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The Model Railroader's Guide to Industries Along the Tracks 3
This informative volume explores six rail industries full of modeling possibilities. Readers will learn how to realistically recreate and incorporate industries such as ethanol, cement, canning, and sugar beets into their layouts through prototype photos and modeling suggestions. A history of each industry is also included.
87 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2008
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About the author
Jeff Wilson
138 books6 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
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September 11, 2013
This is another good book for the model railroader trying to research industries associated with the tracks, but like its companions (there are 4 total, two before this and one that comes after) it has a few flaws.
First, the good points. Wilson's writing is accessible and easy to understand. He has lots of good reference photographs of the real railroad industries. And he provides some good verbal suggestions of the way the industries could be modeled. Wilson provides a nice selection of industries. I was particularly glad to see a solid discussion of the "team track," something I have seen referenced on many track plans, but about which I previously knew very little.
Second, the bad points. Probably the main one is that once again, the modeling suggestions are really very vague, and he only provides one or two sample track plans that would involve the industries listed. In several cases he explains that modeling the whole industry on a layout would be prohibitive in terms of space, and that "selective compression" is needed, but he doesn't often provide us with good examples of how one could go about this compression. Additionally, although Wilson provides some example items that can be bought from various manufacturers, he once again writes these in paragraph form, making them hard to access. The very first book provided these in a table at the end of the book, and I still think this was the best format for such a presentation.
Overall, this book makes a good reference tool for how these industries interfaced with railroads in the real world, but as usual, it is short on ideas of how to actually model them.
First, the good points. Wilson's writing is accessible and easy to understand. He has lots of good reference photographs of the real railroad industries. And he provides some good verbal suggestions of the way the industries could be modeled. Wilson provides a nice selection of industries. I was particularly glad to see a solid discussion of the "team track," something I have seen referenced on many track plans, but about which I previously knew very little.
Second, the bad points. Probably the main one is that once again, the modeling suggestions are really very vague, and he only provides one or two sample track plans that would involve the industries listed. In several cases he explains that modeling the whole industry on a layout would be prohibitive in terms of space, and that "selective compression" is needed, but he doesn't often provide us with good examples of how one could go about this compression. Additionally, although Wilson provides some example items that can be bought from various manufacturers, he once again writes these in paragraph form, making them hard to access. The very first book provided these in a table at the end of the book, and I still think this was the best format for such a presentation.
Overall, this book makes a good reference tool for how these industries interfaced with railroads in the real world, but as usual, it is short on ideas of how to actually model them.
Displaying 1 of 1 review