Good skills and good luck. I like the built-up railcar designs.

the much smaller (and saner) proportioned finised and simi-finished pieces in the background are the HOn30 i was slowly converting my N-scale to before the 1/4" to the foot bug bit me. my skills aren't that great. just a lot of imagination and enjoyment. the 18" gauge conversion is motivated by lack of space for what i had started doing when i was living with base and them, before he sold the house. it's inspired mostly by a combination industrial/fieldban/critters, including also the cane trains of pacific islands, (like spontoon, but also oztrailia and kiwiland, philipenes and many many other such places you probably know of) and also like the r.h.& d. over in england and other super narrow gauge railways (to provide mixed common carrier services on these otherwise, usually industrial in plant railways and park trains. the darjeeling, ffestiniog, ediville, and what the maine two footers might have become, are all among my inspirations)

You know? The cab forward prime mover might be one of those machines which would be "So ugly, it's Cute." Is the purple, spear carrying "Signalman" one of your designs?

he's actually off the shelf from the dollar tree or the 99 cent, i forget which. something called an akodemon game i think it is.

the loco design is based loosely on a mash up of feld railway critters, which it basically is, and several cab forward switcher designs i've seen on the web, from far away place with strange sounding names. india, south america, i think possibly, eastern europe, all over. no one prototype in particular. oh there's a couple on the romny hythe and dimechurch which were my main insperation. and while not directly based on any of their actual measurements, generally inspired by their proportions.

there is also, the new little 18" gauge loco, exists as a blender mesh too. somewhat more complete then the physical model, and will likely appear in many future images from the wilds of lananara. along with its rolling stock. oh i forgot to mention there's also a couple of manufacturers over in england who make similar stock and of similar proportions, who's name is on the tip of my tongue, but i can't seem to dredge up from memory right at the moment. there's even a photo or two of a (prototype) coach very similar to the one i'm building here. one of those something and something names. and of course, anything narrow gauge, there's an example of somewhere in switzerland too.