Westside brass K-28 locomotive on a passenger train of Key Imports and PSC brass coaches. (Mick Moignard)
First is the one of space. Narrow gauge modelling makes good use of space, because equipment is smaller and shorter, will go round smaller radius curves, and look better while doing it than does standard gauge items. There’s also the time question; a smaller layout will, in most cases, take less time to get operational and then to complete.
Photo: Peter Smith’s HOn30 layout “Cariboo Lumber and Stone” as seen at the Derby Convention in 2015, demonstrating that you do not need unlimited space to model something. (Mike Arnold)
Second is what attracts you. Do you want to see the trains run, or are you more interested in the construction and modelling aspects of building a railroad? In particular, do you want to leverage ready to run locomotives and rolling stock, or are you happy to build and rebuild kits, older brass locomotives, or scratchbuild? That last choice gives the most flexibility, but at the expense of time and the requirement of those skills.
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