>From: Roy Inman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Hey, hey Ed, I have no difficulty deciding what trains I want >to play with, and I consider myself a hi-railer.
Hi Roy......(and any other hi-railers out there)......... I think perhaps I did not make myself totally clear. Mouth engaged before brain -- or something like that. I was trying to say that hi-railers, AS A GROUP OR COMMUNITY, seem to be having difficulty in deciding on exactly what kind of modeling they represent. As we have seen from the ensuing discussion, there is a tremendous variety of efforts all collected under the hi-rail banner. I certainly did not mean to imply that all hi-rail guys are indecisive or do not know what they want. Although, I can see how my statement could have been interpreted that way. In any event, I would like to apologize if anyone was offended. Didn't mean to do that and it was accidental. In addition, I did not mean to suggest that not having a common set of modeling practices was in any way a bad thing. I was just describing what I have seen and the way the world actually is. Not trying to pass judgment at all. The diversity of hi-rail is it's strength. Think of each modeler as being able to do his individual "thing" without worrying about what anyone else is doing. The ultimate in individualism! One hi-rail guy may do nothing more than run AF stuff on Gargraves track and feel that he has marched down the trail far enough toward greater realism. Nothing wrong with that. The next hi-rail guy might want nothing less than semi-superdetailed equipment from SHS on ballasted track with larger-than-scale flanges. Nothing wrong with that either. Both types of modelers will consider themselves hi-railers. And then there are all those guys somewhere in between who are also hi-railers. This is not a bad situation at all because it gives folks the flexibility to do what they want instead of what some rigid set of standards says they "should/must" do. As I see it, that is the glory of hi-rail. Yes, equipment interchange might be problematic at times, but that is a situation that hi-railers are aware of and it doesn't seem to bother them all that much. So is it really a problem? Roy Hoffman talked about creating a definition for the various categories of S so that these confusing matters could be explained to the great unwashed masses. I'd like to think that defining pure AF is easy and defining pure scale is easy. Thus, hi-rail is everything and anything in between the AF and scale extremes. Trying to define exactly what hi-rail is -- or is not -- seems to me to be a very difficult undertaking. Defining the outer boundaries of hi-rail is probably quite feasible. Anyway, there is my 4 cents worth (double anyone else, groan) and also a more clear description of my thoughts regarding hi-rail Again, my apologies to anyone who was upset with my prior statement regarding the decision making abilities of hi-railers. Cheers.....Ed L. To REPLY to the list, use REPLY ALL; to reply to the sender, use REPLY. For those of you on DIGEST mode, all REPLY messages go to the list (remember to edit the SUBJECT of your message). Change message settings, use our CALENDAR or LINKS, view shared files or photos, view the list archives, GO TO http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
