The cache included two F7, or similar, locomotives (One Santa fe warbonnet and one Chessie) and two Santa Fe switchers of a design I am not familiar with. The latter look in pretty good condition, but the "F" units seem pretty far gone. The shell of the Chessie unit looks fairly good, but there is no motor. The Santa Fe has a motor, but very gunky wheels and gears. Don't know if it is worth salvaging. There is only one freight car and one caboose intact. The rest are in various states of disrepair. Some are just missing couplers or trucks, while others are probably DOA. There are a lot of loose trucks as well (in good to poor condition), so I can probably put some cars back together.

On the upside the collection includes a lot of track. There are 8 pieces of flex track, about 28-29 inches long in mint condition. There is also a LOT of Atlas sectional track that is slightly corroded, but looks salvagable. I didn't find any with wiring terminals, though. There are also 12 pieces of cork roadbed about 30 inches long.

I'm thinking I might be able to use this to start a layout. But I have a few questions. Like I said, I know nothing about the unique characteristics of N scale. They seem so, so tiny!

Like the couplers...
Those I have are little squarish things that don't look like they'd hold very well. Are knuckle type couplers available?

Or the power pack...
Can I use the same power pack I use for HO trains, or do I need something else?

Passenger cars...
I'd really like to build a layout with passenger trains, since that is my main interest. What is a good track radius for N scale passenger cars? Who makes decent N scale passenger cars that don't cost an arm and a leg?

Finally, I also received a huge stack of model railroad magazines, mostly from the 1990s. It will take me some time to see what I can use from those. Once that is done, is there anyone who might want them, or shall I just send them to the recycling bin?

Any other suggestions are welcome.

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Trust God, love your neighbor, and never mistake opinion for truth.
-Mr. Toy

I have some answers to your questions.

The N scale stuff you have looks like a nice start. However the F-Units almost sound Bachmann by their description. I would save the shells and scrap the rest. Someody, I beleave Intermountain or Micro Trains, makes N scale F unit power chassis that I think will fit these locomotives.

I also run a repair service. What you can't get put back together I would be glad to give it a look see.

There are N scale knuckle couplers. They are manufactured by Micro Trains. They are a division of Kadee so the quaility is there.

You can run N scale trains with packs made for HO. However, you will want to run at half the HO settings due to N scales smaller size and therefore power requirements.

On the passenger cars, they requre only modest space compared to HO standards. Due to the fact that N is nearly half the size of HO. 15" radius curves are pretty generoue for N scale passenger cars.

I am interested in those Model railroaders. I am collecting back issiues of Several Magazines. When your done give me an email and We will work something out.

I hope I have been of assistance.

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Trust God, love your neighbor, and never mistake opinion for truth.
-Mr. Toy

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Trust God, love your neighbor, and never mistake opinion for truth.
-Mr. Toy