An observation about switching

Speaking as a railfan. I'm lucky.
Lucky that my office overlooks a small rail served industrial park and every afternoon a train of varying lengths pulls into the yard and cars are spotted to the industries hereabouts.
Now, apart from the fact that this could be a highly desirable prototype to model for a future layout. (Let's not go there just yet.) I get a daily opportunity to watch switching operations and see how trains really run at slow speeds.
From my office window they run smoothly. No bumping and banging and bouncing over sagging track. From here, no more than 50 yards away everything looks perfect. I know it isn't of course because I've stood down there and heard the bumping and banging and seen the bouncing.
From here it looks just as smooth as the Z scale GP35 did running on my layout from about a foot away.
Now in HO scale and upwards I know modellers can go to great pains to recreate the bumps and bounces of older track. Whereas it is very clear that in Z scale you don't need to bother even if you plan on viewing your model even from as close as your eyes can stand.

Next steps

Where to from here with my Z scale adventures?
I have to admit I was definitely on a bit of a high after the show the layout had run so well. Especially as a "well meaning" N scaler went to great pains to tell me that the Micro Trains GP35 was noted for overheating and could melt the body of the loco. Well matey boy, it didn't. It ran faultlessly for six hours and never felt warm.
The next steps then. Well, I've ordered a couple of kits. A Z track craftsman kit of a centrebeam lumber car. The prototype is a car I see a lot of when I'm out lineside watching trains. They are a pretty distinctive prototype and the kit is not unreasonably priced. When finished, it will add more interest to the freight train as it runs around the layout.

Then for a bit of fun I ordered a pack of these, picnic tables from rslaser.

Fun? Yes. they'll be pretty small. Just how small I don't know. Knowing how small I'll be able to work in Z will help me decide just what I can do. When I get some of these built I'll add a picnic site to the layout for a little visual feature.

What else?

In a few weeks I'm off back up to the Knife River locale again. I'll be running Grandmas Marathon again. The old depot at Knife River still exists to the best of my knowledge so I plan to pay it a visit, photograph it and then construct a model of that and site it on the curve at the front right where there is plenty of space to fit it in.

Another item of rolling stock would be nice. The American Z lines Budd RDC-2 perhaps, to provide a passenger service to the new depot. It's not exactly the same as the RDC-3 that the DMIR used but would be near enough for me I think.

Should be enough to keep me going for a while I think. When I get those projects done I think I'll be well on the way to deciding what I can achieve in Z.

"One instinctively knows when something is right"

Dredged up from my memory is that tagline from an old TV ad for Croft Original Sherry. It came to mind whist I was watching the train circle around the layout at the Granite City train show on Saturday.

Z scale is right. Well, right for me anyway. Right.

What on earth does that mean?

All proponents of whatever scale they practice claim that their scale is "right" some even go so far as to claim their scale is perfect, citing all kinds of reasons and theories. For them, maybe their chosen scale is right. Some folks won't even consider that other scales have anything going for them.

All I know is I got a definite feeling that Z scale was right. It's not a feeling I've ever had with T scale (I like T scale for the reactions of the viewing public more than what I do with it)

As much as I like HO scale and as productive a modeller I am in the scale, Z feels different. I can't describe it.

In fact there's only one other scale that I've had this "rightness" feeling for and that's Gn15. You can't get more different than Z scale standard gauge than large scale narrow gauge. But both have tapped into certain attitudes to my modelling and my abilities to carry these attitudes out to a standard that I'm happy with. I'm not saying it leads to perfect modelling. Far from it. It's modelling that I'm happy with. I have several layouts in unfinished states because I didn't get that right feeling from the scale. Now with Z I've got it again, which is good, because it means I'll carry on and perhaps build "that layout", the one I've been trying to build all my life.