Greetings from Malaysia.

[lifehitsharderthanatrain]

Hi Lifehits, what kind of railways would you like to model . . . European, US, Asian??

no idea on that yet.
haven't even gotten started honestly.
the starter set i'm looking at is some eastern germany locomotive?
sure looks cool.
but i think the one that i would like to model would be subjected to the availability.
i've experience the actual locomotive here in my country, never actually saw in G-scale though.
maybe they do exist just i'm too new to be oblivious about it.
probably will try to model that out if i have the chance.

 

[lifehitsharderthanatrain]

Welcome!
Beware, this stuff can become a little addictive. But fun, and keeps us young at heart.

This is the time for 'something festive' but it can be a little out of place at other times of the year?

Do you have younger children, or grand children, who may be interested? - Small loco's for small people, can be fun.
There are kits, with all you need except glue and paint. Most are quite light, so postage will be less of an issue. - These will contain 3D printed parts, so possibly be mindful of summer temperatures, and leaving them sitting in full-sun?
There are laser-cut wooden kits, which possibly need a little more work?

But most of all...
Enjoy!

PhilP.

there's always that younger child in me that i'm trying to please.
that's how we all got involved in this in the first place.

getting married next year.
going into this hobby will mostly leave it as something for my future children.
it's a way to keep they on track and prevent them from being astray into what's bad for them.
been there and i wouldn't want them to be in the same shoes as mine.

i don't really celebrate christmas.
it's a holiday here, but without the snow it's doesn't feel like santa's around.

 

[lifehitsharderthanatrain]

Welcome aboard.

Ebay, as a source has not been mentioned. I've sourced most of my trains from there. Be sure to compare prices though and don't ignore shipping costs, as they are part of the price.

over the years, and far from the "normal" countries of distributions, ebay can be stressy. postage of bought items easily can take more than a month - while the vendor starts nagging for a positive reaction after days. (to name just the most common occurrence)

so i learned to look for professional vendors with a "shop". in private and direct contact, with fixed price and postage, paying with provable money transfers, i had the least problems until now.
a few times, i even got luck, asking those vendors, to shoot me a mail, when they got a specified item in a specified price-class.

but anyhow - patience is the name of the game.

ps: first, who comes to mind, when thinking about problemless buying is Grootspoor in netherlands (saying as content customer)

ebay's good.
bought quite a number of things i can't find in my country from there.

but being totally new.
yea, i can't imagine anyone just straight away buying all of the kits straight away from some online source.
having a local retailer and getting to see, touch and play with the items before buying, isn't that better?
sucks to be me, having only one surviving Piko sole retailer.
i could go visit my neighbouring country singapore that still have a retailer that carry LGB stuffs, but it's a long drive from where i stay.

 

[lifehitsharderthanatrain]

Catawiki and HiBid are also good auction sites.

first time hearing about these sites.
but they don't ship to my country here, do they?
there's other ways of going around that but it's a bit tad troublesome...

only participated in one online auction sale before.
but that's for something rare that i'm looking for.
can you get good bargains in those kind of auction sales?

 

[Northsider]

Just a thought: if you have a Piko stockist locally, do they have a noticeboard you could use to see if there are people in your area who also run large scale trains? It's a sociable pastime, with opportunities for tea and cake as well as running trains.

 

[korm kormsen]

having a local retailer and getting to see, touch and play with the items before buying, isn't that better?

sure it is.
you mention long drives.
my next dedicated toy shop is a 300 miles/500km drive away.
and triple that to the next model railroad shops in argentina or brazil.

over the time you can learn to replace many needed components by other things or by building at home. like powerpacks from PC powerpacks.
and never ever give away or sell your starterpack curves! these sharp curves are the cheapest track, you'll ever get.
track is heavy, so expensive in transport. but it is relative easy to convert the curves into curves of greater radius, or even into straights.
there even are many modellers, that make their own points/switches (better builders, than i am)

today, you can easy have to pay about 8 $ for a foot of used track, while these starterpack curves can be had for 3 or 4 $ per piece/per foot.

it took me only 50 years to get enough stuff together for what i think to "need".
so welcome to a life-time hobby!

 

[pugwash]

being universal does have its perks.
glad there's no propriety elements in the rails.

Oh but there are differences, Most manufacturers use the same code rail but some do not so always check first.

i'm suprised i can't find many manufacturers from china.

You are kidding, right?

 

[Gerard]

Hi there everyone.
I've just started to try to get myself into this hobby.
Haven't really purchased any train models yet though.

From where I'm from, G scale train models seem to be a bit scarce to source.
The only ones that I'm able to come upon are some Piko starter sets from the sole retailer at where I am.
Not sure whether they're good as I can't seem to find much information about those.

So here I am going all over the internet finding as much details about them.
Still in a dilemma whether I should go get it and then start diving deeper into this sport.
The one I'm looking at is the most affordable starter kit with the festive decals, that's why it's difficult for me to make a decision.

Anyways I do enjoy seeing everyone here being so passionate about each other's masterpiece train and track creations.
Keep on rocking and keep on rolling those trains guys!

Hello L from Malaysia,

Welcome in the forum. I'm from Holland and visited Malysia and Singapore in the 70-ties as a young (20y) student and i was in Brunai Serawak. Wonderfull country!
I understand you're a beginner in the Garden Railway scene.
I wrote a book last year, after 7 years starting as a beginner, about my Garden Railway experience together with my friend Rainer, a professional G-scale vendor/builder/repair-shop owner. This is a link to the book on Amazon:

Our Model Garden Railway: A4 Glossy: Schrieck, Mr. Gerard van der, Kleinsteuber, Mr. Rainer: 9798269268170: Amazon.com: Books

Our Model Garden Railway: A4 Glossy [Schrieck, Mr. Gerard van der, Kleinsteuber, Mr. Rainer] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Our Model Garden Railway: A4 Glossy

www.amazon.com

There are three versions: E-book, A5 and A4.
I am sure this book explains a lot and it can help you making the right choices in the beginning !
If you have any questions about the book and/or G-scale issues feel free to mail me.

I wish you many succes!
Gerard (Bart) van der Schrieck
glm@vanderschrieck.nl

 

[dunnyrail]

Thanks for the advice, in fact that's why i'm looking for starter sets in particular.
Though i can't picture how far i would go if i would take this hobby further.
They call me Ray, but Lifehits sounds like a good new nickname.

Hi Ray do not worry about asking questions, we all had to start somewhere.

You can put your name of choice in your Signature Line below. Go to your name too right, Account Details, Preferences then Signature where you can put in names of your choice as I have with other stuff below.

 

[Paul M]

don't mind me if i annoy the forum with ridiculous questions.

No such thing as a silly question, we've all learnt most of what we know by asking questions. And there's usually more than one answer! The problem starts when advice is ignored

 

[lifehitsharderthanatrain]

Just a thought: if you have a Piko stockist locally, do they have a noticeboard you could use to see if there are people in your area who also run large scale trains? It's a sociable pastime, with opportunities for tea and cake as well as running trains.

haven't really been to the shop yet.
only been liaising with the person to get the piko starter set.
having it pre-ordered and probably will be getting on the middle of next month.

the retailer is sort of a mainly airplane model shop.
it's surprising that it's listed as Piko's retailer.
since they only carry some of old Piko's stocks now.

according to the person, dunno if it's true or not; but there's only about 20? G scale train model players in my country here?
or maybe they've only gotten 20+ person to buy Piko G scale train models?

 

[lifehitsharderthanatrain]

You are kidding, right?

so far i've only found;
echo toys?? - it's G scale but i don't think they fit into the train model category. kinda difficult find anyone selling new ones too.
bowande? - they have some G scale but i can't find any starter sets from them.
and there's Newqida? - can't find anyone selling them though...

do you know any others?

 

[lifehitsharderthanatrain]

Hello L from Malaysia,

Welcome in the forum. I'm from Holland and visited Malysia and Singapore in the 70-ties as a young (20y) student and i was in Brunai Serawak. Wonderfull country!
I understand you're a beginner in the Garden Railway scene.
I wrote a book last year, after 7 years starting as a beginner, about my Garden Railway experience together with my friend Rainer, a professional G-scale vendor/builder/repair-shop owner. This is a link to the book on Amazon:

Our Model Garden Railway: A4 Glossy: Schrieck, Mr. Gerard van der, Kleinsteuber, Mr. Rainer: 9798269268170: Amazon.com: Books

Our Model Garden Railway: A4 Glossy [Schrieck, Mr. Gerard van der, Kleinsteuber, Mr. Rainer] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Our Model Garden Railway: A4 Glossy

www.amazon.com

There are three versions: E-book, A5 and A4.
I am sure this book explains a lot and it can help you making the right choices in the beginning !
If you have any questions about the book and/or G-scale issues feel free to mail me.

I wish you many succes!
Gerard (Bart) van der Schrieck
glm@vanderschrieck.nl

Hey there.

i am from the Borneo Island, in the state of Malaysia named Sarawak.
from where i come from, there's no trains or railway there.
they seem to blame the geography for not having one.

looks like a good book.
i'll sure be getting one if i were dive in this hobby.
still struggling the source even my own starter set now.

the G in G-scale stands for Garden??
don't have a garden at where i'm staying.
living in a small apartment to make it worse.

 

[pugwash]

do you know any others?

What I meant was quite a few European marques are made in the PRC.
Other people may knock Newqida but I had some along with 'Train' - see below - that were perfectly good, a lot of people have bought them to convert into other carriages and wagons with success.
There is some disagreement about the 'G' as to whether it means Garden or Groß which is German for large and I suppose other theories exist.