I have been on a short journey (3-4 years) in O gauge after being in the HO gauge world my whole life. I am constantly learning but it seems that I am having issues with anything that is not scale. I love history and large steam locomotives with lots of smoke and sound and have a bunch of Lionel 3 rail Pennsy locomotives (about 10) and a few others that would/could show up at Washington DC Union station Ivy yards.
I paint my three rail with camo brown to make it look better but... I am having issues with the passenger cars (70' from mth), the large flanges on lead wheels, claw couplers. You name it. If it is not scale it is tending to bother me quite a bit. I am putting in O96 curves minimum since I have large engines (like an EM-1) and passenger cars that would not look as good on tighter curves. I have a "temporary" layout here in VA using Gargraves and Ross track and a whole loft above an extended 1&1/2 car garage in NC that will be dedicated to a layout once it is finished with construction. So not the size of layout that I have seen recently of scale 48 proto but still not nothing. Multi level seems a given. And I probably will have to compromise modeling anything close to DC Union station but first things first.
I have hope that I could move to two rail scale with at least my TMCC/legacy steam engines (which are all scale, not 0-27) by dead railing them. That way it theory I could replace some of the lead and trail wheels with scale, remove the center rollers and go Kadees etc. I have been reading the two dead rail articles eagerly in the magazine. Not clear yet that I can modify the TMCC and Legacy reasonably yet. Even with two rail I would try to go dead rail just to reduce the wiring, electrical issues, cleaning track ...
Is this a reasonable thing to think? Should I just move to two rail equipment with the new layout in NC and sell off all the three rail stuff (which would be a pain)? Any advice from those that may have gone down a similar path before me?