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Tony Cook
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 Posted - October 19 2006 :  12:33:10 PM Link directly to this topic  Show Profile  Add Tony Cook to Buddylist
Hey,

Well as Halloween is around the corner, how about everyone putting their two-cents in and pick the most frightening HO-Scale loco/rolling stock ever produced???

I'll go with the American, Train & Track HO-Scale FT-A unit from the late '60s. If it doesn't break my camera, I'll get a picture and post it for those who haven't seen one before.

Can anyone top the AT&T FT-A for scariest model?[XX(]

Tony Cook
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MagnoliaAcademy
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 Posted - October 19 2006 :  2:54:06 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
...for sheer white-hair-inducing, paroxysm of terror frightfulness I nominate John Long's discovery, to be viewed (with trepidation) in this forum under the title "What the heck is this?" in the Tyco motive power category.
I caution the reader, however: proceed at your own risk. Protracted viewing of the "foofoopoopoochoochoo" has been known to compel the unwary to drink to excess (or at the very least induce sterility.)
Tyco-corcist in residence,
MagnoliaAcademy
where the ghosts congregate

ps: viewing the grotesque ATT EMD-F conjured up by Doctor Cookenstein has been known, like the Gorgon, to turn men to stone. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
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GoingInCirclez
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 Posted - October 19 2006 :  10:50:23 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add GoingInCirclez to Buddylist
Hmm.... can't vouch for "ever" produced since I'm but a young pup me-self, but as far as I've personally seen? Hmm...

- The Athearn GP30 comes to mind. Man, talk about a capital SNAFU - they took what was arguably EMD's most distinctive volume-produced diesel and turned it into a brick! (And even more amazingly, Arnold / Atlas did the SAME BLASTED THING in N scale!). I'd heard whispers about how bad they were for years... I kept thinking "Athearn, bad? Seriously? No way...!" THEN I finally saw a collection of 'em at a train show a few years back. OH THE HORROR! (And yet I still wanted to buy one... clearly something is wrong with me)

- I came across a classic import today (Flieschmann, maybe?) of an EMD SW-__ unit... complete with big honkin' dynamic brake fan in the hood. Looked more like a military bomb target.

- Ever take a good look at an old Life-Like full-dome passenger car? *shudders*

- The Model Power cylindrical hopper might be the absolute crudest alleged model of a prototype freight car I have ever seen.

- For imaginary rolling stock, the Tyco triple-dome is pretty scary. Would hate to see one of those explode.... Hoo boy, fun times for all...

Edited by - GoingInCirclez on October 19 2006 10:52:51 PM
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Hypoponera
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 Posted - October 19 2006 :  11:43:33 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Hypoponera to Buddylist
Does that SW-? that you described have narrow guage wheelsets? I might just have one of those. Mine is only marked "Western Germany" in 3 different locations.
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GoingInCirclez
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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  12:01:17 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add GoingInCirclez to Buddylist
quote:
Does that SW-? that you described have narrow guage wheelsets? I might just have one of those. Mine is only marked "Western Germany" in 3 different locations.

Originally posted by Hypoponera - October 20 2006 : 03:43:33 AM



That's the one! Couldn't tell who made it, but it did say Western Germany. Didn't notice if it was narrow-gauge though, although the wheels DID look very strange.
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Hypoponera
Mikado


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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  12:42:08 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Hypoponera to Buddylist
I got mine in a lot on Ebay. I wanted the lot for the Athearn GP30. I did not pay any attention to the SW-? until it arrived. Mine was powered at one point, but the mechanism had been removed long before I got it! Thanks for giving me some clue as to who may have made it.
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Tony Cook
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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  07:28:57 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Tony Cook to Buddylist
As GoingInCirclez mentioned, the poor Athearn GP-30 does deserve dis-honor. The Athearn GP-30 is easily their one big miss in the rash of '60s and early '70s EMD/GE locos they rolled out.

For what may be EMD's most well-thought of hood-unit, its appearance in HO-scale plastic was a rocky road. Athearn's pops up while EMD is building them too. An article in Model Railroader states that Athearn wasn't pleased with the GP-30...hmmm...wonder why?...and it molds were quickly re-used to tool the GP-35, thus putting the inferior Athearn attempt at a GP-30 to eternal rest.

I remember being so excited when I saw the Lionel-HO catalog announcing its GP-30. They used a brass model painted in Burlington Northern for the catalog pics and I wondered what their real GP-30 would look like...and was rewarded with what is probably one of the better original toolings to come from the toy train set of the '70s. Bachmann-Kader has certainly gotten plenty of mileage outta this mold over the years since.

Then finally the Life-Like Proto 2000.

This missed opportunities make you wonder though. Rather than doing the high-nose GP-38....why didn't Roco tool up a GP-30 for Atlas back in the '70s? Why didn't Athearn re-visit the GP-30 in the '80s when they did the GP-38-2 and SD-40-2...their first efforts to leave cast-on grabs off the shell? And how about Kato...admid the runs of various GP-35 phases?

Well, what might have been....


Tony Cook
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MagnoliaAcademy
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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  10:21:25 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
"trains that go bump in the night..."
Tycreatures:
Can anyone leave the crypt long enough to post a pic of the "EMD switcher" referred to by Count Circ-ula?
You might be referring to the weird offering by Distler; sold as Distler in Europe and distributed by and sold as "Cragstan" here in Amerika.
Fleischmann's American-prototype switcher is an all-die-cast gear-driven heavyweight, either in dark brown or CNW colors. It was marketed as (and pretty clearly is) modeled on the early Baldwin road switchers.
Funny how styling snafus and marketing terds make for collecting bedlam, eh? GP-30s (and the very limited number of master-boxed GP-30 set offerings) are near the top of many Athearn collectors' "want lists."
As for the full-dome passenger streamliner, blame Penn-Line and Varney, who--as per usual in the weird world of vintage--had prototype craziness on planned-for real roadbed opartion to blame. If passenger revenue had revived, and/or the ICC had relaxed regulations, what looks weird would be accepted. The much maligned Tyco-Talgo motive power shares the same fate.
And like all "monsters" they are sought by today's teratological train collectors with absolute abandon.
Mag-Zilla

my vote for the "abandon all hope, ye you enter here" sweepstakes of real-life ugly HO engines would be Louis Marx's hilarious so-called General Purpose diesel. Found only rarely, in YELLOW AND GREY fantasy SanteFe colors and Monon livery, it is grotesque. Subsequently, it is among the HO Marx collector's most coveted acquisitions.
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DaCheez
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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  5:50:18 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Click to see DaCheez's MSN Messenger address  Add DaCheez to Buddylist
I've got some old trains that my grandma found in her basement. Not sure who makes this one, but its a brown metal CN boxcar. The mould used to make this was either dropped on the floor or modeled after a boxcar found in a junkyard. The mould is made so that there are large dents in the roof. I don't know what this company was modeling this after but it is screwed up!!! It's got trucks that look way too big and the strangest lookin couplers I've ever seen. Please PM me if you would like me to email a pic so you can see how ugly it is.

-cheez
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MagnoliaAcademy
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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  7:39:27 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
Greetings Ghoulies, Ghosties and things that go bump in the night...
"Tarantu"-nera, out New Mexico way, has sallied all eight gigantic three-story-tall hairy legs and scary mandibles forth from his nuclear-contamination-riddled victim-strewn lair long enough to forward a pic of the "mystery" EMD referred to be both he and Count Circula. It is, in fact, (as I conjectured) a lowly Distler/Cragstan: a pitiful creature included in a number of battery-operated imported train sets circa 1960.
boo.
Mag-Zilla
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VintageHO
Mikado


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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  9:28:38 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add VintageHO to Buddylist
Here you go Mag-Zilla & Circ-cula, Fresh out of the Crypt.


Numquam Immoderatio Satis Est
(Too Much Is Never Enough )

Edited by - VintageHO on October 20 2006 9:58:07 PM
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GoingInCirclez
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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  10:57:25 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add GoingInCirclez to Buddylist
[:0] AHHHHH! The pimple exhaust fans! The fat angular Pinocchio snout!! The boxy roof lines!!! The unpainted battery boxes!!!! AIEEE!!!!!





(someday I will have one, you know) [|)]
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MagnoliaAcademy
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 Posted - October 20 2006 :  11:29:06 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
Well I see its after sunset because VintageHOsferatu has left his coffin and spread his nightmare Athearn vision upon all unwary Tycreatures.
I think that Reading livery is actually pretty nice looking. If you really wanted to scare Circ-ula to his senses about acquiring such an abomination you should have posted SanteFe freight... ugh!
Mag-zilla
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Hypoponera
Mikado


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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  01:27:11 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Hypoponera to Buddylist
Here are a couple photos of the SW-?.
http://hypoponera.tripod.com/hypoponeras_photos/index.album?i=4&s=1
http://hypoponera.tripod.com/hypoponeras_photos/index.album?i=5&s=1
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Tony Cook
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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  06:18:04 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Tony Cook to Buddylist
OUCH! Thanks Magnolia Academy...

I had forgotten that "wonderful" MARX.... uhh...HO-Sca...well...uh...sorta...scaled...model of an EMD GP-...uh... GP-7? No... GP-9.... hmmm.... let's just say GEEP.

To clarify, when I refer to the MARX Geep as being "scaled," I'm really talking more in the "Creature From The Black Lagoon" area of scales rather than say the Kato-Proto-Atlas area of scales.

That MARX Geep might beat my ATT FT-A unit.

[8]

Tony Cook
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MagnoliaAcademy
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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  10:18:05 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
ghost trains...
Tycreatures:
Glad to have Baron Von Cookenstein acknowledge the truly frightening Marx GEE-K 13 road diesel as a contender in the scare-stakes.

Have dredged some steam-belching candidates from the murky depths of the roundhouse lagoon:
1) Ample evidence the GP-30 wasn't the Athearn mad scientists' only turd--the appropriately named "Li'l Monster," the late unlamented 0-4-2. (This is an opportunity for V-HOsferatu to post another excellent pic so Count Circula can add yet another butt-ugly Athearn to his "want list.")
2) A nod to Baron Von Cookenstein's whipping boy ATT is nomination of their absolutely hideous attempt to turn a cheap brittle plastic-shelled British Jinty tanker into an American steam switcher. This crapper was "included" in ATT's initial train set offerings at their line's "steamer" (yeah, as in the steam rising from a horse apple.)
3) Fleischmann's "Americanization" of the massive Deutsche Bundesbahn prototype 0-6-0 switcher. It is a huge top heavy tank loco with--in true Teutonic fashion--ridiculously overbilt unprototypical valve gear and hopelessly deep Euro-00 wheel flanges. Alas, while incredibly scary, it is probably too "scary-cool" to be a serious contender.
4 and 5) And probably what Mag-zilla would regard as the most likely contenders: from the "high-end" Marx line, their incredibly scary-ugly misbegotten 0-4-0 steam tank turd, generally with a huge poorly heat-stamped "NYC" on the side (or NH or other innapropriate signage) and last, and perhaps even more scary: the Marx-built (in the "Crown Colony of Hong Kong) advertising premium send-away steamer from the infamous GGVGR set. Remember The Jolly Green Giant standing astride the little train in the "Garden in the Valley?" The canning company's ad men thought it would be clever to offer a train to the kiddies so they commissioned Marx, who came up with the Green Giant Valley Railroad: a scary-in-spades set that Moms sent away for. The engine, my nomination for scariest steam, was a modification of the already scary steamer offered in their basic battery-powered cheap sets. Marx added a honkin red-dolloped "Cow catcher", a huge silly gold tipped "balloon stack" and gold sand dome, gold "trim" and blood red cab bearing the GGVRR monicker in gold on black. Behind was dragged a far-too-small tender declaring in gold it served the "Valley Express," a couple of flats molded in frightening colors--one bearing an electric yellow "billboard" proclaiming the train's name and bringing up the rear a crap-boose that gives the old gandy-dancer's caboose apellation "crummy" a whole new meaning. The so-called "Valley Express" caboose gets a separate nomination from me as ugliest piece of HO (more like OO as in Oh! Oh!) rolling stock. It looks like an red outhouse on wheels.

be afraid. be very afraid.

Mag-zilla
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catfordken
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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  2:12:08 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Send catfordken a Yahoo! Message  Add catfordken to Buddylist
many people have asked me why i dislike triang,heres the answer,plasticky c--p,ken
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DaCheez
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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  4:03:59 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Click to see DaCheez's MSN Messenger address  Add DaCheez to Buddylist
I got some old Tri-ang stuff from probably the 60's. It's really think plastic.
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VintageHO
Mikado


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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  10:02:55 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add VintageHO to Buddylist
Mag-Zilla & Circ-ula. Had go down to the crypt again. This time got the Santa Fe and friends, along with the "little Monster".
Eat your heart out. [:D] V-HOsferatu




Numquam Immoderatio Satis Est
(Too Much Is Never Enough )

Edited by - VintageHO on October 21 2006 10:06:02 PM
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MagnoliaAcademy
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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  10:30:37 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
Once again the Sun is set, the Moon is up and VintageHosferatu has posted pix of his sanguinary seductive "brides."
Seeing the GP30s all in a pretty row doesn't do justice to the reality of what Baron VonCookenstein has already related: the 30s look like the Athearn designers were forced to create the tooling viewing blueprints reflected in a funhouse mirror. I've never paid a great deal of attention 'til Tony's "nomination" for scariest scale HO model, so the day he posted this little Halloween forum I set one of my Athearn 30s down side-by-side with an old brassie (Gem, perhaps, don't remember anymore) and a (what I'd always regarded as a rather lowly specimen) Bachmann GP-30.
Imagine my fright when the lowly Bachmann bested the others for scale fidelity!
Still, V-HOsferatu's brides have me feasting on my wee-tiny heart just as he's predicted! (Don't remember ever seeing an undecorated 30 before, and the last two GP30s Athearn catalogued--the Reading and NYC--have also heretofore escaped my collecting clutches.) MAG-ZILLA GREEN WITH ENVY, ARGGHH!
As for the Li'l Monster: nice touch displaying with the box panel info.
Aint it hideous?
Mag-Zilla
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VintageHO
Mikado


Tyco Time

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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  10:39:43 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add VintageHO to Buddylist
Mag-Zilla. Just wanted to you to know. Since you call me V-HOsferatu. My other name is "The Undertaker" I studied under Professor Mordecai Wrott President of the Jekyll & Hyde Club. Here is a picture of my Certificate. As Stated on the bottom of the Certificate. It says: In Case Of Death. I Pledge To Donate My Remains To The International Association Of Mad Scientists' Experiment Fund. Not Valid In Utah. [:D]


Numquam Immoderatio Satis Est
(Too Much Is Never Enough )
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Rush2NY
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 Posted - October 21 2006 :  11:07:51 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Rush2NY to Buddylist
In the early 90's? when Bachmann first came out with their Ez-Track sets, I purchased one to check it out. Whatever money they put into the track technology, they must have removed from the rolling stock budget. Man, is this the ugliest rolling stock I had ever seen!!! A Frankenstein Penn Central green ATSF cattle car!.......Snot-monster yellow Milwaukee road boxcar that Milwaukee road never owned....a ghostly grey Southern gondola acting as a coal car and, of course, a vampire blood red ATSF caboose with plastic trucks that couldn't hold the wheelset in! Booo-tiful stuff I tell ya!

Russ
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GoingInCirclez
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 Posted - October 22 2006 :  12:57:46 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add GoingInCirclez to Buddylist
Re: Athearn GP30's, I'd seen all but the Santa Fe freight. Wonder why it doesn't have road#? I think the UP and Reading examples are the scariest, though. The light colors really evidence another thing that really killed the Athearn GP30: the drive-necessitated oversized wide hoods. Of course, this was a necessary evil, repeated on the GP9, SW7, GP35 and SD45... but it just loked particularly awful on the 30. Not entirely sure why that would be....

Rush- Ah, I was hoping somebody would mention those! Man, those early 90's Bachmann sets were som of the worst garbage ever foisted on would-be hobbyists. Wgat good was roadbed track when all the rooling stock was done up in two-color heatsamp jobs? Dull gray and red (no stripes) "warbonnet" F units, white-outline only Rock boxcars, fake "triangle pacific" cars, and the other cast of ne'er-do-wells you already added to the dunce list. Bleah!
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jlong
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 Posted - October 22 2006 :  01:07:42 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add jlong to Buddylist
I don't know about scary but the most sinister looking engine to me is an Espee SD-40-T2 Snoot tunnel motor. A reptile looking beast.

I can't think of what offhand but I think the Germans built the scariest looking engines I recall seeing.

John Long
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Tony Cook
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 Posted - October 22 2006 :  10:28:09 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Tony Cook to Buddylist
Yes, the Bachmann train set offerings from about the late-'80s until sometime in the early/mid 1990s were truly sad affairs. That poor F-9A unit only vaguely painted for Santa Fe...the warbonnet isn't even fully formed...let alone all the missing stripes, etc. When you look at sets of that period it makes one wonder if the ready-to-run train market was on its last legs. That is also about the time TYCO gives up and drops HO-scale trains.

Remember too Bachmann whittled away at its GP40 and U36B shells around this time. There are scary examples of red-and-chrome Santa Fe U36B models that have had the front and rear pilots cored out to the extreme to allow for the swinging coupler mounted to the truck. The GP40 gets this treatment too.

And paint must have been something nobody wanted to spare or spend money on at the time. Those 50' Box Cars that are cast in colored plastic and stamped with a bare minimum of effort. That blue "The Rock" Box Car is a prime example with no white patch inside the Rock Island "R" logo. One color only stamping on a car that appears to have been cast in color to avoid painting the shell is about as tight as you can get.

Luckily, Bachmann did get religion. Compare one of those 1990-ish train sets with today's offerings. The locos are all nicely painted and the drives are solid. And the Silver Series HO-scale rolling stock is very good with metal wheels and knuckle couplers and the couplers are body-mounted at that. One would have been hard pressed back then to believe that Bachmann's quality would increase as much as it has in the recent years.

Tony Cook
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MagnoliaAcademy
Hudson

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 Posted - October 22 2006 :  10:37:11 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
"Undertaker":
Thank you for allowing a few stolen, furtive glances at that which reposes in your subterranean crypt...
As the mad Arab, Abdhul Alhazred, wrote in the blasphemous and dreaded 'Necronomicon,' "The nethermost caverns are not for the fathoming of eyes to see, for their marvels are strange and terrific. Cursed the ground where dead thoughts live new and oddly bodied, and evil the mind that is held by no head...
"Great holes secretly are digged where earth's pores ought to suffice and things have learnt to walk that ought to crawl."
Arkham Academy
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GoingInCirclez
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 Posted - October 22 2006 :  4:59:12 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add GoingInCirclez to Buddylist
Tony C - Agreed; the newer Bachmann RTR sets are easily the best thing going and a fantastic value when they turn up at discounters around the holidays; I've often advoctaed hunting them down. Of course they're all made overseas now which won't do the "homeland" and guys like MagAc any respectable favors... but to get people in the hobby, there's no better choice.

Still, it would have been far better if they hadn't run so many people away all those years ago. Between Tyco's shoddy powertorques and Bachmann's horrid set jobs, there wasn't much reason for a kid to play the fool then.

Talk about a paradox - it took overseas slave labor staffing newly-tooled factories to afford the increase in quality we enjoy today, but to what effect? [B)]
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MagnoliaAcademy
Hudson

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 Posted - October 22 2006 :  6:31:46 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
Circlez:
Your question regarding V-HOsferatu's GP30 SanteFe and its lack of road number has me curious as well. It should be there and is something like 6327 (Don't hold me to that, however. Its been a while since I looked and I'm disinclined to rummage thru boxes.)
Regarding the matter of whether a small cadre of the American train buying public find Asian-rim bilge produced by children, underpaid peasants and political prisoners far more monstrous than anything EVER turned out in Compton, Los Angeles, Morrisville, PA or Woodbury Heights, NJ--regardless of the level of detail--well, I think that goes without saying.
Requiescat in Pace, American Industry...
Cavete a Canibus (beware of the dogs)
MagnoliaAcademy

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Tony Cook
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 Posted - October 22 2006 :  6:31:59 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Tony Cook to Buddylist
Hey VintageHO,

Thanks for posting the great shot of the group of Athearn GP30s!!! Too Cool!!!

I think I want the CB&Q, after seeing your picture of them all. I have a Santa Fe in my collection now.

Really Awesome! [:D]

Tony Cook
HO-Scale Trains Resource
http://ho-scaletrains.net
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VintageHO
Mikado


Tyco Time

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 Posted - October 23 2006 :  09:10:11 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add VintageHO to Buddylist
Hi Guys. The Santa Fe does have a number. I have one with and one without. Maq-Ac was close, the Santa Fe Number is: 6237. I also have an CB&Q with no number and no logo Under the cab window.
(Quality control at Athearn paint department.)

The CB&Q engines also had a problem with the paint. I have seen a lot of them with paint Just flaking off the Gray part of the shell. They probably did not prep the shell well before masking and painting.
Very hard to find one in perfect paint. Was lucky to find one.
Will keep an eye out for a CB&Q and a Santa Fe for Tony C. and Tony Circle.
Talk to you later, Carl
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GoingInCirclez
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 Posted - October 23 2006 :  12:16:02 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add GoingInCirclez to Buddylist
HOsferatu - If you find any, let me know. The NYC is a sharp looker too. I'll also confirm bad paint, as the two UPs I have seen both had problems along the tops of the hood. And the Burlington examples I've seen also looked pretty ratty (more due to play, though).


So... what I want to know is, given that Athearn achieved near-permanant infamy with their "jumped-the-gun" GP30 - just how did Arnold/Atlas make the SAME MISTAKES in N scale? I'm specifically referring to the "flush mount" radiator fans - an obvious, instant flub they too should have known to avoid!
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MagnoliaAcademy
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 Posted - October 23 2006 :  7:43:27 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
"Quality control at the Athearn Paint Department" V-HOsferatu, regarding absence or road numbers on sample GP30s.

I should have guessed. I have more than a few friends who, as "serious" Athearn plastic collectors, cast aspersions and hurl unkind epithets on my "lowly" Mantua/Tyco inclinations. Undertaker's Geeps remind me, again, that Uncle Irv foisted some huge oversights, errors (and downright abominable paint jobs and livery-butcherings) that the Tyler clan didn't suffer from nearly to the same extent in the days of red box vs. Athearn yellow/blue box rivalry.
Some of the GP7 (9)s paint: like the SF freight and infamous ESPEE 5600 Black Widow are so out of register or afflicted with overspray as to be downright embarassing.
Hail Tyco! (apologies, friends of Irv)
Mag-Zilla
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Tony Cook
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TycoGMOGP20Avatar

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 Posted - October 26 2006 :  08:14:17 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Tony Cook to Buddylist
How did Atlas-Arnold follow Athearn's mistake and make a a near dead ringer N-gauge GP30???

My guess is they didn't do their homework and took an Athearn and shrunk its mistakes down to N-scale.

Here's a more recent example of, "What did you get for the first question..."

Notice the Maitso TT-scale-ish metal die cast toys...including that new Enamelized line all look suspiciously like Bachmann's toolings??? I mean what are the chances that Maitso just happened to make that CB&Q-ish streamlined cupola caboose in their line that so closely matches the HO-scale Bachmann example? Maitso's 50' Plug Door and the other freight cars too, I think, all have larger siblings of very, very similar appearance in the HO-scale Bachmann line. The best might be Maitso's GP40, which is maybe a clone of the HO-scale Bachmann, which is now a clone of the original Atlas-Roco GP40. A copy of a copy of a copy of a copy o a c op o op [:o)]

Tony Cook
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MagnoliaAcademy
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 Posted - October 26 2006 :  8:13:44 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
Atlas reducing the Athearn GP30 (which, I concur with other opinions, is probably the best explanation for the errors repeated in N) probably pales in comparison to some of the horrible quasi-what-the-heck-is-thats produced by first generation N-gauge manufacturers MiniTrix and Lone Star (back when they called it "Treble O" gauge.
God what mutts.
MagAc
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GoingInCirclez
Big Boy


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 Posted - October 26 2006 :  8:23:54 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add GoingInCirclez to Buddylist
Yeah, I sorta suspected that might have been the case, but, well... didn't the N scale GP30s come a year or two after Athearn's attempt?

I mean, Holy radiator fans Batman, it's not like they had CAD/CAM and rapid-prototyping machines back in 1962. So I'm pretty sure there weren't shrink rays either... which means SOMEBODY had to measure up the Athearn offering, do the math, and recarve EVERYTHING into N scale. You'da thought the light bulb would have gone off: "Uh, gee, the models we're cribbing weren't really recieved too well... maybe we can make the radiator fans just a wee bit taller?"

Now I HAVE heard rumors that what got Athearn in doodoo in the first place, was using preproduction drawings... they finished their tooling right about the time EMD realized they needed more fan clearance. And you know... it makes more sense to imagine them designing that tapered dynamic brake fairing with the intent to have a smooth roofline behind it...

But still, given two years after into, you'd think Arnold/Atlas would have learned, after Athearn did the hard way...
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Tony Cook
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TycoGMOGP20Avatar

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 Posted - October 26 2006 :  9:26:36 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Tony Cook to Buddylist
I too have heard that Athearn was tooling the GP-30 on or before the arrival of actual EMD examples.

The original demo GP-30s, which I think all ended up in service on the Union Pacific, do have a feature or two that is in conflict with standard production GP-30s...but does maybe favor the Athearn a bit...



The running lights on the nose of EMD Demo #1962, I think appear to be in league with Athearn's attempt to a degree.

Tony Cook
HO-Scale Trains Resource
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choochin3
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 Posted - October 26 2006 :  11:35:43 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add choochin3 to Buddylist
My vote for the best Frankenchooch is that godawful Lionel HO 2-4-2 steam loco #0642.
Have any of youse seen this thing?It puts that Athearn GP30 to shame.
It might have a tough time beating that ATT engine though.

Carl T.

President of the Cape James Terminal RR.
Edited by - choochin3 on October 26 2006 11:36:24 PM
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MagnoliaAcademy
Hudson

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 Posted - October 27 2006 :  12:26:34 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add MagnoliaAcademy to Buddylist
Frankenchooch:
Great scary steam nomination! That sawed off black plastic turd 2-4-2 is an abomination--even by Lionel HOs lowly standards. Like the ATT "british" americanized Jinty steamer, Lionel must have felt they required a cheap low end steamer, but--Jeez--did they need to sink THAT LOW?
truly frightening, Carl. At least it scared me. Hope I don't have nightmares wherein that clunker perambulates thru my id.
Mag-Zilla
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CNVIATyco
Big Boy


BC Rail

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 Posted - September 29 2011 :  8:33:19 PM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add CNVIATyco to Buddylist
The Ugliest To Me-GE AC4400CW With Low Numberboards And Those Hideous Steerable AC Trucks! I Like High Numberboard Candian Cabs.
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Redneck Justin
Big Boy



The Young Dr.Frankenstein!

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 Posted - September 30 2011 :  08:32:35 AM Link directly to this reply  Show Profile  Add Redneck Justin to Buddylist
Here is my list of some hideous/scary models:
Athearn GP-35: That hood is so scary wide you can't even tell what it it!
Model Power euro style engines made for US:
Ya sure, ATSF used an German tank engine!
Life-Like GP38-2: More like a GP nothing!Its a mix og GP38 AND -2! Oh well. Ran like crap too!

" Heck with counting 'em rivets, TRAINS ARE FOR FUN! Not called the Mad Scientist for nothing either!"
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