Rapido announces blocks of wood with trucks

[John]

[sd45elect2000]

I did a lot of work on the AMT engines, one of my favorite locomotives.

[SirTainly]

and they still roll better than the Athearn ones...

[nkalanaga]

Don't laugh! Way back in the early 40s, MR had an article on somebody's O gauge basement layout.  Primitive as could be, the basic tinplate track was on the floor, the locos were electric boxcabs, literally metal boxes on wheels.  The freight cars were wooden blocks on trucks, each with a big number, and no other lettering.

Boxcars were rectangular, and boxcar red.
Stock cars were black and white striped.
Reefers were rectangular, and yellow (or orange, I don't remember)
Flatcars were a thin board.
Gons were a thicker board, solid, not open.
Tankcars were a flat with a piece of round wood on them.
Cabooses were rectangular, with a smaller block on top, and red.

What made  the entire layout newsworthy was that it modeled an industrial area, and was actually operated with switchlists.  The various spotting locations were painted on the floor, and the operator controlled the loco with a throttle and reverser on top, for a true "walk-around" operation.  Manual uncoupling, of course, just like the prototype.  The owner didn't care what the train looked like, as long as it allowed him to operate the way he wanted to, and didn't cost a small fortune.

[w neal]

This is a great point mr. K. I have a greater appreciation for the beauty of this after switching my portion of the Galesburg layout in N scale. Maybe my layout looks a little more like the real thing, but for the 1940s, I bet that layout was more fun to run somehow.

[davefoxx]

[nkalanaga]

W Neal:  I think that was part of the reason it was printed.  Most modelers back then, by necessity, were "railroad modelers".  One had to build the models, of almost everything, before running a train.  This guy wanted to be a "model railroader", in the technical sense of "model", meaning to simulate something.  He wasn't interested in building trains, he wanted to run a railroad!

There was also someone, in the 70s or 80s, back when computers at home were rare, who "modeled" the Clinchfield digitally.  He programmed his computer, not easy then, to control a CTC panel, so that he could run his chosen portion.  "Staging" was provided by the computer, and he controlled the signals and switches on his portion, as the trains appeared.  Again, no railroad models, just modeling a railroad.

Now, of course, we have train simulator programs that can let one do that, or be the engineer, off the shelf.