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Where to buy Lionel trains in St. Louis

Dave Farquhar Toy trains September 22, 2017September 12, 2017american flyer, home improvement, lionel, lionel train, Mark Twain, marx, marx trains, o gauge, postwar lionel, Prewar Lionel, Standard Gauge

If you want to know where to buy Lionel trains in St. Louis, you have a lot of choices. It’s more than possible to make a day of train shopping in St. Louis.

I’ve never seen a comprehensive list of shops, so I made my own. If you know of any place I missed, I apologize. Please leave a comment and I will add it.

Dave Farquhar

David Farquhar is a computer security professional, entrepreneur, and author. He has written professionally about computers since 1991, so he was writing about retro computers when they were still new. He has been working in IT professionally since 1994 and has specialized in vulnerability management since 2013. He holds Security+ and CISSP certifications. Today he blogs five times a week, mostly about retro computers and retro gaming covering the time period from 1975 to 2000.

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Scale vs gauge: Not quite interchangeable

Dave Farquhar model railroading, Toy trains August 18, 2017March 3, 20221:64 scale, 1950s, 1960s, 1980s, 1990s, american flyer, HO, ho scale, lionel, Lionel 675, n scale, o gauge, o scale, s scale, Standard Gauge

Wondering about scale vs gauge? You’re not alone. It’s a common question, and I’ll try to provide a simple answer. The two terms may appear interchangeable, but they aren’t quite.

Dave Farquhar

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Why do Lionel trains have three rails?

Dave Farquhar Toy trains August 10, 2017August 5, 20171950s, 1960s, american flyer, electric trains, lionel, Louis Marx, marx, o gauge, Quaker Oats, Standard Gauge

Why do Lionel trains have three rails? After all, real trains usually have two. This unrealistic feature is a legitimate drawback for Lionel and other makes of O gauge trains, but the decision made sense at the time.

Dave Farquhar

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Wire a Marx motor without a reverse unit

Dave Farquhar Toy trains February 19, 2017November 21, 2018e-unit, lionel, marx, o gauge, train show

At the last train show I attended, I bought a Marx locomotive that lacked a reverse unit. I found a mess of wires in its place, and of course it didn’t run. So I had to figure out how to wire a Marx motor without a reverse unit. When I wired it up to run correctly, it surprised me. It ran really nicely.

Dave Farquhar

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Tin buildings for train layouts

Dave Farquhar Toy trains December 27, 2016January 20, 20221980s, 1990s, antique mall, christmas, estate sales, garage sale, garage sales, o gauge, radio shack, tin, train layout

When it comes to trains, I prefer older ones made of tin, rather than plastic. And I like tin buildings too. Any time I open a magazine featuring someone’s train layouts, the buildings all look the same. I want something a little different, so I look for tin buildings to go with my tin trains.

Many companies through the years made food containers with printing on them that look like buildings. The tins tend to be about six inches wide, around 8 inches tall, and two inches deep. They tend to resemble the two-story commercial buildings you used to see in downtowns, with a storefront on the first story and offices or apartments on the second floor.

You can use these tins to put together a very timeless commercial district for your train layout. If you know what to look for, you can find coffee shops, bakeries, candy stores, florists, and plenty of other stores to make your town a nice place to live and work. And the buildings usually aren’t terribly expensive, either.

In this post, I’ll cover buildings made after 1970. For pre-1970 buildings, see Vintage Tin Litho Buildings.

Dave Farquhar

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Vintage tin litho buildings

Dave Farquhar Toy trains December 26, 2016September 15, 20221940s, 1950s, american flyer, Hot Wheels, lionel, o gauge, s scale, tin, toy train, train layout, train show, wyandotte

Years ago, I decided I wanted to take a different approach with my trains. I heard about a guy in Springfield who has a traditional toy train layout with no plastic on it. I wanted to see if I could do something similar.

At the time, information about this approach was rare. So I’ve collected here what I know about tin buildings made prior to 1970 (the approximate end of the postwar era). You won’t find everything you want in pre-1970 buildings, so if you need something more modern to fill in the gaps, see my other post tin buildings for train layouts.

Dave Farquhar

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How to quiet Lionel Fastrack

Dave Farquhar Toy trains December 9, 2016August 30, 2017lionel, Lionel Fastrack, o gauge

The biggest problem with Lionel Fastrack is that it is much louder than tubular and other types of O gauge track. So people frequently ask how to quiet Lionel Fastrack. There are a few things you can do to make Fastrack quieter.

Dave Farquhar

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How to sell Lionel trains

Dave Farquhar Toy trains September 13, 2016April 22, 20171950s, american flyer, HO, ho scale, lionel, lionel train, marx, o gauge, o27, old trains, OO, receipt, Standard Gauge, TCA, video game

Since I’ve covered other makes of trains, someone asked me how to sell Lionel trains. So I thought I would give similar advice on selling Lionel trains. Lionel is an iconic, legendary part of Americana, so there will always be some market for its products.

That said, don’t expect to get rich selling off your Lionel trains. But if you keep your expectations realistic, you’ll find an eager buyer, or ideally, at least two interested buyers so you’ll realize a good price at auction.

Dave Farquhar

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Cost comparison of Realtrax vs Fastrack

Dave Farquhar Toy trains May 27, 2016November 25, 2018lionel, Lionel Fastrack, MTH, o gauge

Someone asked me recently for a cost comparison of MTH Realtrax vs. Lionel Fastrack. Both are similar O gauge track systems with plastic roadbed. MTH’s system has been on the market a few years longer, but Lionel’s is more popular, in spite of being more expensive.

Let’s figure out just how much more expensive it is.

Dave Farquhar

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Selling Marx trains

Dave Farquhar Toy trains April 29, 2016January 19, 2023american flyer, collectibles, greenberg, HO, lionel, marx, marx trains, o gauge, o27, old trains, receipt, tin, toy train

Since my advice on selling other makes of trains was popular, I thought I would give similar advice on selling Marx trains. Marx never got the respect that its competitors got, but its trains have built up a following over the years, and in the last decade as I’ve watched prices on competing trains slide, Marx has held its value.

Don’t expect to get rich selling off your Marx trains, but if you keep your expectations realistic, you’ll find an eager buyer, or ideally, at least two interested buyers so you’ll realize a good price at auction.

Dave Farquhar

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