Do our toys affect our modelling now?

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

I think you misunderstood me, its not the bricks themselves that were HO, Its just that they chose to use them to make buildings whose overall dimensions were approximately HO in size. You can make a lego building with lego bricks almost any scale you want! And I mean strangely as in you might not have expected that what is a stand alone scale less brick would have been used to build model railway sized buildings, not an OO verses HO debate!!

It was quite explicitly sold in the 1950s in mainland Europe as suitable to build a town for your HO railway. I had a set with a cardboard base which had a town centre road network and the railway station site printed on it, definitely for HO track. Their HO road vehicles were some of the best scaled for the purpose, but on the fragile side - unlike the bricks - and didn't last that long with myself and siblings using them vigorously.

 

I graduated to the Marklin manufactured Meccano equivalent. A knock off, but superior in many respects. My finest achievement was a cable car powered by my Mamod engine. Unfortunately I had neglected to provide any failsafe for the support wire, so when it broke the car pendulumed down into a large sash window. Since the car was solidly constructed the window glass was no obstacle. Thus I gained my training in how to linseed putty in a replacement pane. There's nothing like construction toys for learning how to do things...

[Arthur]

Does anyone remember Triang Arkitech, or was it Arcitex? Modular building kits that were produced in both 1/76 and 1/42 scale. I never had it as a child but I always hankered after a set.

EDIT it is Arkitex.

Yes, my brother and I had a set. Yellow, plastic, girders fixed together by pushing them into white nylon/plastic corner joints. Walls, plain, window and door, were clipped on and you had a choice of metal red or blue lower panels for the windows. Very 1960's. A neat and fun system.

 

Never had Lego but did have Meccano which was much more my kind of thing.