Please Mr. Bachman ( if your as old as I am you will remember dancing to a tune with a title very similar to this. Hope if brings a smile) If you would bring out a Spectrim PRR H9s or H10s 2-8-0 with the same quality as the EM-1 (one of the best engines I ever purchased) you couldn't keep up with the orders. They used them for switching as well as road engines. There are probably more PRR modelers than most other roads combined. That's why sales are so high. Just get the whistle right. One of the roads that I know of, the Western & Allegheny, bought some second hand showing that the short lines also had them. Great short line engine. Bet this post will draw a few pages. Bill
Hi: Understand where your coming from PF. Been there done that, But really, 1950's Zamic and the lead filled material standards, with Pittman outside frame motors sticking into the cab interior, against today's standards? Sound was unthinkable in the price range and quality 10 years ago we enjoy today. The EM-1 and the PRR H class engines were a few of the most requested engines listed on BLI's site until they took it down. The only good thing I can say about that era now is that they did pull. But it required a few or more amps to do it. Bill
There have always been a lot of PRR locos on the market for a simple reason - they sell well. Not sure why but some roads (such as Mopac) just can't drive the numbers to justify a production run.
One of the beauties of the old Penn Line/Bowser H-9 was that the boiler was made of a soft metal. I have seen several of these engines where the owner filed off the "shoulders" of the Belpaire firebox. That, plus a new cab, changed the engine completely. A big letdown with the Penn Line engines, and the H-9 in particular, is that they could pull very few cars. I think I got mine up to eight cars.
I do believe the Great Northern had engines with Belpaire fireboxes.
The Bachmann planners have to think about the market before bringing out a locomotive. Yes there are myriad Pennsy fans but how does that translate into sales?
Having spent many years as a model maker I can appreciate scale models and accuracy to a prototype. Having spent many years in the marketing end of the hobby business I also appreciate the fact that a hobby company must be as diverse as possible to survive in a niche market such as model railroading. Bachmann produces a wide variety of products in many scales and many detail levels - that's what makes Bachmann successful.
florey-
The Great Northern also ran locos with Belpaire fireboxes.
-- D
pennsy? no thank you, too much of that. Just my opinion.
Hell yes I would buy one as soon as it became available
I am sure the Bachmann K4s didn't have any selling problem
I wish they would come out with a PRR Mikado
i want an iron mountain 4-8-0 lettered for pennsy.
PRR M1/M1a and 2-10-0 were niche engines and were successful sellers for BLI
Yet there were many more PRR 2-8-0 freight engines than any other kind and were in service till the end of steam
473--H10s-----------586--H9s alone
Within the last year or so there was a layout article about a Rio Grande layout which was very well done and looked very nice, as I remember. There was one steamer which was was assembled by the owner and of which he seemed to be inordinately proud with Rio Grande markings. EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! I don"t think I need to tell you which 2-8-0 I'm talking about. Just like chalk screeching across a blackboard. It totaly ruined the viewing of his railroad for me. paul :o :o :( :'(
Yeah, inquiring minds would like to know?
Rich
So far as I know the Rio Grande NEVER had a loco with a belpaire firebox. In my opinion the Pensy"s locos looked very powerfull, bruteish, and ugly! Just my opinion. The H model in question looked so out of place in a Colorado mountain setting that it just totally grossed me out and spoiled the scene.
paul
I'm converting my spectrum 2-8-0 to look more like a C-48
and a belpaire on the Rio Grande?!?!? BLASPHEMY
If I ever bought an engine with a belpaire firebox, it would HAVE to be sand down or the whole locomotive would get an entirely new boiler
almost did that to the local clubs spectrum K4 and turn it into a New Haven I-4
Quote from: beampaul7 on February 19, 2012, 04:12:43 PM
So far as I know the Rio Grande NEVER had a loco with a belpaire firebox. In my opinion the Pensy"s locos looked very powerfull, bruteish, and ugly! Just my opinion. The H model in question looked so out of place in a Colorado mountain setting that it just totally grossed me out and spoiled the scene.
paul
They are that
(http://bandb3536.com/trains/prr280.jpg)
(http://bandb3536.com/trains/prr280b.jpg)
Quote from: florynow on February 12, 2012, 12:04:00 PM
Lionel made toy trains and did lots of PRR-quasi-stuff because of the market they were in back then..... apparently not much different from now in certain arenas. I hope that Bachmann is not becoming a toy train player in similar fashion. With fewer sound equipped generic Spectrum steam locomotives (model-railroader-friendly undecorated models in particular) and more non-prototypical Durango Silverton trains sets and way-bigger-is-way-better (but largely useless on a typically small layout) stuff like Schnabel cars ....... I don't know what to think. I'm glad I have what (very nice out of production) Bachmann equipment that I have because I believe a drought is coming.
Fret not young one. I'd just about bet someone else's life that the reason we see so many DRGW overgauged engines is for one reason only: The DRGW.
Not many people model narrow gauge, but lots of people already have a Bachmann set, or their Dad's old layout, or something akin. So what's going to sell for the DRGW in their gift shop? HO or N, it's going to be a standard gauge. And if you really want to split hairs, the DRGW was at one time a dual guage railroad...
Far as the Schnabel car, Bachman will tell you the same thing, they sold it because there's a niche markwet of modern era modellers that wanted a nice High-Wide load and didn't want to pay Brass prices and din't know the kit versions well enough. Had Bachman:China not done the groundwork for their Schnabel, Bach:USA wouldn't have retooled the molds to do it here.
If you want, take heart in that the 2012 catalog doesn't have the Schnabel cars in it. Cause I for one am sadly dissapointed that I may not have gotten a chance to get one.
(And was kinda hoping Bachmann might tool up some alternative loads)
Now if only we can get non-brass DRGW steam ;) ;) ;)
AMEN BROTHER! :D ;D :o
belpaire fireboxes don't suit my tastes, thats my biggest beef with PRR then it goes on to tender shape, headlight positioning,the dark green mixed with ark red its just not a good road for me. I'lll say the only belpaire firebox engine I have is an Aristocraft G scale 0-4-0 turned into a 0-4-4t commuter engine and even thats on the waiting list to be shopped down and those pointed edges smoothened over
At first I thought the Belpaire boilers were ugly as all get out
But now that I read more and more books on the PRR and visit the RR Museum of PA I have come to really like them
If the color is done correctly you can only detect the green color in bright sun light, and then it has to be very clean. Otherwise it looks dusty and smokey flat black! I only noticed the Brunswick green when the sun was out on the K4s when it was on display at Horseshoe Curve one trip. Color was used by the PRR as they determined it held up better than straight black under the then paint manufactures formulas. Information taken from the Keystone from an article dealing with the green color. Cab color was very dark mixture of freight car color and black. In latter days depending on repaints it varied from straight black to straight freight car color and every thing in between depending on what was on hand. Correct colors were followed more closely when repainted at Altoona. Bill
Quote from: florynow on February 26, 2012, 04:47:18 PM
I also suspect that, in the days before computer mixing of colors, that even the mighty PRR had variations in the various paints that changed from shop to shop day by day.
PF
Paul-
I'm not so sure. There have been standard colors for many, many years and custom colors were described by the formula of standard pigments which made the color. This all started with the printing industry which was well developed by the third quarter of the 19th Century.
-- D
it is well documented that the shades of "freight car colour" varied widely on both the pennsy and the b&o. not all the variations seen in old photos can be attributed to fading of the paint or film. there was alot of variation in the actual paint shades themselves. it is well documented that in the diesel era, certain paint shop foremen didn't follow the official painting diagrams to a t. this resulted in several known examples of switchers with keystones on the front. placement of keystones on the side in places other than those on the paint diagram, etc.
taking those two knowns into account, it is not unreasonable to think something similar occurred with "dark green locomotive enamel."
in later years, penn central had a habit of doing "quickie" repaints where they painted over the keystones and applied their own logos. many of these locomotives lasted into conrail, who painted over the penn central markings, and applied "CR" in their place. i have photos of such locomotives rusting away in the boneyard at altoona in the late 1980s, 20 years after the demise of the pennsy.
I recall reading somewhere that PRR Brunswick green got its greenish tinge from copper added to the paint. If you own a boat you may paint the bottom of the hull with a copper bearing paint - it deters barnacles (so my neighbor tells me.) Maybe there was a reason for the Pennsy to do this.
I drove cross country in 1970 and on the way home I passed a big PC yard. Sitting on a siding was a black PC E-8 or 9. The afternoon sun was shining on the engine and you could see the PRR dulux gold stripe thought the layers of paint. That speaks to the quality of the repainting.
Oops - I broke my promise never to mention the successor to the PRR and NYC.