Hi! I have a question about HO scale. I am helping to clear out items from an old hobby store. We came across some HO scale “mini scenes”(as I call them) made by Preiser of Germany. I got a whole bunch of these and took them home to strip out useful parts(i.e. people, etc) for use on a modern layout. The people from these appear to be slightly smaller than currently available HO scale people. These “mini scenes” are at least 40 years old.
Has the HO scale itself changed? Was (is) Preiser HO made different from other manufacturers? I know for example that American O scale is different from European O scale. I’m just curious. Thanks for any help you can give
The answer is a clear “No”! Both in the US and Europe, HO scale is 1/87.1. Preiser figures are to that scale, so you can use them in your future layout.
Could it be that manufacturers have adopted to the length of real people? Some 50 years ago the average male length was under 6 feet. To day it is over 6 feet.
It’s probably not so much the Preiser figures that are not to the proper scale as much as it may be other manufacturers not to proper scale. I have ran into some Bachmann and other brands of figures that look like giants compared to properly scaled people; more like S scale than HO. They may even be marketed as being for both scales they are so far off.
The only thing that’s different is figures, vehicles and structures are now made more to scale. I have structures and such from the 70’s and they are smaller than comparable structures available today. Back then a small neighborhood could packed into a given area more easily than it could today. After all, the trains were the center of attention. Not so today. While the trains still garner their share of the attention the structures too now get more attention from more discriminating modelers.
I have figures from several suppliers, but all sold under Woodland Scenics’ auspices in those little packs hanging on the rotary display in the hobby shops. Some are about 25% larger than others. Generally, I find the figures placed in the cabs of steamers to be the same size as the smallest ones from WS. The largest ones could easily favourably be used in S scale.
Don’t know if it applies to these figures, but I recall some things were made to 1:96 (1/8 inch) scale. There was some arguement made that since architects scales were easier to find than scale rules, it was easier to work in 1/8 inch. And also, like someone mentioned above, it automatically created a selective compression effect. Now we seem to be more in the structures should dwarf the trains perspective and don’t do near as much selective compression.
When I was detailing the insides of my Walthers Superliners, I was placing figures inside and I was using some Woodland Scenics figures. I had to modify them quite a bit to make them fit. I later ordered some Preiser figures and they fit a lot easier. When I compared the two, it looked a little guy sitting next to Shaq.
I removed all of the Woodland Scenics figures and replaced them solely with Preiser.
Pretty clearly over the years thing have been sold as “to scale” (be it HO or N or O or whatever) but are not. Vehicles might be the worst offender. The old Tyco Petticoat Junction Sierra #3 4-6-0 was closer to 1:76 in proportion, so much so that some guys in Sn3 1/2 used the engine. Back in the very very very early days of Japanese brass (late 1940s) it was not clear that they were supplied with scale rulers or even accurate plans, so “off” were some of the models (we are talking now about collector items, pre Pacific Fast Mail and other makes). And parts were not all to the same scale, be it correct or not. I think they were eyeballing the measurements!
As to figures, I too have noticed significant variance. But even more so, structures. There are houses and stores available that are improbably small, quite possibly closer to 1/8" scale. This would be (and is) acceptable for really big structures so long as the doors are true HO, but on some structures the doors too are far too short. So a scale figure trying to walk into such a door will look odd.
HO scale hasn’t changed in the 50 years I’ve been modelling. Put a scale rule next to the people and you will find most of them are about 6’3" these days whereas in the general population I would think there is much more variety and a lot of people shorter than 6’ 3". There was a thread about this some time ago.
I have some British people in OO scale and they are even bigger. I think OO scale is something like 1:76. They use HO gauge track but because their locos were smaller and small motors were not available in the early 50s they used a bigger scale that meant they could fit the motors into their smaller outline locos. If you ever see a photo of the Flying Scotsman next to a US or Australian loco you’ll see what I mean. Even in real life it looks like it was built to a different scale.
Y’know, I was wondering about that myself, a few years ago when I was ‘populating’ my Walthers’ “Royal Gorge” passenger train. I had some seated WS figures and some seated Preiser figures. Everything worked okay as far as intermixing them until I hit the dining car. In order to get the WS figures to fit at the tables, I would have had to amputate them below the knee (which I’m sure would have made them pretty angry at the dining service, LOL!), but the Prieser figures slid right in and looked very happy with the service (my “Royal Gorge” is famous for their Rocky Mountain Trout).
And I KNOW that American’s are not necessarily larger than Europeans. I have a lot of European friends that I look up to. Literally. [:P]
And I do know that back when PFM was importing brass steamers, they imported a Rio Grande M-75 4-8-2 that was handsome as all get-out, but had a 10% larger boiler diameter than the real thing. To say it looked Formidable was an understatement, LOL!
I would point out that during the 1940’s and to a degree into the early 50’s, it was quite common for HO structures to be modeled to 1/8" scale (1/96), rather than 1/87, particularly with regard to cardstock structure kits. This was even the case for some of the early imported HO locos and rolling stock.
On the opposite side of the coin, as already mentioned above, Tyco/Mantua’s 1880’s, 1890’s and Dixie Bell locomotives of the early 1970’s where all done to essentially 1/76 (OO) scale.
