Yesterday I got into a long conversation with a local Lionel dealer. He had just got back from a visit to Lionel HQ. He said they will be starting a new line of narrow gauge O scale trains built on S scale running gear and S scale 2 rail track.
Modeling the "Fargo Area Rapid Transit" in O scale 3 rail.
You'd better go back to the know-it-all dealer and remind him what the date is.
Rob
It would be fun to see if it was "doable" with 4 rail track (ie. the usual 3 rails of O gauge track with a 4th rail "hot" to run the s gauged engines between it and one of the outside O gauge rails. Switches would be a real problem, though. However, there were plenty of examples of dual gauged right of way with standard and narrow gauge in the "real world" so there might be some prototype stuff to give one some ideas how to do switches (or turnouts if you prefer). Anyway, for someone to tinker with, it might be fun to try to bring this April-Foolish idea to life.
I'll put it on my list of thing to work on in my retirement, if I ever can afford to do so.
Little Tommy
Dual-gauge track has been discussed in some detail before, but with HO, not S, combined with 3-rail O: http://cs.trains.com/TRCCS/forums/p/182456/1996761.aspx#1996761
Bob Nelson
Oh God no! That adds disappointment to the O scale hobby.
Boston's freeway system is insane. It was clearly designed by a person who had spent his childhood crashing toy trains.
-Bill Bryson
Gargraves offers O/S gauge 4 rail track in flex track only thou no cross overs or switches
Life's hard, even harder if your stupid John Wayne
http://rtssite.shutterfly.com/
Would this be compatible with Bachmann's ON30 narrow gauge ?
Seems like Bachmann has this gauge pretty much all to itself with some very nice locos.
Bill T.
HO track corresponds to about 31 inches in 1/48 O scale, which is where the On30 designation comes from. S would correspond to 42 inches. This latter gauge is used in Japan and Africa, but unfortunately not much in the US, except for street railroads like the San Francisco cable cars. It is close to meter gauge; but of course that was not used here either.
S and HO are almost 1/4 inch apart; so there is no interoperability there.
Seayakbill Would this be compatible with Bachmann's ON30 narrow gauge ? Seems like Bachmann has this gauge pretty much all to itself with some very nice locos.
That was "April 1st" when I started this topic.
Didn't fool me, and I'm easy to fool!
However, this has all got me thinking that since I have a Thai layout and the State Railways of Thailand was meter gauge, maybe I'll try installing an S gauge atlantic chassis on a cheap Marx 999 shell and see what that looks like!
Becky
Trains, trains, wonderful trains. The more you get, the more you toot!
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