Scale Craft OO gauge Class H Northern...in motion !

That engine is Massive!  Beautiful looking as well!   Just getting started on my OO journey.  Have a line on a semi scale Lionel Hudson with its cars, a few pieces of the 2 rail Lionel track ( I will probably use Gargraves or On3 flex). But it needs new trucks on the tank car and the Hudson has a broken cowcatcher(can those be found still??)

Carey: Definitely MASSIVE and impressive! Super-nice! THANKS for sharing that unique OO engine!

Hello all thank you for your kind words .

Lionel OO always seems to be available on ebay ... parts and complete items ...  other OO is and always was a but thin on the ground ..but everything is out there ..just a matter of hunting  ..

Cheers Carey 

True....and as Lou Palumbo always states with his tag line, "Keep Searching!"

Yep, the search is always ongoing.  I found a mostly complete 004 set the other day in northern Indiana and today my wife and I made the day trip to go pick it up.  Now to find a few more pieces of track so I have a full loop.   AD

Now, hopefully, you will not have to deal with those pesky 072 curves for the 700 Hudson. The 00 takes up less room.

Yep, I know the reissue O gauge can do 042 if the smaller diameter pilot wheels are installed, but to me that big, beautiful engine needs atleast 054 and larger to look its best.  I found that semi scale OO set and bought it and have located a beautiful full scale set that I plan to purchase as soon as I raise the funds to do so.  I have also ordered a loop of Gargraves track to run my OO on that fits my table space.   That monster Northern is incredible to see run.  I can watch that over and over!     AD

Carey,

Thanks for sharing.  It's really impressive to see and hear it run.  Did you have any good tips for getting one running again?  Or how to tell a pre-war vs. a post-war run?

Chris

Scale Craft is an important part of model train history and they also manufactured O scale engine kits. Their steam locomotives were well made, highly detailed and might have been cast in brass. I believe the owner was from the same family as the founder of the Yellow Pages.

Hello all 

Thank you for your kind words ... ok I'm new the OO world ...but John Ericson   has written the bible about OO gauge ...please click link   and spend a few hours ...there are more branches to this tree then you can count .... very well researched ....  lots of links ..  

http://americanoo.blogspot.com...scale-craft-101.html

Many layers to the Scalecraft tale mostly one guy with a passion for trains burdened with lots of money ...how do you make a small fortune in model trains ..begin with a large fortune ...  

I do have a prewar and post war Class H .. but do not have photos of them here on the computer ... John probably pictures on his blog or next week I can post some ...   prewar motors for OO and Ho were normally 6 - 8 volts   and marginal at best ...   per mag  came in     and post war everything went 12 volt ...  so motors changed   which meant mounting changed  etc etc ..

OO is a fun little world ..but always on the fringe ..peak year 1939 and fell off quickly.... 

In the world you see a lot of Lionel OO ..... they most have had very pushy sales men ... 

Other OO makers mostly offered kits ...so there are a lot of kits , partials  etc out there ...compared to the number of completed "running " models ...from my limited experience ......  

lots of fun OO was offered 1934 -50's ... of course OO is offered in 2 rail ...outside 3rd rail ...and the most common is Lionel's center rail ..here are a few OO examples ...  but look at John's blog site  he is the dean  of OO .... 

here is a link to see Scale Craft's starter set of 1937   running    

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71V2LyL3MM0

Cheers carey 

Yes Lionel was the 1000 pound Gorillia of the Pre and Postwar years in several scales of trains.  They made up their own gauge of trains and had the audaticity of to call it Standard Gauge.  J.L.Cowen was a very astute businessman, with a very aggressive style and advertising dept.  He knew how to "plant" the seed in young boys minds, and reach their fathers who many times had issues connecting with their son's in that era.  Telling them that Lionel brand trains could be that segway to connect man and boy by building a model railway.  From ads in prominant magazines, Lionel's own in house magazine, radio and even TV once that went more mainstream in the USA.  Many companies rode Lionel's coat tails, some bucked the trend and did what they wanted.    Lionel was brazen enough to use Scale Craft models as stand in's for photo shoots while their own line was still being developed.  We still see this today in the Lionel catalogs.  I remember a few years ago, the models for many modern diesels were obviously HO models from MTH and Athearn as Lionel had NOTHING of their own made at printing time.   I have always pondered what the model railroad seen had looked like had Lionel gotten a better foothold in OO, had the war not happened, stopping developement of many things Lionel had in the works for OO.   While HO won the smaller scale battle, it could have been a much different looking postwar era had the OO line been pushed harder/further.  But Lionel had much more competition than those pre war years, the big dog was being challenged and challenged hard.  Once J.L retired, his son and the ones that followed lacked the vision, the harsh business style and the company suffered and fell.   Mr Donnoly's family made their fortune in the printing business and that funded the O and OO lines of trains.  Seldom seen and many times just lumped into pop can flats of HO trains at shows.  Only the astute will picked them out, others assume its a very early and crude HO model that is out of scale and pass it buy.   I have done this in the past before I developed a love for this niche scale.    AD