Agreed. To me detailing in N scale is synonymous w/ "jeweler". That is some cool work. Always enjoy seeing N scale work. I remember as a kid I had American Flyer stuff we'd set up at Christmas. One of my neighborhood buddies got an HO set and had it on a sheet of plywood he shoved under the bed when not in use. I recall how HUGE that dang HO stuff looked. Now, I model in HO and marvel at the "trickeration" of N. As for "Z", I can't even spell it.
I have been working on trying to build an Northern Pacific North Coast Limited, but am having trouble coming up with locomotives and passenger cars. I probably have the locomotive situation covered, but trying to get accurate passenger car models is probably impossible unless you go to high dollar $$$$ brass. I had a Athearn Genisis F-7 in the Lowey paint scheme and then acquired a Stewart F-3 in the Lowey paint scheme, ALMOST. The Stewart locomotive was lacking road numbers and a lot of details. The dark green was also not correct, so the F=3 was repainted, and some details such as the winterization hatch, 5 chime horn, hand rails and other details were added. The Stewart locomotive is on the left. The North Coast Limited was usually powered by an A-B-A locomotive configuration. Needed a B unit, so the hunt was on and Iwas able to locate a Stewart dummy B unit, again lacking road numbers and numerous details. The dark green color was off so the unit was repainted after adding a winterization hatch and a steam generator. I got as far as getting the decals applied and now comes the part I do not like at all, adding the handrails. Finding the correct passenger cars may not be an option, so I have cobbled together this train. I did manage to find a Walthers Dining car, and the rest of the cars are also Walthers. The observation car is not correct, a Riverossi car that looks like a Pennsy or NYC observation car. Here's what it looks like so far. I don't know why I am spending so much time working on a train that wouldn't show up on my layout. I do connect to the NP, but the North Coast Limited would have no business going over my tracks.
The North Coast Limited runs east and west and my freelance railroad which does connect to the NP at Logan, MT runs north to south. I do run an excursion train from Logan, MT south to Yellowstone Park at West Yellowstone, but would not need but a couple of coaches or dome cars.
