Tin Plate O gauge will it fit?

Not a dumb question at all. Tinplate should fit. The only exceptions may be crane cars that are taller than ordinary cars. Lowering the boom will probably work.

Not an expert, but it would seem that it would depend on the tinplate. Some is quite small, and undersized for O-Gauge. Here's an example of some Marx tinplate...

Some of the Lionel and American Flyer tinplate is about as small as these 6" tin cars. A lot of what I've seen is no bigger than most post-war Lionel O-Gauge.

O72 should be fine for your tinplate. It's the turn outs that are usually the issue. My layout uses 32 and 42 curves, 4.5 inches apart at the tightest section and my big 700 series passenger cars have no problem. They did however crash into engines with overhangs (postwar 671) on an earlier version where the tracks were closer.

Hope this helps

Tim

Will it operate on the track?  Yes, it will run just fine.

The bigger question might be side-to-side and top-to-bottom clearances on your layout.  The only way to determine that will be to evaluate what you plan to run on pretty much a case-by-case basis.  Some O gauge tinplate is quite small; other O gauge tinplate is quite large/long.

The only commonly found tinplate items that need 072 curves are the articulated streamliners - Hiawatha, UP M10000, and Rail Chief. Even those will actually run on 063, but at the time they were built 031 and 072 were the only options. (Not sure if they will run on 054; my layout doesn't have any.) As far as I know all of the other traditional tinplate will run on 031. There are a couple of modern items requiring wide curves, such as the Richart Bi-Polar, but even those should be OK on 072.

Allan and others are giving good advice to check clearances, especially for such items as the crane cars. 

Not all Hiawatha streamliners required 072 track.  Specifically, Pride Lines made two versions of their reproduction Hiawatha trains.  The first version required 072 track but their second version incorporated several engineering design changes, which allowed that train to operate on 031 track.  For example, the solid engine to tender draw bar used on their first reproduction Hiawatha train was modified with a "joint", i.e., it became articulated on their Hiawatha II locomotive.  Similarly, on their second version all the vestibules between the Hiawatha passenger cars were eliminated and replaced by metal ends to the cars and O gauge knuckle couplers.  These and other changes allowed Pride Lines Hiawatha II trains to navigate 031 curved track.

Bob

If you watch the track radius required on the larger streamlined sets you should not encounter any problems. I run Std & O-Gauge together without any problems. It's so nice to have all five loops running at once with my train room lights dimmed. Keep us posted as to your progress. Remember it's all about having fun....Good Luck!                  

Streamlined cars will not run on O54 track. 

In answer to someones ? above.

I have atlas o and ross switches and their are a few places where 21" cars are very very close to scenery. Are the "O" gauge the same height and width of standard gauge except the wheels are "O" gauge width or is the whole train scaled down?

The whole trains are scaled down from Standard Gauge…considerably.  One of the reasons I switched from Std. Gauge to O gauge some seven years ago.  

Standard Gauge is excellent, of course, but my space considerations pretty much necessitated going with O, which I can also run on my regular O gauge layout if I care to.

MikeMike,

   These gentlemen have given you good advise and I would like to fill in the blanks just a little for ya.  If you are talking about 072 Conventional Tubular pretty much all the different Tin will run.  However track does matter, especially when it comes to switches and Tin Plate engines and tenders, along with some of the crane cars.  Atlas, Gargraves and some Ross switches are going to give you problems with your Tin plate trains, as long as you stay with 072 switches FasTrack runs Tin very very well, same with Atlas Industrial Rail, with white cloud track base, you can even transition between these 2 type tracks and Tin Plate run smoothly.   The RealTrax also Runs Tin well, except for the switches, in fact the Lionel 2600 series Tin Plate rolling stock even runs well on 031 RealTrax, the inside loop of our Tin Plate Christmas layout runs on 031 RealTrax with zero problems.  Hope this expands your knowledge about running Tin Plate a little, good luck with your layout.

PCRR/Dave

PCRR/Dave gives some very good advice. When you are ready to lay track think ahead to what trains you want to run. Find out the little problems with any type of train. The Tinplate Forum is a great source of knowledge for any one new to the dark side.

 I built my layout many years ago to make clearance for a Bigboy. I figured if it works for the Bigboy it will work on anything.

  I was wrong. Bigger Prewar engines smash into tunnel portholes and the drivers scrape the passenger platforms.

  I hope you all learn from my mistake.

Of course if you like to run a lot of different O gauge, from different manufacturers, you may want to have one loop on your layout with now turn outs also. Then Marx, Lionel O27, Ives, etc, will all have a place to run with no problems.

Tim

You can attempt to figure this out, but you really won't know unless you put the train on the track and carefully/slowly move it around the track by hand. You'll see any overhang issues or clearance issues and can correct them.

That being said, I agree with all the above responses. If the track spacing accounts for overhang, and the cars are neither too tall nor too wide, everything should be OK. Running 031 stuff on 072 track minimizes the overhang even more, so you're helping yourself every time you find that you can step up the track radius.

Timothy,

  You are absolutely correct and my layouts usually do have such a loop for just that reason.

PCRR/Dave