I was rummaging through a box of parts and miscellaneous items the other day when I came across this body and chassis from an old Atlas O scale industrial switcher. At one point, I guess I saved this as a “future project.”
I remember when Atlas tried to make a push into scale O gauge modeling, perhaps as far back as the 80s? AHM was headed that way too, and they produced a very similar looking four wheel switcher.
These things are quite common, almost as easy to find as black NYC gondolas. I have always surmised that many were purchased thinking they would be compatible with three rail O gauge trains. Many of these models are available still in their original boxes.
So my question is, what can we do with these? Has anyone ever tried to re-power one to operate on three rails? The first thing that comes to mind would be the plastic chassis from Lionel’s four wheel industrial switchers – but I would want something a little more “switcher like” in terms of speed, etc. One truck from a modern six-axle diesel could work – but which one? Is the cab tall enough for the vertical can motor?
I wonder if the tooling for these models is still around? And, of so, why hasn’t anyone produced them again, especially with the markets for two rail scale and three rail high rail much larger than they were years ago?
