Hobby fatigue

[cteno4]

This old house has held in there just presenting the basics and letting the content shine and hosts are very secondary. They have gotten more into the owners and hosts jumping into doing the work but it’s usually in a way to help educate how to do stuff. But this is on content that is of interest to most. Model rr would be a very niche market. But this is something the streaming environment is allowing outside the major channels/cable. There are a few paid subscription layout streaming channels now.

 

jeff

[roadstar_na6]

4 hours ago, Welshbloke said:

presenting style on Mighty Car Mods

Including very strange scenes with spray cream, loud music and funky lights? 😄

[Kiha66]

5 hours ago, Welshbloke said:

Simple things like "Here's the old loco I picked up for pennies, let's give it a service and see what happens", with the idea being to help the regular questions regarding attic rediscoveries of childhood train sets. Never mind that this 1970s Hornby pannier tank has dimensional flaws and a big flathead screw in one side under the tank, we want to clean it and get it working again because it's fun.

 

Sounds like squid needs to start his own show, mostly about trying to fix ancient micro ace monsters!  😁

[railsquid]

Not sure if three hours of non-stop cursing ("What kind of [redacted] [redacted] son-of-a-[redacted] came up with this [redacted] design?") would be compelling viewing...

[cteno4]

Sure it would be right up there with the usual colorful host. Of course you would also need to throw the engine against the wall a few times and step in it as well. Also maybe do it all naked. It’s about eyeballs and market share!
 

jeff

[Cat]

14 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

Sure it would be right up there with the usual colorful host. Of course you would also need to throw the engine against the wall a few times and step in it as well. Also maybe do it all naked. It’s about eyeballs and market share!
 

jeff

Or just go Toshiro Mifune and do the second half without pants.

[cteno4]

Naw already have a name to play off current reality tv, Naked and a Model Train...

 

jeff

[railsquid]

4 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Sure it would be right up there with the usual colorful host. Of course you would also need to throw the engine against the wall a few times and step in it as well. Also maybe do it all naked. It’s about eyeballs and market share!

 

Aha, I see your plan - you have shares in a mind bleach manufacturer and want to artificially create a global shortage, driving up prices and share value?

 

Meanwhile just taken delivery of another fixer-upper, this time not from MicroAce...

[cteno4]

Squid the loco flipper!

 

jeff

[Welshbloke]

Good news, the new RhB stock is out and has actually cost me less than expected. Now to wait for delivery.

 

As for MCM, a freakin' random cat is quite likely as I have three of them.

[nah00]

On 2/25/2020 at 8:45 PM, railsquid said:

Not sure if three hours of non-stop cursing ("What kind of [redacted] [redacted] son-of-a-[redacted] came up with this [redacted] design?") would be compelling viewing...

 

I mean I tune into that show at least once a week at my workbench, although usually mine is 'I just *bleep* worked on this *bleep* thing last *bleep* and now it has another *bleep* problem?!' or just a steady stream of bleeps as I look for a tiny gear pin on a concrete floor. 

 

James May did quite a good series on DriveTribe about repairing a colleague's old train he got from his dad:

There are 3 episodes altogether and I found it quite interesting. 

[Welshbloke]

I keep acquiring projects which won't really work for a video...

 

Yesterday I wandered into one of the local model shops, came out with a couple of wagons and a battered old outside frame GWR 4-4-0 kit. It's by K's who were a big name in British OO kits in the 60s and 70s, missing the cab roof, bufferbeam, one flycrank and the tender. Hence why it was £5.

 

Today I went to a different shop where the owner builds kits as a sideline. Mentioned my new project, he promptly has a rummage in the store cupboard and produces a box. Containing two complete examples of the same loco and another box with some random parts. "You can have the lot for £20". Oddly enough I went for it. So I now have two complete GWR Bulldog class 4-4-0s in need of restoration and most of the bits to rebuild the first one (the missing crank and a pair of buffers, it'll need a cab roof, bufferbeam and tender).

 

So far I've had signs of life from all three motors and I'm concentrating on the least battered example. I've glued some stray bits back on and it does run, but needs better pickups and more of them as well as attention to sticky tender axles. The other one needs slightly more work, it has a bent running plate and some bent brake gear under the tender, as well as the pickups. The one which started this odyssey will be dealt with after.

 

The snag is that any video would essentially be me poking bits of whitemetal and occasionally saying "Ohh, that's how they did it!"

[Martijn Meerts]

On 2/25/2020 at 6:05 PM, cteno4 said:

we need the reincarnation of Bob Ross making layouts and structures on pbs!

 

I'd pay to see that. You just know it's going to be a double track layout too, a single track would get lonely without friends. It'd also be filled with trees 😉

 

[cteno4]

And a mountain, but no people.

 

jeff

[Welshbloke]

I bought a mountain earlier. Another Busch vac form tunnel for when I'm running Swiss metre gauge on the dining table. They're great for disguising the 150mm radius curves in the Kato plan on the Glacier Express set box which involves the starter set track (basically CV1 plus some extra 248mm straights) and the V5 track pack.

 

This is what I meant by bringing the fun back. The curves are too tight and the tunnels are caricatures (it looks as if they deliberately sent the line that way just to make a hole in the rock, rather than go around it). But get in close with a camera or MK1 eyeball and you have an alpine pass route. I usually add the platform set and some sidings to the basic plan in the interests of not having to handle the stock as often, now I can field four or five RhB trains.

[nah00]

My tunnels look the same way. There's no real reason they would exist the way they do and the mountains on top of them are ridiculously exaggerated but when you look at the tunnel portal straight on and see a train pull into or out of the station it looks fantastic and you don't even notice that the switches start in the tunnel. Also it's my experience that even the smallest tunnel can serve to make any layout look much larger as there's a place where trains 'disappear' momentarily. 

 

On another note I've noticed my enjoyment of the hobby has increased over the past few weeks since I started this thread. Also I've got more work done on my layout and started to tackle the pile of projects that was starting to get a bit high. Overall I feel much better than I did before. 

[cteno4]

1 hour ago, nah00 said:

On another note I've noticed my enjoyment of the hobby has increased over the past few weeks since I started this thread. Also I've got more work done on my layout and started to tackle the pile of projects that was starting to get a bit high. Overall I feel much better than I did before. 

that’s very nice to hear nah! Glad letting it out and changing things some got you in a better place with the hobby and it’s back to bringing you joy! It’s an important lesson for all of us to keep an eye on these things ourselves!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Welshbloke]

Here's what I mean by making it fun again:

 

Some of my Kato RhB stock awaiting the delivery of the Glacier Express Ge 4/4 II and Gourmino restaurant car. Tunnels are Busch prefabricated, as are a few rock formations and a couple of campsites.

 

M in the background isn't really a grumpy cat, but she got the name from doing an excellent impression of Judi Dench glaring at 007.

 

[Tonytramman]

what a great thread, although i'm doing my one day a week in the Office, i just spent an hour reading this!

I miss exhibitions though, the big London one was cancelled a week before it was due and that's where I normally pick up the bits and pieces for the next years projects. Luckily I have done very few of them so am now trying to work through some this year. 

many good words said here about changing things up, for me, I play a little guitar (blues/Jazz/rubbish) have a mountain of WWI biplane kits to finish..

2 O gauge micro layouts

1 OO LONDON TRANSPORT tram depot layout to finish

1 00 SR electric layout to do some actually track laying for, though in my defence track became quite scarce during lockdown even online, suggesting there are some modelers still out there.

I have a few drawers full of 00 steam outline stock which might have to go to be fair.

I rashly got a 009 roco set a few years back which is literally still in its box..

I also have a fairly large collection of railway/tram books covering many subjects.

oh nearly forgot the Japanese tram layout which keeps growing.. not that I still have much of a clue what I am doing on that front.

what else? oh yes started learning Mandarin  Chinese for some bizarre reason which I still cant remember now!

if anything i need some burn out time to rest.. oh and this forum is quite addictive as well.

don't start me on Youtube.

Tony

[cteno4]

Like tires, hobby rotation is good!

 

It’s been a long haul here, but we will get thru this and shows will be back again. Good thing is having multiple hobbies really help in situations like this! I probably could retreat into the basement and spend a decade on all the hobby projects lurking down there!

 

cheers,

 

jeff

[Kiha66]

I've been feeling this a lot lately, especially with my American N scale trains.  The local club has been closed ever since the start of covid, which while the right move is causing a large amount of nasty emails from club members flying around. 

 

It's been nice to try something new with Japanese Ho scale, it's been giving me a nice break from all the negativity that the local modeling scene is currently experiencing.  I put together my recent set of kato HO freight car kits last night, it was surprisingly enjoyable even with a few mistakes on my part..

[Tony Galiani]

Not so much hobby fatigue for me.  More like things in general fatigue!  I have been working on my Kato DD-13 but it is going so slowly because, despite my best intentions, I have run out of energy by the time I want to start working on it.  The DD-13 work I have done so far has been a nice respite from the ongoing pandemic stress - we are sweating out the Fall term and counting the days to the end of the semester hoping to make it without a major crisis.  But the stress is showing.  I find that some things are okay to work on and can be a relief from work but then doing something requiring very precise attention is not so much fun.

Oh well, sooner or later this will all get better.

Cheers,

Tony Galiani

[cteno4]

Hang in there Tony. Do the things/hobbies/joys you need to to adapt and sustain you thru all of this. The trains will always be there and coming back to them later will be a whole new little joy.

 

jeff

[disturbman]

Same here.

I'm having a severe case of work/covid fatigue and the perspective of having to live through another year like this is not making things easier. It has however been pushing me more toward the hobby, when I find a bit of energy, as I have absolutely no headspace to read non-fiction or do research for my non-alimentary work. I also have been spending an inordinate amount of time looking at YAJ...

[Claude_Dreyfus]

10 hours ago, Kiha66 said:

I've been feeling this a lot lately, especially with my American N scale trains.  The local club has been closed ever since the start of covid, which while the right move is causing a large amount of nasty emails from club members flying around. 

That's unfortunate. I know we like our trains, but there has to be wider perspective here. Our club suspended it's meetings back in March. As secretary, I and the other committee members needed to taking into account the fact a number our members are older (our oldest member celebrated his 100th birthday back in June), and some others have underlying health issues and therefore more vulnerable. We try to keep in regular contact via Zoom but it's not the same. I have missed playing trains on the club layouts (I have no provision for H0 DCC running at home, something I will have to address), but we just sit have to sit tight. 

 

I have been busy on my little layout at home, but as it nears completion progress has dropped off... pretty much to a standstill. I'll probably have a break and think about something else for the moment (although I missed the elderberry season this year, so my elderberry wine has been pushed back to next year 😡).