Hello: Newbie here...question at the end

brentagade

New Member
What's up? :wave: I haven't really gotten into the "train" thing for a long time, since I was younger. My dad had decent amount of HO accessories. One year for Christmas, my parents bought me a "Transformers" set up in HO scale. It was pretty cool. We did the HO thing every year for Christmas for awhile. Then one year, dad got me a "Lionel" Passenger train set. Actually had that up out of season for awhile until the loco broke....and that was all she wrote. My dad ended up giving most of the HO stuff to my uncle b/c he had younger kids...and we're talking late 80s, early 90s.

Anyway, next time I go home to visit I was thinking about digging to see if I could find anything...and then eventually start collecting. What I was wondering if anyone had any opinions on "O" gauge versus "HO"....Also, I always kinda liked the switchyard type setup. I had one of those tracks that would decouple the cars by use of an electric magnet for my Lionel. Does HO make a similar setup for decoupling?

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Thanx
Brent
 

shaygetz

Active Member
Welcome to The Gauge :wave:

While I love the heft of O scale, without long green and lots of real estate it would be an impractical scale, save for On30---basically O scale equipment built to run on HO scale track.

As for electro-magnetic uncoupling, Kadee makes a commercial model for HO but it's fairly easy to makes your own as well.
 

60103

Pooh Bah
You don't even need an electromagnet. Kadee makes a permanent magnet uncoupler, but it has the problem that if your train jerks a little going over it, it uncouples. Generally use electromagnets on main line and permanent on sidings.

O vs HO (vs N vs S vs G vs..) everyone has a favourite. A lot depends on personal taste and what you want to achieve. Or how much space you have.
HO has the most stuff you can buy. O has more heft and is more robust if you have youngsters. (Lionel O, that is, not Scale O).
 
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