Does the lionel train come in HO scale. Just feeling out whats out there.
Not for sure, haven’t seen any of late. I have half a dozen from back in the mid-60’s. You might try ebay, lots of HO cars available there. Good luck. DaveC.
It seems like Lionel tries offering trains in a smaller scale about every 20 years or so. In the 1930’s they had a very nice line of OO models that unfortunately wasn’t brought back after WW2. In the fifties they offered HO trains for a while. In the 1970’s they offered an HO line, some of which eventually was available thru Bachmann IIRC (like the SP 4449 engine). Then in this decade they came out with some nice HO models, including a UP steam engine and a UP turbine, but quit making them due to some lawsuits and their subsequent bankruptcy.
You can still find the odd most recent batch of HO Challengers and Turbines from the Union Pacific on auction sites and at more obscure online retail sites for toy trains.
Mike’s Train House I believe has the tooling for what was formerly Lionel’s HO Challenger series. They have just brought their version of that tooling to market. Be advised that there are some considerable compatibility issues between the on-board electronics in all MTH engines and those marketed as “DCC” that the heavy majority of HO scale enthusiasts actually use. MTH’s brand of digital control is called “DCS”, and you can only get full functionality if you use the matching digital controlling devices.
I have one of the grey and white Lionel Challengers. It is a nice engine, and I feel fortunate to have it. It could have been more extensively detailed in view of its MSRP, but…you can’t have it all in some cases.
-Crandell
They did during the 50s or so but I dont know about now.