Ship models

Model railroading is my hobby. And I am fascinated by boats and ships, too. So why not combine it?
Here is the result - a harbour diorama. It is a little scenery with a common freight ship, as it can be seen here in Germany everywhere along the river Rhine. The freight ship, as shown in the pictures, is a very simple construction, made from balsa wood and a simple computer graphic, printed on paper. A quick and easy "do-it-yourself" idea.
If you are interested, visit my website (see the link below in the "link" section) for more information (in German language) and more pictures. You will find there the construction manual and the PDF files for print. The downloads are free for your private hobby.

The picture above shows it - I preferred a "modern" era. But sailingboats and railroad modeling would be a nice combination, too! Of course, this is more specific, because the "classic" sailingship epoch is a pre railroad-era. Nevertheless, in the middle of the 19th century (the steam engine era) up to the beginning of the 20th century both did exist. Or just take a modern sailing yacht....

Coming back to my little scenery: The idea was to create a complete diorama with function, not just a single ship model. All placed on tiny 80 cm x 40 cm - this harbour fits the size of bookshelves!
So this is not a model railroad layout - it´s a micro layout, with a trackplan that provides a lot of possibilities for shunting on the pier with 1 locomotive and 2 or 3 wagons.

With some slight modifikations of my basic model kit this freight ship becomes a tanker! The pdf print files also give a tankship version.
Generally, a harbour is always a good theme for model railroading: different industry buildings or ship types are a good background for interesting shunting tasks. So I created several harbour layouts in N-scale, as you can see.....

Many ship modelers are interested in warships. Especially WW 1 and WW 2 are the classical era of the huge battleships. Could give a lot of inspiration for a railroad model layout, too. But most construction kits will not fit the N gauge. So do-it-yourself is necessary...