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Tractor Forum discussion that turned to toy trains talk

Re: Reconstituted Original Tractor Forum!!

murph, what size was it?

For the smaller hands of a child, the larger size trains seem to be the easiest to play with. That's why I think the Playmobil and other G size sets are great.

But something like a "O" scale Lionel is also a great size for a child. With Bonehead's son at age 4, Lionel might be a bit more advanced and more expensive than he might want to get . . . unless Bone plans on playing with the trains too.

Again, the question is really a question of is this a play alone toy or is this a bonding toy for growing up.



jodyand . . . are you talking about the old tin Marx trains? Those are amazing in that they look like crude tin toys but really they were some great trains. I believe they are still in production too. Simple folded metal trains but with great lithograph designs. Talk about a trip down memory lane!!!
 

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my son. "bernie jr" just turned 3. i wanted so bad to buy him a race track for his 1st christmas but got out voted big time by the boss!:yum:

anyway when he was 2 i bought him his 1st tractor a 1958 bolens ride a matic which i hope that we can restore as our 1st father\son project.
in the very near future i plan on getting him a train set or race track so we can play.:thumb:
 
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B_Skurka said:
murph, what size was it?




jodyand . . . are you talking about the old tin Marx trains? Those are amazing in that they look like crude tin toys but really they were some great trains. I believe they are still in production too. Simple folded metal trains but with great lithograph designs. Talk about a trip down memory lane!!!

Well the one i had was plastic but i do have my uncles old Marks tin train he gave me about 20 years ago. They both still run good. Let me see if my camera is working and i will take some pictures of both.
 
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Jodyand . . . I'm willing to bet the tin trains are worth some real money if they are not scratched up!



dirtybernie . . . you may want to ease into it with the boss and go for the circle around the Christmas tree next year. You can even buy special edition Christmas cars with the year painted on the side. The logic, of course, is that you buy a new car for "bernie Jr" every year.

The cars below are all made by "LGB" but Bachmann, Lionel, and others make "HOLIDAY" cars.

And you can get cars for other holidays too. But Christmas has the largest selection.
 

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Re: Reconstituted Original Tractor Forum!!

Thread has gone from tractors to trains at least it's in alphabetical order!! And a good thing too, I might add!!

Mine was (sadly no longer is) A Lionel "O" gauge Switcher engine / Santa Fe engine and some 30 assorted cars and close to 100' feet of track, that during my childhood had consumed most if not all of my earned income from my various farm animal raisings !!

During one of my oversee's tours my ageing father made a magnanimous gift to a nare do well cousin's child, thinking I had no use for that junk any longer and at that time he was correct!! A few years ago during a nostalgic period I priced it in an antique magazine at close to $75,000 ..

Life is full of twists and turns! NO?

Dean
 
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OK here they are not the best picture as my old camera is about had it. The first one is my old Plastic one
trains003.jpg


And here is the old tin Marx. Which is in great shape i have all the cars for the tin one also..
trains004.jpg
 
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B_Skurka said:
I looked at N also. I figured that HO (Half 0 Scale) is the perfect size for inside a house, and N is not quite there. I went all the way down to the super mini-size Z simply because I can set it up on a narrow cradenza so it runs circles around a stereo speaker.
Back in the late '40s, early 50's, my Dad was into S guage, which was essentially American Flyer. Back in those days, serious hobbyists either had Lionel "O" guage or American Flyer S guage. Dad had started with Lionel, but hated the limitations of 3 rail track. It didn't look real enough to him.

He laid all his own track, using linoleum strips for crossties, and holding the tiny spikes with a hand-notched needle nose pliers. The way he got around the 3rd rail was to run a bare wire around the outside of the track, supported by tiny wooden pegs, through which he ran the power. He soldered pickup extensions from the engines, out through the trucks, so they rode on the bare wire and powered the engine.

When American Flyer came out with the 2-rail S guage, he sold all the Lionel stuff and built a new setup. The 2-rail had it's own issues, primarily the switching of polarity on reversing loops. He wired double-pole, double throw switches so he could reverse the polarity at the strategic moment. It took dexterity to throw the dpdt switch at precisely the right moment to keep the engine running.

S guage was very appealing -- smaller and more compact than O guage, yet large enough to enable more details than HO.

He built all his own rail switches, carving bakelite to form frogs. The switches were all mechanical, using picture wire, springs, pulleys and control rods in a L-shaped slot to operate them.

I was pretty young, yet I remember the details like it was yesterday. Dad was a perfectionist, and seldom let me actually work on the setup (nobody could do anything better than him -- both in his mind, and in reality). About the time I might have made a contribution, when I was around 10 years old, we had some financial reverses, and the layout was put away for a few years.

Dad died in 1955. He was 47; I was 15 and an only child. I was pretty angry that God had taken away my Father, and had little interest in anything, let alone the trains. Mom needed money desperately. Without consulting me or offering me a choice, she sold the entire elaborate layout -- over 100 square feet of complex layout, hand made scenery, and all rolling stock, for $100.

I have never been able to handle a serious interest in trains. It appeals to me, but I have seen perfection (on a level of many model RR clubs), and I know I can't do as well.

I did take a fairly deep look at garden trains now that we have the room, but it's simply too much money on a tight retirement budget.
 
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Don. . . that is the sort of story that just hurts to listen to. But it sure is understandable why you never really got into trains as a hobby. Florida, as I understand it, has a lot of garden railways (and they are on exhibit in Disney's Epcot center). I'd love to set one up outside but the climate and the big dog in the yard sort of make me think I'm in the wrong spot for it.



jodyand . . .that tin unit is the type I am familiar with. Marx did a great job with their graphics, and the streamlined look of that train is supurb considering the simple construction methods they used.

That is the kind of train that really is awesome.

My Marklin MAXI series trains are similar to the tin Marx trains in many ways, with the folded tabs. But the graphics on the Marx are superior. Here are a couple shots of a limited edition Marklin MAXI loco so you can get the idea of the graphics and the simple tin designs.
 

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OkeeDon said:
I have never been able to handle a serious interest in trains. It appeals to me, but I have seen perfection (on a level of many model RR clubs), and I know I can't do as well.

I'm with you on this one Don. I guess if I was ever really interested in trains, I would go out and find someplace that I could drive a real one. Seems much more interesting to me.

Hope you had a good Christmas Don!
 
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B_Skurka that train is beautifully and look brand new. Thats something there thats looks like it would be a rare piece. Thanks for sharing the pictures of it.
 
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Don i hate to hear that and yes theres nothing like a hand built layout that someone has put there heart and soul into building. To bad that your mom sold it but like you said she needed the money but it would have been a nice thing to have that was your fathers.
 
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jodyand said:
B_Skurka that train is beautifully and look brand new. Thats something there thats looks like it would be a rare piece. Thanks for sharing the pictures of it.

That is one of their "annual museum series" pieces. Every year they come out with 1 new piece in each size range they make, it is a very limited production run and they sell out very quickly. I've got one of every MAXI piece they made for that series since they started making MAXI. I do not buy their regular production pieces. My collecting is limited to their museum, toy fair, dealer, nickle plate and other limited run pieces. I also only buy European pattern pieces so I don't have any American style MAXI pieces. Some of their stuff is pretty reasonable, at roughly $75 per car, but some is almost obscene in price.

I have 3 pieces in my office that I have to sneak home someday :whistle:
 
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