The terms 'toy train' and 'model train' are often used indiscriminately by many.
They are used as if they are interchangeable, but are they really? A closer look at both is necessary to tell for sure.
A toy train is nothing more than just a toy.
It may move thanks to battery or a clockwork movement, but nothing more sophisticated than that.
Toy trains are usually less intricate and less elaborately designed than model trains, and as a matter of fact may not look very much like an actual train.
They are also in general less durable than model trains.
But thanks to their reduced complexity versus modeled trains, they nearly always outsell them.
They are often given out to children as rewards for good performance in school and so on and so forth.
Or they can be purchased out and out as toys, and not necessarily bought as rewards for anything.
These Types of trains, on the other hand, are part and parcel of a large framework which includes not only the trains themselves but also an entire miniature railway system and, in some cases, figures of people, buildings, cars, even mountains, hills, bodies of water - all of which have been reduced in size but using scales to make them easy to handle and construct, but which still make them proportionate to one another.
In addition, those who engage in the creation of these setups often choose to recreate certain railway stations that exist or that use to exist.
These trains go by different scales or sizes, based on pioneering work done by the international model railroading committee to establish standards regarding scale and other important considerations.
There are several scales for toy trains, such as the N-Scale, the HO-Scale and the O-Scale.
N-Scale model trains, for example, are very small, with a scale of 1:160 of the original train, and need to run along a 24-inch wide track.
HO-Scale trains, on the other hand, come with a scale of 1:87.
They need a railroad track 69 inches wide.
As they are half the size of the O-Scale Model Trains - neither too small nor too large - they have become the most popular choice among both veterans or novices.
Lastly, O-Scale train are the largest, 1:48 of the actual train, and require a track 31 inches wide.
These are the trains of choice for those who have the space for them and want to show them off.