I have always been in O gauge but have heard of standard gauge numerous times when reading or talking about pre-war Lionel. I have never seen a standard gauge train or piece of track. How does it compare in size to O gauge?
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Paul, standard gauge is a little bigger than g scale or maybe the same size. The Locomotives and rolling stock were huge. The track and switches were still 3 rail. This stuff took up a lot of room to say the least.
Just to confuse things a little.......there is a difference between Standard Gauge and Standard O......Standard O is full scale for the most part vs Traditional O.
standard or wide gauge track is 2.125" gauge. you might find reference to 2.25", but early on gauge was often measured from rail center to rail center which added 1/8" to both O and Standard/ Wide gauge in early catalogs.
in the prewar era, no actual prototype locomotives or equipment were modeled, so scale was still not really fixed as was also true of early O gauge, but if you were to go strictly from the track gauge, it would represent a scale of 1:26.6.
check out the Tinplate forum. Tinplate and Standard gauge were basically the same for many years until tinplate o gauge showed up in the 30's-40's because of the size of standard gauge items.
now there are modern and vintage tinplate Modern comes with all the expected electronics.
what sets tinplate apart from any gauge are the intentionally toy like look and desire by most modelers today to continue modeling layout like those done when standard gauge trains first appeared. All were very simple and lacked prototypical elements because they were most likely temporary due to the amount of room required to operate.
I have modern tinplate in o and standard gauge. I also have o scale, o gauge and o-27 items. I love them all but the tinplate continues to draw the most comments because of the history and because of the bright colors.
Originally Posted by Dave Hikel:
.... The Depression shrank the size of American homes and had the same effect on toy trains. Lionel stopped offering Standard Gauge trains after 1940....
Originally Posted by CH:
... they were most likely temporary due to the amount of room required to operate....
with early standard/ wide gauge, you basically had one curve option, 42" diameter, so standard gauge layouts really didn't take up much more room than O31 gauge. i believe improving motor technology (shrinking in size) did more to doom standard gauge than anything else.
for better looking std/ wide gauge layouts, wider radius curves are available today. i'll recommend USA Track <http://www.standardgaugetrack.com/> for quality tubular track in curves up to 84" and 87" that really improve the look and operation of larger equipment.
Here's a size comparison with similar trains. The train on the bottom is a Lionel Standard Gauge Hiawatha. This was a new design put out by Lionel in 2001 to run on Standard Gauge track, but with TMCC, sound, and smoke. The Hiawatha immediately above it is basically the same train in 0 scale; the other two trains are also 0 scale. Personally, I love Standard Gauge - it has a certain whimsical feel to it, almost like a steampunk fantasy world.
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And if you're talking American Flyer, the correct term is Wide Gauge. As I understand it, Lionel had the rights to the phrase Standard Gauge.
The locomotive in the front is an O-Gauge 260E. The one in the back is a standard Gauge 400E.
Scott Smith
Originally Posted by ReadingFan:
Standard Gauge is actually an odd gauge, created by Lionel to increase sales....
though it turned out to be a great marketing ploy, i'm not really convinced Lionel had anything in mind when creating standard gauge other than trying to fit motors built on turn-of-the-century technology inside a locomotive shell. vs #1 gauge (45mm), standard gauge gave Lionel ~3/8" more width to play with in their designs.
O gauge is big enough and takes up enough room as it is.....can't imagine trying to fit in these standard gauge models; they're enormous!
Not all standard gauge is that enormous. A NO.8 electric engine with some 500 series cars is about the smallest you can get in standard gauge. There are quite a few that will run on a 4x8 table with 42" curves.
Ives also called it Wide Gauge
Originally Posted by TrainsRMe:
And if you're talking American Flyer, the correct term is Wide Gauge. As I understand it, Lionel had the rights to the phrase Standard Gauge.
I have seen a lot, but mostly ignored, "Standard Gauge", except I did buy, fix, and
resell a Flyer electric outline loco and passenger cars, and bought a couple of
Flyer Std. gauge cars including a yellow caboose. Always have thought that for a
mantel displayed toy train, Flyer with the one way couplers was it. However, other cars and engines, steam, were not cheap, so I lost interest. I thought the Flyer was the most attractive and, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seemed that Lionel standard gauge, like "G guage" seemed to come in a variety of different physical sizes, which is what I thought was going to be the subject of this post.
Originally Posted by Chris Lonero:
Not all standard gauge is that enormous. .... There are quite a few that will run on a 4x8 table with 42" curves.
you're right there. a lot of chatter is about the Brute and the 400's, but by far my favorite locomotive on S-42 curve track is the lowly 2-4-0, #384. behind a few 500 series cars, it fits into early standard gauge layouts better than the huge stuff.
Originally Posted by coloradohirailer:
...correct me if I'm wrong, but it seemed that Lionel standard gauge, like "G guage" seemed to come in a variety of different physical sizes, which is what I thought was going to be the subject of this post.
Standard Gauge trains do indeed come in a variety of sizes, but there really is no defined scale for Std. Gauge trains. That is one very big difference between Std. Gauge and Large Scale (G gauge). LS has a number of defined scales (1:20.3, 1:22.5, 1:24, 1:29, 1:32) which apply to most of the models being produced.
