British railway equipment

[Big Walnut Railroader]

I don't know what it is about British O gauge trains and what not, but they are really unique pieces of equipment and also very hard to find out about. Back when I first joined the forum I posted a thread about Ace Trains and Bassett-Lowke, but it would appear that those aren't the only sources for these trains. So I now pose another question (or more) on the subject:

~What are some other manufacturers that produce Ready-to-Run (R-T-R) or kit versions of British O gauge locomotives & rolling stock?
~Does anyone here on the forum own any British O gauge locomotives & rolling stock from any manufacturers?
~Can these run on 3 rail track (Lionel tubular)? If not, what needs to be done to make them able to do so?

Other information would be good to know as well. Thanks in advance.

[PhilaKnight]

In the lastest issue of Classic Toy Trains I thought I saw a ad for Ace Trains and their was small print stating what site would could order Ace Trains from but it wasn't Ace trains. It's prob a import Company.

[Bob Keller]

I've got recent production equipment from Ace and Bassett-Lowke, and old-stock Lima. Ace is great, the only downside is the B-L being DC three rail (which means hooking up a DC transformer to the normally AC line when I want to run it.)

I've also got some modern ready-to-run rolling stockm from Skytrex. The Skytrex gear has scale wheels (run fine on RealTrax or Atlas O track) and runs about $50 to $90 a freight car. They offer some small ready-to-run switchers (two rail only) for about $300 each.

You might want to check ehattons.com toi get an idea of the UK O gauge market. BTW most kits/r-t-r are two rail.

[Nick12DMC]

Apart from the 3-rail Ace and Bassett-Lowke which are similar 1:48 as per Lionel etc.

You could I guess swap in a AC control board or TMCC from Electric RR to convert a DC product to AC. Hmmm Ace A4 with full TMCC.....

2-rail O gauge in the UK is 7mm to the foot. It used to be mostly kit built equipment but in recent times Heljan have brought out two BR diesels Class 35 Hymek and Class 47 r-t-r. These are around the £400 mark.

Maybe it would be possible to build a 3-rail chassis for some of the 2 rail kits.

I would say that US 3-rail O is a lot better value than some of our native offerings. However this might start to change with the introduction of Lionel's GWR Hall class (hogwarts set). Which at its current price point may be a wake-up call to certain British outline manufactures.

Nick

[Anonymous]

Aside from the current manufacturers mentioned, you could also go for the vintage stuff.  There is the original Hornby O gauge made from 1920-1964.  It's very much "classic tinplate", using tubular track and for the most part not being what you could classify as "scale models" (their LMS Princess Elizabeth, plus their SR Schools Class and No. 2 Special locomotives being exceptions).  If you don't mind having some playwear, some Hornby can be more affordable than modern Ace and Basset-Lowke.  Generally, Hornby clockwork trains are much easier to find than electric ones.  Check out this site which contains a price guide for all the different types of Hornby O gauge locomotives: http://home.planet.nl/~zwakh019/priceguide.htm .

[dwiemer]

I too have had a desire for one of these sets from "across the pond" as my mother is off the boat from jolly ol' England.  This is why I am excited about getting the "Hogworts" set as it looks really nice, even though I have absolutely no desire for anything Harry Potter, this set will find a place on my pike.

Dennis

[alexweiihman]

I picked up a Hornby 1920's 0-4-0 tank engine in LMS colors.  It is an old windup, but it is a great piece.

[daan]

Apart from basset lowke or ace trains there's Hornby (later mecano) and a huge lot of finescale kit manufacturers. 3 rail is something very odd in Europe, the ones manufactured by Ace are meant for "overseas". 0 gauge is 2 rail here, lima, rivarossi etc is also 2 rail DC!

If you want stuff like that, forget ebay.com. I've seen advertisements on .com of hornby material with prices far above the price fetched on ebay.de or ebay.uk. Also ebay.fr or ebay.be are well known sources for prewar and postwar 3 rail. (also take a look at JeP, the made nice machines as well!)

.de is germany   .uk is United Kingdom   .fr is france and   .be is belgium.

Also interesting are the swiss locomotives by the small manufacturers like Buco, there are very simple ones, but also highly detailled and scale sized.. Also Hermann ( http://www.hermann-rail.ch/ ) makes beatufull 3 rail swiss locomotives.. Search for those on ebay.de or ebay.ch (germany and switserland).. An old friend of mine, living in Amsterdam, has a huge collection of these very nice running locomotives.. Now and again he changes his collection and ebay gets a lot to sell.. If you fetch one of these for a nice price, you really have a good day!

Here is a page with links for europe: http://www.argespur0.de/index.php3?hid=038188