MTH Electric Trains and the Atlas Model Railroad Company announced a shared asset deal that will allow each company to use select models from the other company’s O scale tools and molds. The first of these shared assets will be passenger car tooling that can complement locomotives being produced by the other company. The program […]
We’re always adding new content to our website. Here are some recent items you may have missed. The Lionel 700E Hudson steam engine Polar Express layout build video A compilation video from CTT’s five-day layout build. American Flyer store display photo from the 1950s What’s the story behind these photos? Senior Editor Roger Carp tells […]
Have you ever been curious about how to calculate the speed of toy trains? Running trains over a layout, how can we know whether it’s moving at a realistic speed? Answering this question requires a bit of math. Speed, or velocity, is simply distance divided by time. In the United States, we are used to […]
5 tips for better scenes on your toy train layout Whenever someone asks me what makes a toy train layout special, I reply that detail is the key. Size and scope don’t matter as much as what a modeler does in the space available. Developing memorable scenes – “vignettes,” as they’re called – can […]
Richard Arsenault’s S gauge railroad (shown in the February 2003 issue of Classic Toy Trains) illustrates the drama that a grade can add to a model railroad. The battle of man versus mountain can be won in S, O, or Standard gauges only if the inclines aren’t too great. Classic Toy Trains file A […]
Submit your My Greatest Find story We at Classic Toy Trains invite you to tell us about your “greatest find.” What’s the best train or train-related item you’ve ever found? What makes it your “greatest find”? Does the locomotive, set, car, or whatever have a fascinating story attached to it? Did you search for years […]
Isn’t amazing how a single vintage photograph of a store that stocked electric trains can serve as a time machine to carry us back several decades. Pictures like this one are scarce, and so we at Classic Toy Trains know how fortunate we are to be able to share it with you. Our gratitude goes […]
Trains.com Summer Camp 2023 has shut down for the season. But that certainly doesn’t mean Camp Director David Popp’s modeling efforts will come to an end! In fact, David recently hosted a Trains.com Webcam live stream video session (akin to Midday Modeler) from his basement, just to show and share many of the projects he’ll […]
Last Day of Summer Camp 2023 on Trains.com Video! Camp Director David Popp has been been working really hard all week to get his locomotive weathered, boxcar decaled, bridge constructed, detailed parts assembled and painted, as well as the truck project completed too. Although camp closes after this session, we’ll see you back on the regularly programmed Olympia […]
Summer Camp 2023 | Day Six. The “extra” days on the weekend have allowed Camp Director David Popp to tackle all of those little projects that he hasn’t had time to do while working on bigger efforts for the On30 scale Olympia Logging Co. railroad. Hard to label these “little” projects as chicken scratch…but one of […]
We’re always adding new content to our website. Here are some recent items you may have missed. A look at Menards 2023 Halloween village items Halloween village items are on the shelves at Menards. What might work for your layout this year? The return of the MTH RS11 Chris Montagna reviews the return of the […]
Digital Command Control, or DCC, is one of two ways most modelers control their trains. Instead of sending current directly to the rails, and making any train that’s receiving that current move, DCC sends packets of information through the rails and to individual locomotives to tell them what to do. For a DCC system to […]
