Return to Model Trains and S-Scale Hi-Rail

 

Our lives changed after I finished college and my military obligations. I now had a full-time job at Freightliner. My interest in trains became active again, and I focused on American Flyer and S-scale, which I was familiar with from my childhood. I didn’t have space to start a layout, but I began exploring new possibilities with the American Flyer items I had gradually acquired from Goodwill and other places, to replace my original train, which my father had given to neighbor kids when I left home for military and college. At this time, American Flyer was effectively history because the company had gone out of business, but it was not yet collectible, so starting my collection was not difficult or expensive.

I decided that stock American Flyer locomotives, cars, and track didn’t look very realistic, and could be improved upon. I worked in the direction of “hi-rail”, which is defined as a compromise between ‘tin-plate’ toy trains and highly accurate scale models. Stock toy trains are often referred to as ‘tin-plate’, which is a reference to older toy trains that were made from tin plated thin steel (tin-can metal). The American Flyer engines and cars had wheels with flanges that were way oversized, couplers that were way oversize and didn’t look anything like real couplers, and sectional train track that was far too tall and had unrealistic oversized irregularly spaced large metal ties. However, the locomotive and car bodies were good representations of the real thing.

I set out to explore the possibilities of improving the stock cars, locomotives, and track to be more realistic. I also discovered that some ‘O-gauge’ items (larger than S-scale), especially Marx, were made closer to S-scale proportions than O-scale, except for the wheels, which had to fit O-gauge track. At the time it was easy to find cars to tinker with, often missing wheels or couplers, for less than a dollar each. I accumulated a significant collection of rolling stock with lots of possibilities. They had little value otherwise, as they were rag-tag and not very usable as is. Here are a few examples, alongside American Flyer cars (American Flyer on the left, Mars and Lionel O-27on the right).

I’ve used the term ‘gauge’ and ‘scale’ above interchangeably. Technically, ‘gauge’ is the distance between the rails of the track. O-gauge measures 1 1/4-inch, and S-gauge measures 7/8-in. ‘Scale’ refers to what proportion the models are, compared to full-size. O-scale is 1/48th of full size, and S-scale is 1/64th of full size.

During this time I was gifted a used Lionel train set by my brother-in-law. I set it up and ran it several times, but it didn’t fit my plans otherwise. Lionel, in comparison to American Flyer, HO, and N-scale, is HUGE! This was an O-27 set, and the three-rail track and extremely tight radius turns made it hard to imagine any realism.

Improving American Flyer track was the first thing I tackled. I pursued a do-it-yourself approach, as there were few S-scale items available commercially. I ended up making the rails from strips of tin can metal, and making sections of track by gluing ties I made to pieces of plywood.  Making the rails involved some crude bending dies I made, but that was during the time I was designing stamping dies for Freightliner, so that utilized my work skills. I used commercial HO track spikes to fasten the rails to the ties. Here’s a photo of some of the track that has survived, alongside American Flyer track.

I went a step further and experimented with a way to have two track circuits, so I could pipe sound to speakers aboard the trains. This was way before the various schemes that are available today. I added ‘studs’ down the center of the track, in a way that was not very noticeable, with the idea that metal wipers under the rolling stock would slide along the studs, to complete a third path for electricity. I was probably inspired by Marklin (a German company) that made track that way. Here’s a photo of my stud-contact track.

Improving the couplers and wheels (trucks) was the next areas I targeted. At the time, decent semi-scale trucks were available, made by Ace Manufacturing. I procured a number of pairs, and applied them to reworked cars. I experimented with different ways of making trucks myself, including casting wheels and truck side frames from epoxy casting resin, using impressions in modeling clay as my molds. The results were moderately successful, but very labor intensive. I continued to use Ace trucks. 

For improved couplers, I decided to use Kadee O-scale couplers, as there weren’t any S-scale couplers at the time, and the O-scale couplers were a big improvement both visually and performance-wise over the American Flyer couplers. I also modified an American Flyer locomotive tender by adding a loud speaker. I never did go the last step and actually pipe sound to the track, but I think I reached a workable solution, had I had a layout to try it out on. Here are several cars that have had the above treatments, along with the modified tender.

The bulkhead pulpwood log car started out as an American Flyer flat car. I added the bulkhead ends and the log load. The lettering was done with HO decals. Unfortunately one bulkhead hasn’t survived the 50 years of storage. The hopper car was built from a vintage Kinsman kit. It’s wood except for the cast metal hoppers.

I discovered that Matchbox toy cars (and others) often were made to S-scale, and were quite realistic. I began seeking out automobiles and trucks that would fit my desired era of the 1950’s. Here are a few examples from my collection...

One more approach to my ‘hi-rail’ scheme that I wanted to pursue was creating paint schemes and details on paper, and then gluing the images to built-up wood bodies. This had to wait for technology (quality and affordable home color printers) to catch up, as I didn’t have the skills or patience to make needed designs free hand. This approach was how scale model rolling stock was often made very early on in the hobby, where printed car sides (and other details) were applied to a basic wood body. Items such as grab irons would be added, to provide 3-D details. I think my interest in this was a carryover from making stage props in high school, where it was satisfying and challenging to create believable illusions. The closest I got to accomplishing this was creating a cut-out model of a historic time-share coastal cottage we frequent. I ended up making it in to a cut-out assembly book, and sold (for printing costs) multiple copies to others that use the cottage. Here’s a picture of one of the assembled models. It’s made to S-Scale.

The project started out as a way to learn how to use TurboCad computer drafting software, where I ultimately created the images for the model. I started out by making a 3-D computer model of the cottage based on my measurements. I then created each external surface. I included slots and tabs, along with written assembly instructions, for the cut-out books so others could make it. I have since created similar computer models of my childhood home (from memory and photos) and our current home and I plan to include those models in my current developing HO layout, along with the cottage. I will print them out in HO scale. I may still tackle my wife’s home when we were dating and the first house that we bought (both from memory and a few photos).

I never made it past this experimenting and development stage to applying printed appliques on actual train cars. The work that I have done has been very satisfying, however. I may still try a train car or two using this approach, perhaps in HO, and perhaps in S-scale, just to see how effective it could be with today’s technology. 

I enjoyed many hours pursuing the various things I’ve described above. However, I never made an S-scale layout because our home at the time was small, and S-scale was large. It took the introduction of N-scale to move me in the direction of a train layout in my adult life. That will be the subject of a future blog entry. I still have all of my old S-scale equipment, packed away in boxes in our garage loft. Some of it may be collectible, but most if it is pretty rough. I don’t think I’m sitting on a gold mine, and I do enjoy the occasional looking at some of the items, and thinking about what might have been.