Is Z scale moving more towards the big, permanent layout model, the Z-Bend Track modular route or the smaller desktop layout approach? Maybe it’s just my own need to categorize things and Z scale is actually growing on all fronts. I don’t know how popular it would be but I’ve again been thinking about a [...]
I hated doing it, but the Milwaukee Road layout had to go. I never like giving up on a piece as I did earlier today and the short version is there was an issue with the track itself. On most layouts, these smaller desktop layouts included, I always add just a touch of superelevation, or [...]
In the previous turnout article, we showed the very basics of attaching our turnout stock rails to the ties. In this article, we’ll take a look at our turnout in its near complete form and we’ll also point out a few mistakes we made so you can avoid making them too. This is less of [...]
This weekend I began working on the turnouts for the Waterfront Project using the #8 Fast Tracks turnout fixture and Code 55 unweathered rail, a good match for Micro-Trains Line flex track. I had always referred to these Fast Tracks tools incorrectly as jigs. A quick definition of jigs vs. fixtures: a jig is a [...]
Latest Issue: March 2013 Issue Trainini Magazine is a German language, monthly Z scale magazine in PDF format and it’s free! Hard to beat that. Each issue link will open in a new window for easy reading. Don’t worry if you don’t read German (but good for you if you do!) as the photos tell [...]
Thanks to Digitrax for supplying Ztrains with the following release and images. The Digitrax DZ123Z0 is a 1 amp DCC board replacement mobile decoder. It is designed to easily replace the light board for solder free installation in an American Z Line GP-30 and GP38-2. It can also be used with the Budd RDC, which [...]
As I began working again on our Red Rock desktop layout, I was looking through lots of online photos from iconic areas in the US such as Sedona, Arizona and the Colorado Plateau. These are such beautiful areas; I wanted to try to bring a bit more of this feel to our desktop layout. Building [...]
This month we’re back to our scenes, starting with the Milwaukee Road desktop layout. In the last installment, we showed the basic foam shape covered in latex paste. It’s always a process to go from that very basic shape to fine tuning the carving of the scene with areas being reworked several times in some [...]
This material is a supplement to the Westphalian-Eisenbahn GmbH (WLE) article and track plan in the January | February 2013 issue of Ztrack Magazine. Recently I was talking with Rob Kluz of Ztrack Magazine about a railroad webcam in Germany featuring a crossing on the Westphalian-Eisenbahn GmbH (WLE) in Lippstadt, Germany. Rob decided to write [...]
I came across some photos recently on TrainBoard in the HO section and enjoyed these images so much I contacted the model builder, Michael Cawdrey of Brisbane, Australia, and asked if he’d write an article for us here at Ztrains. I was really taken with Michael’s groundwork but what I didn’t know at the time [...]
If you’re building a small switching layout or a full modular model railroad layout, it just makes sense to build it on a high quality foundation.
As I responded to an online comment today here at Ztrains.com, I noticed our recent Marklin article was actually our 100th article since we went live with this Ztrains.com redesign in 2011. This means we’re averaging an article per week, and while I don’t think we’ll be challenging Stephen King anytime soon for the most [...]
There are of lots of reasons I like Z scale of course: the quality of the trains, the 1:220 size itself and not to be overlooked are the Z scale manufacturers and their constant desire to push the details. Here’s a great example of a manufacturer really putting their backs in to an upcoming release, [...]
An overstatement for sure, but is model railroading in any scale supposed to be dead easy? It’s not that I want model railroading to be unnecessarily difficult or complex for the sake of it but there’s an old saying that goes, you get out of something what you put into it. I realize if we’re [...]
It’s been a busy start to 2013 here at Ztrains.com, working on our own projects and websites as well as work for both Ztrack Magazine’s and American Z Line’s websites. It’s good to be busy but more important for Z scale; it’s good to see so much activity from these companies. All this activity means [...]
With the New Year recently begun, many of us are now making good attempts at keeping our resolutions intact, always a tough thing to do a few weeks beyond the January 1 mark. I tried a new approach to my New Year resolutions for 2013 though; I began about 6 weeks early, in November 2012, [...]
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