Remember the Mantua hook and hoop couplers? Looked funny but they could connect the cars.
Mantua’s first HO product was a 2-8-0 released December 1937. Still don’t know if that was the first made in USA or not.
PennLine - 1947
Bowser - 1946
Ulrich - 1946
Walthers - 1937 but I can’t find a month or what model. Seems to be a whole line.
Red Ball - 1939
Thanks, Texas Zephyr… A good friend has Gilbert HO Hudson. It looks new; it runs; and its smoke unit still functions. Not much for details but it was made about in 1947.
Remember the Globe Models F-7? It may be the first plastic diesel model.
Some other players I recall that may have been missed in earlier posts: Kemtron, Central Valley, Silver Streak, Model Die Casting, Ambroid, and JC Models.
Pacific Fast Mail was an early brass importer with United Models and Tenshodo.
Anybody care to mention Athearn’s HI-F drives ? [swg]
I think I read a long time ago that Mantua became Tyco or was absorbed by Tyco. I can’t remember exactly what the relationship was but I believe I read that in an HO primer written for Kalmbach by the late Linn Westcott many years ago.
Tyco was started by Mantua in the 50s as their ready to run line of products. All of Tyco’s engines and cars were simply assembled Mantua kits. Then Tyco got sold to Consolidated Foods, which is when the Power-Torque drive was unfortunately invented, and Mantua shut down for around 10 years.
You can read Mantua’s full history up to when they were bought by Model Power at www.railstop.com , and Tyco’s history at http://tycotrain.tripod.com/tycotrains/ .
what is every ones favorite engines and how many do u have? so far i have 2 steamers a norfolk and western and a clementime. i have several desials though BNSF, 2 new havens , and 2 seaboard coast line presidentail engines.
bighead
p.s. dose anyone have pictures of there layouts they could post?
helllo? is anyone out there? no has posted here in a while.
Yes, there are lots of folks out there. Everyone is happily posting layout pictures in the “Weekend photo fun” thread and conversing about all aspects of HO scale model railroading in all the other threads. I don’t think you are going to get much traction with an HO scale only thread when we are all quite happy posting in the main forum. I don’t think anyone is being rude or deliberately ignoring this thread it is just that it is rather redundant.
thats what i figured… and the anyone out there? thing was a joke lol
Based on the thread, by favorite engines I presume you mean models. My all time favorite has to be the original Atlas RS-3, painted in the NP canoe scheme. Not only did it actually have scale width hoods and is it the smoothest runner I’ve ever owned, it is also the one that introduced the Kato drive to the HO world. Doing so it forever raised the bar on what an HO model should run like. It doesn’t have the detail that other current models have (the hand rails were molded on, no window wipers, etc.), but on a major heavy operating layout those sorts of detail parts always get broken off anyway.
In fact, I go as far to say that I think this locomotive is probably the single most important product in the development of the HO diesel locomotives since ummm the introduction of flywheels. I haven’t seen any improvements in drive trains since then. Now there is an interesting topic to carry this thread forward. What ARE the landmark inovations in HO scale models through the years. We have already sort of talked about the Mantua Mighty-Mite motor.
How many do I have? More than ummm ummm more than I’ve been able to count. If you really want to know this do a forum search for “how many locos” or “what is your roster”, you will find things like:
http://www.trains.com/TRC/CS/forums/1/457691/ShowPost.aspx#457691
http://www.trains.com/TRC/CS/forums/1/427264/ShowPost.aspx#427264
http://www.trains.com/TRC/CS/forums/1/393727/ShowPost.aspx#393727
[quote]
so far i have 2 steamers a norfolk and western and a clementime. i have several desials though BNSF, 2 new
I agree with the Atlas RS3. I have 2 NP’s. Both have same road number. I never got around to changing number on one.
Landmark innovations for HO should include changing from brass rail to nickel silver rail.
Here’s a question. What was the most popular prototype for HO cabooses? I’d say ATSF cabooses. Athearn and AHM had them painted for just about every US road.
True if scale is not mentioned in the rest of this forum one can almost bet it will be HO.
It is redundant for many things, but could be really interesing if people are want to know about the history and development of HO. Other than that, I just hope it doesn’t degenerate into another “coffee shop” or “whistle stop” gab fest about “anything”.
But I would claim that was not really an HO scale inovation. I would say that was an N-scale inovation. It has always used nickel-silver from day one. In my recollection I had never seen a nickel-silver rail before I switched to N-scale in 1969. When I came back to HO in about 1980 the nickel-silver was available. In retrospect I did find out that Atlas had actually made nickel-silver way back in the fiber tie days, but it was largely ignored.
Now that I think about it all my Atlas and AHM O-scale track from the 1970s was nickel-silver too.
I dunno too much about the old days, either. But here’s one interesting tidbit. My club, the South Shore Model Railway Club, used to be called the Quincy Model Railway Club, and was established in 1938 as an HO scale club (we still have a copy of our original charter).
So HO was around long enough for a whole club (well, more like the 12 people in it at the time…now we’re up to 60 members) to be using it by 1938.
We like to say in our advertising that we’re one of the oldest continuously operating HO scale model railroad clubs in the country…but I don’t know who else has been around longer in HO scale.
Paul A. Cutler III
Weather Or No Go New Haven
That sounds about right. If American made equipment was starting to appear in 1937 and bunches was coming out by 1939, there had to have been a fairly large user population. It also makes sense that in the early years when equipment was rare that folks would have banded together in clubs to make the most use of the available resource.
Favorites? In steam that would be impossible. I like big steam and little steam and everything in between. Right now I have more Hudsons than anything, with several Mikes as well. I like my Consolidation and recently bought a 4-6-0 that needs a decoder. I want sound but I need to be able to fit it in a small tender. I think smaller sound is now becoming available.
Diesels? That’s easy. F units. I have 3 AB sets. Two are P2K F-3s and one is a BLI F-7 set. I have many more old Athearn BBs which I haven’t decided whether it is worth it to invest sound decoders into or just keep buying new. I want to have a sizeable fleet of Fs. RS3s are my second choice. I like the versatility. I am going to use them both in commuter passenger service and as road switchers for my way freights.
My favorite engine is the Union Pacific Big Boy, closely followed by the Daylight, and the 9000 class 4-12-2s.
My engines are:
Bachmann Spectrum 4-8-2
Bachmann GS-4 Daylight
Old Bachmann F-7 that doesn’t run like anything I’ve ever seen…
Bachmann Spectrum F40PH-Got this for Christmas one year. I don’t like it.
And finally, One first run (1960) Rivarossi Big Boy.
cool
HO is 3.5mm/foot and OO is 4mm/foot. I’ve seen some older approx N scale stuff from England listed as OOO scale…don’t know what the exact scale is.
underworld[:D][:D][:D][:D][:D]