Bachmann's 2019 Official Thomas and Friends Announcements

Some people are hoping that they release them to the same size as Tomix. I personally hope they don't. The Tomix Thomas range isn't even correctly scaled to Japanese 1:150. They are a lot larger than British N scale trains, which, in reality, they would be slightly smaller, following the numbers. In fact, using sunhuntin's measurements, the small engines (Thomas and Percy) are the same size as my HOn30 scale trains, which would have a noticeable size difference to correctly scaled n scale trains. I am really hoping that they produce them to be either 1:160 or 1:148 scale because those two scales at least look good with each other. I think that they might do 1:148 scale, because, for the HO ranges (1:87), they used the toolings from the Bachmann Mainline and Branchline ranges (both 1:76.1) for everything that did not need to be custom molded for the Thomas theme (Even then, everything else was scaled to 1:76.1 for consistency). An example of where they needed to compromise with this was with the Bachmann Duck. In the Model Series, Duck and Thomas both had the same size of wheels. The Bachmann Duck's wheels are smaller so that he wouldn't have clearance issues based on the NMRA standards. They could easily use the Graham Farish toolings for the 2 Troublesome Trucks, then scale everything else to follow that. I really hope they do this option.

On a completely unrelated note, I believe the Bachmann N Scale Thomas range is my answer to curing the 'Might-As-Well Syndrome.' If the tooling for these models is 1:160 or 1:148, I will do everything I can to support this range. As I will collect these models, I no longer will have need to buy the HO (really OO) scale range, because I won't want to buy all of the characters twice. This also eliminates many of my 'wants' of the regular OO scale stuff. The only one it wouldn't really affect would be the Narrow Gauge models, although, I'm not sure if Bachmann will make more of them. Apparently, Mattel had a lot of issues with the way Bachmann had designed Skarloey and Rheneas by making them accurate to real life and not the show (which is also apparently why Rusty is taking so long to be released). This also will make it easier when I leave for 2 years when Summer 2020 hits. When Bachmann made the Large and Narrow Gauge ranges, they released the initial products in the year they were announced. If the N scale range follows this, I will be able to buy them, leave, and come back when they have only released a couple more models. The nice thing about these is that there is a finite amount of models that I will be able to buy over the coming months: Rusty, Blue Carriage, Red Carriage, and the N Range listed above. Another nice thing is that N scale track isn't completely expensive, so if I do decide to replace the EZ track I currently have, I won't need to spend a lot on track. I really hope this N Scale range turns out to be a good thing.