MTH RailKing cars question

[Steve1964]

I recently saw some MTH RailKing rounded roof boxcars for sale that looked very retro. They are advertised as being O and 027 sized cars. How do these cars compare in size to the traditional sized stuff that Lionel made in the 1940s-50s?

Thanks

Steve

 

[Firelock76]

They're a bit bigger than the old traditional 027 cars, but don't worry, they'll look fine on the layout.  I use them on my own layout, sometimes with 027 cars in the consist and they don't look out of place at all.

[Steve1964]

Thanks very much for the information. Are the Railking cars sized more like the Lionel 6464 series cars?

Thanks Steve

 

 

 

[Firelock76]

You're welcome! Actually, they're a little bigger.  For lack of a better term I'll call them semi-scale and let it go at that.

[Steve1964]

There is actually one of these MTH cars on Ebay that I am watching, but I thought the size was wrong for my old Lionel stuff. I emailed the seller and asked him for measurements of the car-----and he said it was 9 inches long by 3 inches high.

I cannot believe that this is right, that is only about the size of my 3472 Lionel milk car. I found the car in the MTH catalog archives, and that said the Railking cars were roughly 10 1/2 by 3 3/4.

I may buy anyway, these are very cool cars.

Steve

 

 

[Firelock76]

I'll tell you, they are VERY cool cars, I especially love the models of the "billboard" reefers and various vintage cars from the early part of the 20th Century.  Very colorful and dramatic.

As an aside, I don't worry about whether they match dimensions of the other cars I have.  Look at photos of vintage freight trains and you'll see a variety of car sizes.  At any rate, I personally buy and run what I like and don't sweat scale all that much.

[Trucktrain7]

Just to give you a little extra information in case you don't know. The RailKing rugged rails are the same size as the 6464 series.