trains on a small budget.

[Anonymous]

Painting matchbox cars, and making easy scenery. Not exactly "model" building but it's fun, creative, and cheap.

http://mackrafty.tripod.com/

updated for Jan 24th 2005

Would love your input.

[NZRMac]

You've got the makeings of a great layout.

Keep up the good work, and work on your scale sizes, either the truck is huge or that's a way small garage!!

Ken.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the input.
I just started making structures. Wasn't to worried about measurements. Just trying get the basics down. Then I realized when I had it assembled, but not painted, that only the front end of a vehicle would fit into the shop.
I think I will work on getting other buildings up first, then I will redo that one.

Is a matchbox car HO scale? HO is 1:87.1 right? The other makers of cars for HO don't have the same quality, yet inexpenviveness as Matchbox. (IMO)

[56chevytimes2]

Hot wheels and matchbox are basicly 1:64 scale. Some of the"big Rigs" that fit in the bubble packs are closer to 1:87 but not perfect . Hope this helps.


Kurt 56chevytimes2
www.kingsransom.com/breon_wagon.html
www.kingsransom.com/cars/betsy

[Anonymous]

Well if I am going to use Matchbox for a lil bit (some of them just look kewl). Should I make the buildings a little bit bigger or just aim for 1:87.
What do you think would look good?
Anyone else out there using matchbox cars?

[Anonymous]

It all depends on what YOU want to do. The true model railroader will yell and spit at you for using Matchbox cars on an HO layout. But if you don't mind that they're bigger, who cares. If you're planning on one day having a quality HO scale layout, keep your buildings in 1:87 scale, you can always replace the cars later. If you like the size of the matchbox cars (remember that they aren't all 1:64, they're close but whatever size allows them to fit the packaging), then you might want to look into S scale trains. They're 1:64 scale trains.
Just to let you know... Model Power makes some nice modern HO scale cars for like $3 or so. About the same price as Matchbox but I guess they don't have that "kewl" look to them.

[Dave Farquhar]

The scale on Matchbox, Hot Wheels, and similar cars varies. Some are close to 1:64 but a lot of them are closer to 1:72 or 1:76, so the ideal scale for using those types of cars would be British OO scale. But those guys have always been more concerned about uniform packaging than scale. So a Matchbox Honda Civic ends up being close to the same size as a Ford Crown Victoria. The Civic will be close to 1:64, while that Crown Vic might not even be 1:76.

The $3 diecast cars are more likely to be 1:64 than the $1 diecasts.

Ultimately you use what makes you happy. Is a 1:76 Matchbox car on a 1:87 HO layout any worse than the 1:43 scale Matchbox/Maisto/Road Champs cars on my 1:48 O scale layout? The trick to using off-scale items on a layout--something we O gaugers end up doing all the time--is to give off-scale items a bit of distance away from things that are scale, to disguise their size. If you're going to have a bunch of Matchbox hotrods congregating at a diner, then build that building to 1:76 scale, but then don't put it right next to the tracks and certainly don't put it next door to 1:87 buildings. But if it can be off on its own a little bit someplace, you'll get away with it.

Undersized buildings can go in the back of the layout. It makes them look further away than they actually are, and makes the layout look bigger than it really is. It's somewhat common to populate the back of a layout with buildings from the next size down--N scale on HO, HO scale on S or O, Z scale on N...

As far as how to build your buildings, the most important thing is just to build, learn what you can from each one you do, and hopefully every building you do is better than the one before it. When I was 11 or 12, I made some decent stuff that I wish I had now, and I made some stuff that should have gone straight into the trash. Considering the maerials I had to work with consisted of styrofoam meat trays, a bottle of white-out, a bottle of Tacky Glue, and a couple of paint markers, I guess I did OK. Computers weren't any help then--this was 1985.

Experiment. If it looks right to your eye, then go for it. At this stage, the most important thing is for it to be interesting and fun for you, while staying within whatever budget you have available. That's the eternal challenge, but as you seem to already know, that can be part of the fun too.

[TurboOne]

mackrafty, how are you doing ?

Dave said it very well. Its your layout. If you are happy with it. Fantastic. Enjoyment is the best part of trains, and each of us has are own buttons. I like matchbox, but have been leaning towards hotwheels as they are $0.73 each at Wally Mart.

Build it, and you will be happy.

Enjoy

Tim

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the tips.
Any easy tips on scale conversions. I suppose the only way to figure it out would be to know the original size of a vehicle. The crown vic, or a dodge viper are differnt lengths in real life, yet both are about 3" for matchbox.
right?
Argh, been so long since i've had to use math for anything other than my budget.