Micro-trains Heavyweights arriving soon

[FrankCampagna]

From BLW website. Can't believe the price. May this company forever remain in business, and never go the Chinese route.

http://buynscale.com/mt-new.htm

Frank

[Chris333]

Yes I found the Erie had some 10-1-2 sleepers so this may be the start of my PAX train. I think when the car arrives I will put that days date on it just so I can see how long it was before MT released the rest of the cars...

[tom mann]

Wow, that is a good price.  I don't know why they are cheaper than the Santa Fe reefer, but whatever they are doing they should keep it up. ;D

[sizemore]

Nice Homerun this month for MT.

The S.

[Iain]

I'll have to go in for a Pullman for the Pinehurst specials.

[Puddington]

Awesome - Empire Builder and Pullman's...yummy !

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Absolutely a winner.

I'm (and by I, I mean my wallet) gonna be in trouble when the coaches arrive.

Thats when CR abandons my layout, and a tourist railroad takes it over...

[FrankCampagna]

I should point out that many sleepers made their way into service as private cars. Both railroads and individuals purchased many of these. In my area, many made their way to Cooperstown on Hall of Fame day, into the seventies. They traveled via D&H and shortline Cooperstown and Charlotte Valley. Private cars used to travel everywhere, even on the back of freight trains. Many are still around, although not as far roaming as they used to be.

Frank

[Sokramiketes]

The lettering looks too big, especially on the Empire Builder lettering?  Those Empire Builder cars had orange window frames, didn't they?  Wasn't the GN green darker/more green than than typical Pullman Green?  It looks like MTL is still using their muted Pullman Green color from the troop sleepers?

Hopefully those are just blurry pre-production artwork mock-ups or something. 

[SkipGear]

This is the early Empire Builder 1935-1945 (After A/C), not the modern streamlined train that Kato has tried and failed with few times. From the pictures I have seen so far, no orange.

http://www.gngoat.org/eb35_1.jpg

Haven't found any good shots for the lettering but I am guessing it is right.

[mcjaco]

Any word on when the unlettered versions come out?

[Sokramiketes]

This is the early Empire Builder 1935-1945 (After A/C), not the modern streamlined train that Kato has tried and failed with few times. From the pictures I have seen so far, no orange.

http://www.gngoat.org/eb35_1.jpg

Haven't found any good shots for the lettering but I am guessing it is right.

I know it's not the streamlined scheme, I was talking about the window frames only.  Here's the Branchline Trains artwork from their HO scale 8-1-2 release:



Careful with your timetable shot, as that is a colorized black and white photo.

Interestingly enough, Branchline doesn't have the Empire Builder scheme listed with their 10-1-2 cars, I thought they would have done the scheme if GN had them, as they did release this scheme on at least the 8-1-2 and 12-1 cars...

[Sokramiketes]

Always interesting to see how other manufacturer's interpret whatever information they can find as well.  Check out this link to the Challenger HO Brass factory painted set:

http://www.brasstrains.com/product_detail.php?p=014263

Notice they didn't paint the window frames a contrasting color, but they also didn't paint the roof or underbody fixtures black like on the Pullman owned car in the same set. 

I was researching GN Z-1 electics awhile back, and while no color photos seem to exist, you can tell that the window frames are a different color, or shade, than the body in B&W shots.  Concensus seems to be light green on those though, not orange. 

Tom Madden was, I believe, handling most of the research for the Branchline cars, and if it has to do with heavyweights I'd trust him to get it right over anyone else.  So likely the paint and lettering diagrams are out there, either in Neuberry Library or at the Pullman Archives at IRM, and that's why Branchline decided to go with orange window frames. 

[Sokramiketes]

Ok, verbage and clearer photos are up at the Micro-Trains site.  They are saying the Pullman was built in 1910 and has metallic gold lettering.

Hmm...  They had "Bronze Gold" or metallic gold lettering as-built, but starting around 1930(?), the Imitation Gold lettering was in play.  Modeler's call this dulux gold or whatever, and it was a yellow-ish lettering instead of metallic gold.  So when were these cars converted to A/C?  And why not use the later Imitation Gold lettering on this air conditioned model?

A few years back I cut stencils for the lettering of a restored NYC heavyweight Pullman, and I think they were 7" high in the letterboard. Will be interesting to see how the MTL lettering scales out.  To my eye it just looks too big.

EDIT: Looks more like a pre-war/post-war thing on the lettering changeover after all.

[asarge]

I cannot believe the price of the car. $22.70 for a passenger delivered with an interior is just incredible to me.

How many railroads used the 10-1-2?