So, someone got the bright idea that my Dad's Lionel 6017 caboose needed a gold roof and painted it. Great, huh?
Believe it or not, it's possible to remove paint from plastic and metal toys and models, using household items, easily and inexpensively. Whether you're wanting to restore an old Lionel train to what it's supposed to look like or wanting to strip chipped paint off a Matchbox car to prepare it for repainting, it's easy to do.
I'm into O scale and the rest of the world, it usually seems, is not. Dimensions in model railroad books and magazines are almost always sized to HO scale, or even S scale of all things. Of course, after A. C. Gilbert imploded in 1967 and took American Flyer with it, it seemed like the "S" is S scale stood for "scratchbuild," because building it yourself was the only way you were going to get anything, so I guess that's fair.
Here's a cheatsheet you can use to convert measurements from one scale to another.
While almost everyone knows American Flyer and Lionel, and a lot of people have heard of Marx, there was a fourth maker of toy trains in the late 1940s and early 1950s that was much smaller, although very innovative, and today is nearly forgotten: Auburn, Indiana-based American Model Toys.
Its legacy, however, ties into virtually every major producer of O gauge trains in business today.
Toy trains are a funny thing. Vintage Lionel trains are almost a status symbol, and their value has almost taken a mythical quality. Marx, on the other hand, was the working class brand in the 1950s, the company that had something for you no matter how much you had available to spend.
For the most part, today's prices reflect that. Lionels are expensive and Marxes are cheap.
Someone asked (not me specifically) whether it's possible or desirable to run Marx and Lionel trains as part of the same layout, what the caveats are, and how to do it.
It seems to be a pretty dark secret. The answer is, yes it's possible, and yes, it might very well be desirable, but it's possible to run into some pitfalls.
Don't be fooled by the topic I put this in: This has potential implications for any area of manufacturing.
Lionel, the most famous U.S. maker of toy trains and model railroads, has been found guilty of industrial espionage and ordered to pay $40 million to competitor MTH Electric Trains.
What happened? Well, both Lionel and MTH outsource their production. As it turned out, some work that was done for MTH ended up in Lionel designs as well.
The sign said "50% off all items $25 and under. Other items, make offer." I spied a table full of beat-up Marx trains. I picked through them. There were two 3/16 scale tinplate boxcars and cabooses, paired with a Marx Commodore Vanderbilt locomotive, marked as a "set." Price: $79. At least two of the cars were missing wheels and the loco had bad paint. Heaven only knew if it ran. The bundle wasn't worth $20. Likewise for a six-inch bundle. Two common six-inch cars, rusty and one missing a coupler, paired with a locomotive with no wheels or engine or paint--about 90% naked, except for rust--for $65. I'd have been willing to pay $7.
I almost overlooked the three six-inch passenger cars that were almost completely devoid of paint. It's a good thing I didn't.
Needing a place to store my trains, I decided to build some shelves so I could simultaneously store and display them when they're not on the track. I used materials that I had on hand, exclusively. Other materials would have been better, but I didn't have them.
I built the shelves on the front of my table. That space is otherwise unused, and four feet of shelf can hold five or six train cars.
I keep seeing listings on eBay in the O gauge model railroading section for something called "Homies," which the slimy salespeople say are the hottest thing in model railroading.
Yeah, whatever. I found some. I bought some. Here's what I think of them.
