"Metal figures for use with HO buildngs" Topic

Kibri is re-releasing its Old West series. What figures would work with HO scale, other than soft plastics? Preiser do some hard plastic western sets. Does anyone do 20mm metals?

Scales are interesting things in that despite labels, size seems to vary from manufacturer to manufacture. HO means half O scale and yet I think we all know that O scale is not consistent from manufacturer to manufacturer. The doors on the K Line O scale super market are much smaller than the doors on the Plasticville O scale super market. The point is that some HO will actually work just fine with 15mm. If the Blue Moon are close to 18mm as the site indicates and the Kibri are at the small end of the HO scale, Kibri and Blue Moon Wild West might work well together.

An 1:72 figure is about 120% the size of an HO figure (averaged) and a Blue Moon figure, top of the head, will barely reach the shoulder of a 1:72 figure. If you can convert that image in your head it will help you determine if HO works with Blue Moon. I'd say some HO can work sometimes and sometimes not.

To the original post, Stone Mountain Miniatures used to have a range of ACW figures that were designed to match to HO. Certainly you could adapt a variety of confederate figures to western figures. Hunt up 20mm ranges of figures, that is approximately the same as HO. Good luck.

I believe that Frying Pan does their figures in 20mm

If you like the Blue Moon figures you may also like the buildings designed to go with them.

link Old West'

link Old West Buildings'

Kibri are really even smaller than HO. Regular HO is 1/72. Kibri building are 1/87 th and are really really tiny when compared to HO figures. Maybe good for 15 mm.

Why would you say that? "Kibri are really even smaller than HO, HO is 1/87 and Kibri are 1/87 and regular HO is 1/87 and the only exception is Japanese HO".
HO= 18mm, due to the swelling of todays 15mm they will do quite happily for 15mm. Especially if you wish to play inside.
PDF link
@War in 15mm: the scales are set by international standards. If there is a "larger" and "smaller" HO it means:
1 you are looking at Japanese items, which are swollen to 1/80 to represent 3'6" on most lines except sometimes bullet trains, which run on standard gauge.
2 You have mixed up OO and HO.
Or:
3 the manufacturer is lazy and a liar, and has picked a floating point somewhere between HO and OO, called it both, and thinks its customer base is a bunch of five-year-olds and therefore they don't need to care. They certainly don't need to care about return business.

Thank you chironex for the link to NMRA. Per NMRA standards, in HO scale 3.5mm = 1 foot. So if the average human in 1880 is 5'6" (it's more like 5'8" today)then
3.5mm/ft x 5.5 ft=19.25mm
So a big 15mm or a small-to-average 20mm would be good.
Assuming the building maker scaled the buildings to 3.5mm=1ft.
I'd always wondered how they ever came up with a screwy number like 1/87 for HO. Especially if it's SUPPOSED to be 1/2 "O"; that should make it 1/96? Now I know -- it's 3.5mm=1 foot. It works out to 1/87.085…

I'd always wondered how they ever came up with a screwy number like 1/87 for HO. Especially if it's SUPPOSED to be 1/2 "O"; that should make it 1/96? Now I know -- it's 3.5mm=1 foot. It works out to 1/87.085…

Smudge on the paper is the best guess at this time. Lionel was the one who created the 1:48 scale O-Gauge. At the time, they were copying a Märklin set – but the drafts man misread the Märklin standard. If you buy 0-Gauge buildings from outside the US they will be 1:43.5 (or relatively close to that).

When Lionel screwed up there design…other companies in the US followed, they could save a bit of money by using smaller castings and the like.

"At the time, they were copying a Märklin set – but the drafts man misread the Märklin standard."

Perhaps they changed it deliberately as 1/48 is an architectural scale in the U.S.

It's possible, but there was an article from one of the Lionel people in an old Model RR magazine. They freaked out when the first parts came off the line because they didn't fit the packaging right. By that time, it was too late – since they had already invested too much in tooling and parts.

Well, I have owned Kibri Old West buildings and they are much smaller than say Bachman Old West buildings.
Just beware before you buy them, that no matter what it may say on the package, they are on the small side.
Scale seems to be in the eye of the beholder.

That is impossible. "close 'nuff" is in the EYE of the beholder, "scale" is in the MATHS of the beholder. The scale in question is a set value and there IS no small side. There is really only one possibility and that is that one manufacturer or the other is simply lying.

Or possibly both.