Menards Suggestion... or two.

KOOLjock1 posted:

My suggestion for Menards is simple: with all the wonderful buildings you've tooled, how difficult would it be to tool a catenary system?  It doesn't have to be an operational system...  ...snip... Jon

I would not want Menard's to waste the time and resources to produce a cat system that was not fully functional.

I agree with Dave.  It can't be that much harder to make it functional.  The hardest part might be to choose which system to approximate in modeling.

Chuck

Except for buildings, it seems like everything from molds for Menards was once made by someone else before.

Menards is also a Midwest company, while catenary and the New Haven are a Far East/north east thing.

PRR1950 posted:

I agree with Dave.  It can't be that much harder to make it functional. 

Chuck

I'd think it would be much harder to make a fully functional system. Some who have put together their own systems have posted in the past about the difficulties (and continued maintenance) in designing and running an operating catenary system.

Power and wiring hookups and insulation design and contruction, installation techniques to ensure consistent engine connections (including at switchpoints and curves), etc. etc. -- many complications in designing and producing a fully functional system, and also an installation and operational challenge, especially for an average operator. The cost certainly would be much higher as well. Also, this is something that would have to be designed and built from scratch - there are no existing models or designs to pattern this after. Then there's the issue of wiring (or hooking up) internal power connections in the engines. 

I just don't see there's any way Menards could design and build a fully functional, and easily installed and reliably operating catenary system, for a reasonable cost.