The Scent Of Ozone...

Cont...

So why, you may ask, is an HO modeler of some 58 years (and "serious" since the early 1970s) that currently has a 20' x 16' out-building housing a 100% functional HO/DCC w/Sound layout, deciding to also return to 3-rail?

That's a good question.

If you noticed in my previous post above, I actually was quite into 3-rail during the 1990s as an adjunct to my primary interest of HO scale modeling. Though at the time I had an elaborate HO scale layout, I had no 3-rail layout. What I did happen to have was a growing collection of 3-rail equipment. Along the way I also acquired track, tons of it. Brand new "O gauge" tubular track purchased by the case, and excellent condition 022 switches, too. However, I had no permanent place to run such equipment.

Instead, I scratched my 3-rail itch by using a two wheel dolly to transport my stacks of storage boxes (engines and rolling stock) as well as cases of track, and on a Thursday evening, I would make several trips to/from the house across the paved parking lot of the church I pastored at the time, to our "Fellowship Hall". (That contained an unobstructed 35' x 50' or so of carpeted seating/table area.) Therein I would set up portable tables, pushing them together, and assemble a track layout. Lockons and jumper wires would serve as simplistic wiring. Upon that I would run trains for a couple/three evenings, running diesels or swapping out steam engines, same with the rolling stock. Often times, I would invite an O gauge 2-rail friend over that also had a past history and appreciation for 3-rail, to join in on the fun and we'd run my trains a couple evenings before I broke it down, packed it up, and back over to the house for storage until the next month or so for another night of 3-rail trains.

This was modus operandi until early 1998, when the opportunity to own our own home appeared. (Up to that time, our housing had been part of the pastoral packages provided by the churches I pastored.) The deal was extremely attractive, but the bank wanted a significant amount of "front" money to secure the deal. I didn't have a large bank account, but what I DID have was trains... lots of them.

SO, they went to market. I sold as much of my 3-rail as I could. (In the end I only had a couple pieces of rolling stock.) I raised about $6000-$7000 dollars in train sales, essentially liquidating my 3-rail and surplus HO in the process. (In fact, just about ANYTHING I could sell. Except the wife and daughter. I decided to keep them. )

It paid off in spades, and the wife and I still live in that house we purchased (paid off long ago), and intend to continue to do so until assisted living may be required.

So, that was it for my 3-rail affliction until the early 2000's during The Great Scale Experiments when I dabbled in several different scales and themes on a small around-the-walls layout in this small computer room that I'm currently sitting in while typing this installment.

One of my more promising scales/themes was 3-rail. What I learned was with 3-rail, a small area can be quite effective when using traditional equipment. I also learned that by going to a "City" setting, cramped, track-filled scenes would much more acceptable to my eyes. (As opposed to trying to cram spacious mountain railroading into such a small room, a theme that most of my non-3-rail scales had reflected for the previous 20-30 years.) I settled on GarGraves track and switches, and that choice went even further to enhance the impact of the traditional trains. (They looked really good on it.)

In all, 3-rail was working for me. I had a "Kansas City" theme and was collecting equipment for KC roads of the 1950s/60s. I know I've shared the following picture many times before here at OGR, but it's about the best surviving picture of my KC Lines 3-rail experimental layout, and at least it illustrates where I was heading with my 3-rail:

Like I said, it was working. The traditional trains said to my mind: "You're playing with toy trains so don't take this too seriously", so my mind accepted the center rail as simply part of the toy train scene. Plus, the "Phantom" center rail of the GarGraves track system minimized the center rail (see above pic!), and over all, the visual impact of the traditional trains upon GarGraves "Phantom" track was quite pleasing to my eyes.

Then I made a fateful decision: I started migrating toward "Hi-Rail".

Big mistake for me. As soon as the scale equipment started appearing, all of my scale "givens n' druthers" kicked in: I wanted ALL the equipment to be scale, I wanted the engines to run as smooth and as slowly as my quality HO stuff had performed... and as I tried to migrate toward that goal something reared its head that I didn't anticipate: That center rail stuck out like a sore thumb to my eyes, as well as the deep flanges, large couplers, etc.

Then it hit me: IF I'm going to do "scale", I can't do it with 3 rails. So that was that. I went back to 2 rail scale modeling, sold off what 3-rail I had acquired, and aside from one minor 3-rail collecting spree several years ago, 3-rail was no longer on my radar.

But that was going to change.