Brass Track

[CBQ Fan]

A friend of mine just started buying some HO trains and track. I haven’t paid any attention to HO since the early 90’s when I started modeling N scale. He just bought some Atlas flex track and thinks it is brass.  How old would that be?  I am thinking he probably bought nickel silver and just doesn’t realize it. It was labeled as new, seems odd but like I said I don’t follow HO.

[Steveruger45]

I remember it vaguely.  Code 100 brass set track and 1960’s era.  I don’t recall flex though

[Mark5]

Probably 1960s. Does it have the old "fiber" ties or is it injection molded? The Tyco HO set I got one Christmas (1960s) was brass sectional track.

By the 1970s all I remember in hobby shops was nickel/silver. Although I modeled in N back then, I was in an HO club (N/S rail).

Brass has a less than stellar reputation for conductivity.

Mark

[CBQ Fan]

It will be interesting to see it when he gets it. I think either he or the eBay seller are unsure of what they have!

[peteski]

Since nickel-silver is actually a type of a brass alloy  (which contains no silver), it can have that warm-silver (almost gold) look to it.   Plus if it is oxidized, it also looks darker, with warm tone to the color.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nickel_silver

[conrad]

I remember it vaguely.  Code 100 brass set track and 1960’s era.  I don’t recall flex though

Wow, I sort of remember HO brass flex track in the late 50's.  I think my father got it a Polks, a hobby shop in Manhattan.

Oxidized quite often, needed lots of cleaning.

Conrad

[Jim Costello]

Atlas was still making brass track in '87/88 at their NJ site. I was lucky enough to see their factory, track being, solenoid motors being would and assembled etc.

Jim

[Mark5]

From the April 1970 catalog:

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[CRL]

I remember brass track from the 50’s. My scoutmaster had an HO scale layout that had an old section of brass track that was very hard to keep clean & running in our humid coastal environment. He was “intending” to replace it with nickel silver, but I’m guessing it was still on his layout when he passed away many years latter. Doc didn’t like to throw anything away. I donated all my old scout camping gear to the troop when I aged out, and Doc’s widow gave it all back to my mother after he passed.

[CBQ Fan]

I finally got to see the track tonight. All flex track was clearly modern Atlas flex track. Nickel silver. He also had a ton of section pieces with brass rails. He has purchased a lot of Athearn blue box cars and locos. Reliving his youth!  It is fun watching him get hooked!

[wvgca]

brass sectional track is good for making static wall displays  ...
for running ?? not so much ..., lol

[jagged ben]

In about 1988 when I first got into N scale and my dad took me to the hobby shop to buy more track, the first thing the guy at the counter starting talking about was brass vs. nickle-silver.  It turned out he was an HO guy who didn't realize that the N scale track only came in nickle-silver, until a colleague set him straight.   We were buying sectional track so I don't know about flex, but there you go. Atlas was still making brass sectional HO in the late eighties.

[Mark5]

Atlas was still making brass sectional HO in the late eighties.

Bizzare. Stopped seeing it myself in the 70s. @Atlas Paul

[CBQ Fan]

Bizzare. Stopped seeing it myself in the 70s. @Atlas Paul

Could be left over stock from the 70’s.