Building a minature ride on railway in O scale??

N scale is roughly 4" scale (amusement park train). Z scale would be a better fit, but would still be larger than 1/8 -- between 1/6 and 1/5 scale.

O and N scale box cars with O figures???

 

 

I've thought of doing this with an old Z-scale set I have.  As observed above, it would not be exactly scale, but given the options it seems Z is the best scale for ia "ride on" model of a model train.  I have also thought about using N scale as the type of larger fun train seen at many parks and zoos.  

Go with HO scale trains. You cut the roof off then sit the people inside the cars. It will look more realistic.

Here is a video I took at Alex M's house one day when we were running trains. You'll see at about the 50 second mark his amusement park train comes out of the tunnel. It's HO. We discussed this when he was adding the train to the park and agreed HO was the way to go.

http://youtu.be/f1dfacmft8Y

Mike R

Excellent. Awesome idea.

Glenn

Our multigauge modular railroad club has a z scale train running on our HO layout with HO figures glued into 3 gondolas running around some Ho amusement rides. It looks pretty good to me. I always figured it looked close to a 1/4 inch scale.

I agree that most of the park/zoo/amusement part train rides not would be closer to HO, but look at the F3 type train I posted a tiny picture of.  I recall riding one that small - the cars were just one person/seat wide, when a kid.  Dopn't know where it was but it was the size of the train in that picture, and an F3, but ATSF warbonntt like paint.  Anyway, the top of the f unit comes up to the waits of a person, so I think N guage is best to model that.  something like the park trains they have in most cities now, HO or even ON30 wuld be better.

http://www.traintown.com/#!photos

 

Train town has some great looking trains would be fun to model that park in 1/48 scale with the roundhouse lined up with steam engines.

Click through the photos great ride if you are out that way near Napa.

 

Think I might stick with the N scale cheaper easier to get then Z and passengers fit well in the freight cars.

A 40' boxcar only comes out to 1.25" when scaled down to a 1/8 scale on an O size layout. I would think an N at 3.9" would be closer to an amusement park 16" gauge. Only 1 person wide, my O person looked pretty small in an HO gondola. I have not dug out an N gon too see. Just sayin..

 

But, whatever you like is the correct size.

Also, there now is T scale, which is nearly half of Z.  Just a few types of cars, all Japanese prototype.

N scale ride with O scale people on the Mesozoic Park layout:

 

Jim

Well looked at pricing for Z and N scale, and various sets at the local hobby shops. Z was looking a bit expensive. But found a nice Bachmann N scale set with oval of snap track, power pack and nice set of cars for really cheap at a local shop. And picked up an extra gondola for passengers.

Have been to a couple of rail parks where they run a mix of miniature freight cars and ride on cars for the public.

 

So rather then taking a saw to the roofs of the freight cars I will just leave them as part of the consist. The Atlas gondola had regular couplers and Bachmann set ramp style couplers. The Gondola with the set and Atlas gondola are pretty similar. So I peeled the bottom off of each and cut them in half, and swapped half of each base gluing them back on. So the scale couplers are between each gondola and match up and the other end of both gondolas has the different ramp couplers and it all links up well.

 

Perhaps may add another gondola or 2 but the figures tend to add a bit of weight to the train and do not want to over do it.

 

Will glue this to a base I can take to train shows to run as an amusement park ride.

The figures I have in O scale seem to fill the seats well so it would be very tight to try to fit 2 people to a seat.

 

Will have to make a control panel for the engineer.

Seriously, I rode that train as a kid, the F3 looks just like I remember with the driver way back at the back like in your photo.  Only instead of gondolas, my brother and I rode in open-top models of passenger cars.  I have no idea where it was though: if I had to guess either Salt Lake City or Denver (Elitch's?) around 1957.

The website here shows a man (human being) riding on a small train. I hope that this is not what you mean as O gauge trains won't hold more than a few pounds.

Lee,

 

I remember riding in open top cars that were supposed to be passenger cars also. My engineer also sat in an opening in the roof of what was supposed to be an F unit positioned as in the one I modeled in the photo.

 

I think it was a standard model sold to various amusement parks. Mine had to have been be in an amusement park in the New York City area.

 

Jim

I take my son to ride on them once a month and we just went today.  (There is a live steamer club near where I live and they run them one weekend a month).  They have several steam engines and F3s. 

 

http://livesteamers.org/

 

 

I guess you could find out how long & wide the amusement park (say F3) engine is then compare it to the real 1:1 scale which would give you an approximate ratio.  Then use this ratio for an equivalent type Lionel/MTH engine to derive a rough approximation of HO/N/Z scale type to use.  Also consider forced perspective where park train is to layout location.

 

Or you could ask other modelers to loan you a few HO/N/Z cars and place them in park and eyeball what looks best as your train(s) pass by.

Here's how I see it.

  I think Z might more closely match your link photo. But that's not what I saw in amusement parks growing up, only "train" parks.

 For carousel, or small(2ft-'ish) gauge "Briggs& Stratton" rides where you may be an engineer, or maybe not, N is closer.

HO for some of the bigger, more serious "hole in the roof" engines, and covered cars, some "rides", some transportation. And On30, for serious narrow gauge park transportation, or longer tours. 

I only skipped other sizes due to cost, and availability. "the popular solutions" 

S / American Flyer would be another alternate for a bigger train

Here is a photo of the train at the Railroad Museum of Long Island. It is originally from the New York World's Fair in 1964