Please forgive my naivety - I’ve done a fair amount of reading but am completely new to model railroads (or railways as they say here in Britain!).
I’ve just bought a Lionel EMD Santa Fe train set on eBay (listing description below):
LIONEL TRAIN SET COME WITH EVERYTHING YOU NEED TRAIN SET TRACK SCREWS LOCK ON AND WIRES
ENGINE NUMBER IS 8351 RUN GREAT BOTH WAYS AND LIGHT UP
COME WITH 4 FREIGHT CARS NUMBER 9022 9305 5715 AND 36658 CABOOSE THAT LIGHT UP PLUS 8 027 CURVES AND 8 027 STRAIGHTS AND A TRANSFORMER
It looks as if it will run as the components are all there, but the trouble is, I’m looking to extend the track and I’ve hit a wall of confusion. The track I am looking to create is just a basic loop. It’s just shy of 13 foot (4 metres) long and will obviously be 27 inches wide (0.685M). As far as I can see, the 027 track will have enough curved sections on either end to bring it into a loop. I have roughly 1.6 metres of straight (5.25 feet) already, but I think I’m going to need about another 5 metres of track for it to expand across the space I need it to.
My questions are two-fold. Firstly, it seems that the only Lionel stockist here in the UK just stock Fastrack. Would a train designed for 027 track be compatible with Fastrack, or does it have to specifially be 027? I’ve done a bit of reading into it and I can see a fair bit of discussion on the differences between the two types of track, but not if an 027 will work on fastrack.
The train can be run on Fastrack, I primarily have 027 track, but also have a loop of Fastrack for the Christmas layout. All my trains run fine on it.
There may be an adaptor piece to go from Fastrack to the 027 but I’m not sure - a quick internet search will show that.
If you have a large layout, you can run track feeders from the transformer to far ends to prevent voltage drops. Just keep consistency in your tracks and wires.
O27 and fast track aren’t really compatible in making a loop of track. right now is the time to decide do you want to buy fastrack since you can get it in the united kingdom or do you want to buy more O27 track off of places like Ebay that will ship to united kingdom. Either system is good. I use to have some big layouts in O27. I’m not fond of fastrack for personal reason but it is a good system just loud. The track is hollow under the plastic road bed and it acts like an amplifier on the sound from the track. O27 is loud enough on a board. Fast track you don’t need to screw down. Both have there plus’s and Minuses.
Do you know what kind of transformer you’re getting? Lionel made some long ago that were designed for frequencies and voltages other than the American 60 hertz and 120 volts (115 back then). Transformers then were essentially–transformers. You could run the American types on 50 hertz, with the voltage dropped to about 100 volts. The output voltage would drop in proportion. But you could get by.
The ones they make now have a transformer in there somewhere, but surrounded by phase-control electronics that won’t work at 50 hertz.
So you may have some work to do make it work in the UK, depending on what’s actually in the set.
By the way, I make it that you have about 5.9 feet (about 1.8 meters) of straight track–8 sections at 8.839 inches or 224.5 millimeters per section.
P.S. I just came across a comment that the Lionel CW80 has been modified to work on 50 hertz. It should have a sticker on it reading “QC50”. Can anyone confirm this?
I’ve never heard of an adaptor made for 027 to Fastrak. I believe Lionel did make an 031 to Fastrak adaptor but of course that’s not what you’re looking for.
No matter, I’d go with Fastrak exclusively, it’s good stuff, I use it for the loops under the Christmas tree.
Fastrak can be noisy but O gauge trains are noisy to begin with, it just comes with the territory. There are ways to cut the noise a bit, some guys mount it on dense-pile carpet, some on foam insulation board.
Just a warning, since it hasn’t already been said-
O27 isn’t actually going to give you a 27” diameter circle, because the 27” measurement is from the center rails. So you actually need a space with a width of about 30” to comfortably fit the O27 track. Fastrack only comes in sizes O36 and up, as far as I know. If you use fastrack, you will need to make sure you have a few inches more than 36, for the same reason as with the O27. I personally reccomend sticking with the O27 track, as fastrack creates a lot of noise when the train runs over it. Also if you ever choose to do so, you can somewhat easily trim O27 track sections to custom lengths by cutting the track with a hacksaw. Fastrack cannot be modified in this way.
No, O27 is the only track whose diameter to the ends of the ties (sleepers) is exactly the nominal diameter. The O27 radius, to the center rail, is 12 1/2 inches, for a diameter to the center rails of 25 inches. Add the 2-inch tie length and you’ve got 27 inches.
The 12 1/2-inch radius determines the length of the O27 straight section. It’s the radius divided by the square-root of 2.
O31 track is the other way around, in that the even 10-inch straight section determines the radius, which comes out very close to 14 1/8 inches. The O31 tie is 2 1/4 inches, so the diameter to the ends of the ties is about 30 1/2 inches, which is why it is sometimes called O30. Lionel didn’t call it O30 or O31, but referred to it simply as “O”.
Lionel adopted center-rail diameter measurements with Fastrack. They then may have made an exception for O31 Fastrack. I have been unable to determine just what its radius is. Maybe someone on the forum knows. A measurement of the center-rail chord of a 45-degree curved section would answer that question.
Becky, I don’t see the actual radius anywhere in that ad. There are various possibilities:
o It is the same as for sectional “O31”, that is, about 14 1/8 inches. This would make sense if they’re selling it as a replacement for the older track, but in their Fastrack convention of measuring to the center rail, it would be called “O28.25”.
o It is 15 1/2 inches (31/2) to the center rail. This is the same convention as they’re using for other Fastrack, except that 31 doesn’t fit into the multiple-of-12-inches scheme. And anyone expecting to use it to replace O31 on an existing layout is in for a surprise.
o Something else.
Is no one willing to measure a piece? Does anyone even have one?
OK, just to make sure I went out to the “Chugger Barn” and got four 031 Fastrack curves, put 'em together amd measured same.
Plastic roadbed to plastic roadbed, edge to edge (ignore the rails) the width of the turnaround is 39".
So, if you’re going to replace, say, old-style 031 tube track with Fastrack you better make sure you’ve got the space to work with, it’s going to use up a lot more room than the old stuff, strictly due to that wide base.
On that Christmas tree set up I’ve got on a 4 X 6 plywood base I can manage two Fastrack loops, but that’s all, no room for an inner third one.
You sure that’s O31? It sounds like O36. Lionel did make both. That would mean O31 to give 39" lionel would be measuring from inside of the plastic to the inside of the plastic but I don’t even think if you added the plastic size twice to 31" would give you 39"
Would you mind measuring for me the straight-line distance (the chord) between the ends of the center rail of a single 45-degree O31 Fastrack section? I need the very center of each end, ignoring that little 1/4-inch connector blade.
Darn it rtraincollector, you’re right! The track I measured is the 036 radius stuff out of a starter set! I forgot! So’s the stuff on the Christmas board, that’s all the LHS had at the time. Silly me! [banghead][:$]
And sorry 'soni, I don’t have a 45 degree crossover of any kind to measure.
At any rate, the roadbed plastic does take up a bit of space, anyway you look at it. My apologies folks.