Kato's Broadway may restart Tuscan Color Debate

[Nato]

   My Broadway and add on set arrived today fron BLW. First off let me say "Wow!" Now for the comparisons and things I dislike. The Color debate as to correct Tuscan color will re start again. First we have the old Rivarossi PRR cars, the color always looked to dark and purple to me, Con Cor copied this color on their PRR smoothside cars. As someone who got to see PRR cars and ride on PRR in the mid 1950's early 1960's that color looks wrong to me, but then I was just a kid ranging in age from 9-teeenage 16 years when I made my rides so my memory might be wrong. Now we have Walthers ten six car, the color to me looks dead on,and finally Kato's which looks kind of overly redish to my trained Art Major (BS Degree) eye,but the PRR colors did fade some in the pre Dupont Imron paint days and weathering etc. would make it look redder,not so dark. The Dulux Gold striping and lettering on the Kato train is brighter and zippier looking then the sudued Gold on the Walthers car,but Kato's letters are slightly larger and fatter looking. Kato's train looses points in my book by not having the end bulkhead and door inside the platform, none of their cars have ever featured this, and no glass in the end door windows,their cars have never had this. In looking at builders photos of Pullman built cars for PRR the Walthers car seemes to have the correct ends ,each one different, Kato's ends are identical on all cars,however some of the ten six cars were built by ACF as well as other cars by Budd as well so I believe the ends are correct for some cars. Detailing on the Kato cars is otherwise very nice,the aluminum window frames add class, the safety bars found across isle windows on sleepers are cast on where approprate like on their earlier SF cars. The Twin Unit diner is quite nicely done,but the semi permiment coupling between units allows quite a bit of space when cars are on curves some kind of draw bar with two holes in it that went over a peg would have been better so you could have closer spacing if your curves were wider. The double doors between kitchen and dining cars are modeled, I honestly don't recall if both cars had a pair or only one car. I remember they opened with an electric eye when approached and could be over ridden to be locked in the open position. I know this they were natural metal ,silver color on both sides. Coolest car in Kato's set is the duplex roomette sleeper, I had thought Kato would forget this car,wish you could get this car seperately. The most amazing detail is on the Budd roomette cars, the car number indicator found in a window near the platform end in modeled, way to go Kato! The large oversize door windows found on the real Budd cars would look better again with glass, the Rivarossi sleeper modeled this feature. Comparing the underbody details on the Kato & Walthers twin sleepers reveals most of the same equipment, but some slightly more complex detailing on some of the compressior (I believe ) boxes on the Walthers car,also brake resivoir detail, but given the fact that both ACF and Pullman built these cars there could be slight variations in this equipment between the two builders. Also walthers made their detail very complete because variations of their car are sold with out the skirting with this detail showing. The trucks on the Kato non Budd cars are the same used under their UP cars, some UP cars used a different truck more like the American LTD ones, Walthers car features a slightly different looking truck, but I believe (I'am not a Pennsy expert) that both types may have been used. The rebuilt Heavyweight RPO car which served on the Broadway for years is another nice car again, how about a single release of just this car. The obs car and mid train lounge car feature the offset to one side roof top antennas that the real cars had. In closing I would give Kato's Broadway a 9.8 on a one to ten scale, very nice but not quite perfect, Walthers single car rates a 9.9 in my book. Yes the working diaphrams are a great feature on the Walthers car, I don't know if they were Tuscan color as on Kato's cars or black as on Walther's I do know the wide one between diner and kitchen cars was Tuscan to give an unbroken look. Any hardcore non closet Pennsylvania fanzees and modelers out there feel free to add information and your views, especially if you have recieved either one of the sets.                   Nate Goodman (Nato). Salt Lake, Utah.

[David Leonard]

My set won't arrive for a while, but when it does, I'll compare it with the PRR Color Drift Card. Bear in mind that while Kato advertises this as the "as delivered" [my phrase] 1948 version of the Broadway, the E8's that are in the pirpeline represent a 1952 appearance, so presumably one could model the Broadway as brand new in 1948 or somewhat weathered in 1952. Maybe the the Tuscan is in between? We'll see. Well, actually we won't see, because we won't acheive any agreement on it!

[keystonecrossings]

The original Kato E8's were too "orange".

The new Broadway is an improvement, but is too light for my preference.

The InterMountain cars are very close to my drift cards and is the color I prefer.

But, as Lee Corso would say, "Not so fast, my friend..."

Earlier Tuscan was lighter. The darker shade came later and was correct for the 1950s. I don't recall when in the 1940s the shift occurred, but for 1948, the Kato color may not be wrong.

Suffice it to say, however, that the Kato BL will not match the IM/CCS cars.

[Walkercolt]

Weeeelllll, the IPMS guys would bust our chops on N-scale colors as being too "intense and dark" for the scale. They call it "scale effect". The Brit's during WWII painted their day fighters slightly lighter in color than their day bombers because of the differences in size. They had a point. The "die-hard" plastic guys point out that when you view a 1/144th model from a couple of feet, it's like you're looking at the real thing from a couple of city blocks, so you're looking thru that much air and haze and dust, plus, we don't usually view our models in direct sunlight outdoors. I've taken real chips of paint from various locomotives(usually the steps) and a model painted that color would be "way too dark", and that paint was probably sun-faded a bit. There have been pages of discussions on the lack of "atmospheric effects" in model photos using Helicon software, with some validity. Kato's art department took Pennsy paint chips and decided how much "scale effect" to use, and that's what they made. Is it "correct"? Absolutely not. Does it look good on our dark layouts? Yes, hopefully. Will it match another brand car? I doubt it, but I doubt that every car on a Pennsey BL matched either. So we'll waste a few billion watts of electricity arguing about it, again. Just remember everybody's "opinion" is as good as yours, and nobody will change anybody's mind in the end, and your life doesn't depend on it either. Enjoy.