It's *seriously* time consuming unless you spend an awful lot of money on a complete d item, at which point you may discover that the pleasure is in the building. When my dad retired he wanted to build a 5" scale loco so he got a workshop built, it was a work of art. Lathe, miller, shaper, pillar drill, power saw. One Christmas he and I had a few evenings building a few bits for a little steam engine he had castings for. It went no further, he worked out that there was maybe 10 years at 5 hours a day, every day, to generate a loco and more importantly he was more interested in other stuff, principally gardening and going to Italy, buying a house and making another garden.ah no, other Requirements intervened today - but having dug it out, can fire it tomorrow if that will soothe!
Love the Bassett-Lowke pic. I'd love to have the time & funds to play with large-scale live steam.