laming posted:Doug-Sr posted:Any one who wants s gauge,there is more out there we can afford to buy finding it is easy , i hope they will still make it,but if they don't good used s gauge will always be out there to buy
Well... must depend on one's S persuasion. I was into the scale side of S when I tried to do S scale. I most certainly did not find things plentiful. I looked for several years to find even ONE of these:
And it wasn't CHEAP once I did find one. Finding enough of the above to even represent a couple/three of the Kansas City Terminal's S-2's was out of the question.
Then there was the issue of lack of variety, but no need to go there.
S scale really is a great size. It is such a shame that it has never really taken off, and that is has received the shaft over and over again.
Andre
That was my experience as well Andre.
If you are interested in the scale side of S you better like frustration and be willing to pay for it. If you are lucky enough that what you want was actually been made then you will have to #1 Find someone with one that wants to sell it and #2 pay whatever they want for it.
Example: GP30's are my favorite diesel. Greenbrier made them in brass in S scale. I paid $750 for an unpainted model with no electronics, no lights, and no sound. To get all of that done and painted puts the total at around $1500 for that engine. In HO I purchased a Walthers Proto GP30 which is better detailed than the Greenbrier was and it was already painted with lights. I installed a $125 DCC decoder and speaker and all in I paid about $250. Did I mention that the HO model runs better and quieter AND I didn't have to go on some grand search to find it in someone's collection and pry it from their fingers?
How about a second example? Omnicon S PRR K4 - unpainted bought from brasstrains. Paid $850 it got to me and had fallen apart during shipping. I sent it back. Vs. Bachmann Spectrum HO PRR K4 - $250 with DCC/Sound (TCS) runs like a Swiss watch and sounds great.
S is the best scale that will never be for me. I wish it would get better, but with Lionel and MTH behaving the way they are I'm pretty sure the best days are behind us.