New freight car from Intermountain - 2927 Covered Hopper

[pogopod]

Sure wish someone would produce another plastic pellet car. There are so many grain cars available but very little for plastic pellets. A local siding had cars from Thrall, NSC, Trinity, and several other car builders all on the same day. Meanwhile other than two Atlas ACF cars and an older Microtrains car there is nothing out there. I see pellet cars on almost every manifest freight why no more models?

[Mark5]

Hmm, all the road names for these are listed as "Pending Cancellation". But the undec is "Confirmed for Production".   

I dug this up to keep the hope alive ...

Mark

[Tom L]

Hmm, all the road names for these are listed as "Pending Cancellation". But the undec is "Confirmed for Production".   

I dug this up to keep the hope alive ...

Mark

Gosh, has it been 4 1/2 years already? I was/am looking forward to these.  I don’t know what it means regarding the roadnames pending cancellation vs the undecs (its been in that status for a couple of years, at least) but I would buy a bunch undecs if thats all they produce (unlikely, I know). 

In the mean time
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Tom L
Wellington CO

[C855B]

Yes, it's frustrating. Y'all made me look at my "pending pre-orders" spreadsheet. I signed-up for the PFE mech reefer re-run three years ago this week. ...sigh... 

Frankly, I'm increasingly irritated about this. Our market is small, and most company-to-company competition is gentlemanly. Pre-announcing without production and delivery imminent usually preempts other makers doing the same or similar thing (some exceptions). This habit of announcing simply to gauge the market hurts all of us.

[MRLX1020]

I'll have to order a handful of the MI versions to placate the local folk.

I'm sure Elanor will be elated...@C855B

[C855B]

I'm sure Elanor will be elated...@C855B

Just looking forward to the day.

[thomasjmdavis]

Yes, it's frustrating. Y'all made me look at my "pending pre-orders" spreadsheet. I signed-up for the PFE mech reefer re-run three years ago this week. ...sigh... 

Frankly, I'm increasingly irritated about this. Our market is small, and most company-to-company competition is gentlemanly. Pre-announcing without production and delivery imminent usually preempts other makers doing the same or similar thing (some exceptions). This habit of announcing simply to gauge the market hurts all of us.

I was trying to respond, but any conversation about the marketing strategy (or utter lack thereof) for N scale at IM just drives up my blood pressure.  And if my BP goes up much more, they won't deliver anything within the balance of my lifetime.

Are there any dealers who still take these vaporware reservations for stuff that will be cancelled in 3 to 5 years?  (preferably at a discount commensurate with the waiting time)  I've never found a dealers list on the IM site.  There are a couple things I might order, but I don't have a local shop, and haven't found any internet dealer interested in a "futures contract" on N scale boxcars to be delivered in 2030.

[Tom L]

They should definitely rethink their pre-order strategy for all the reasons stated above, I can’t imagine it is really indicative of demand for their freight cars.  Maybe it works on more expensive stuff, like their engines. I’ll pre order expensive stuff like engines or passenger sets but seldom lower price stuff like freight cars

I remember when their new run of the 8000 gal Tank cars (assembled, metal wheels, body mounted couplers) came out and most of them sold out on the MB Klein website in less than a day. It was tough to find some of the more typical “mundane” schemes on EBay or other shops, as well. Now the next run is sitting in “needs reservations”. I just can’t believe there is no interest in these based on how fast they sold last time.

  I mean, everyone who models transition needs a nice red Mobilgas tank car, don’t they?

Tom L
Wellington CO

[nkalanaga]

I reserve items from IM with the expectation that they will be cancelled.  If one does show up, fine, but if not, it just goes onto my "cancelled" file.  That's getting a little long by now...

[daniel_leavitt2000]

I totally forgot about these. Still waiting on the PS-2 4785 and Trinity3281. So dissapointed.

[nkalanaga]

I'm waiting for the early 4750 Center Flows.  They appeared in one magazine ad, then have never been mentioned again!  I need a bunch of them for the GN, NP, and BN.

[thomasjmdavis]

  I mean, everyone who models transition needs a nice red Mobilgas tank car, don’t they?

Tom L

Everyone needs a few cars modeled after Lionel prototypes so that we know its a model railroad, right? I have an ancient "Mobilgas" car (not sure who made it) that is red with black lettering- I don't think that one has even a Lionel prototype.  But the one I really want is the silver tank with the 2 red Pegasus ( https://www.tichytraingroup.com/Shop/tabid/91/c/mobil-gas1/p/10372-6n-mobilgas-tank-car-decal-6-sets1/Default.aspx ).   And a couple Sinclair black ones (not sure if any of the green variations are prototypical or if all are based on Lionel).  But mostly UTLX and GATX- which make up most of the cars I see in photos.  I think I still have several kits buried here somewhere for the latter.  I've found the key to the IM kits is to substitute Gold Medal or JnJ etched parts for the grabs and other small styrene bits that were virtually impossible to work with (for me, anyway).

[learmoia]

The old Red/Black Mobilgas (if N scale) is likely the Arnold/Revell model.
They also did Yellow Shell, Silver Texaco, Black Sinclair, and maybe a few others.

~Ian

[Rossford Yard]

Well, and to the consternation of many here, I will take IM's side, as I do with most mfgs.

First, years ago at train shows, Frank was, well, frank, with industry data especially IM's production runs.  I always appreciated that, just because of my interest in the hobby.  He relayed that at that time (maybe 2005, will have to find my document on that) that they had sold about 250,000 covered hoppers in BOTH N and HO, for instance.  However, a car like their much anticipated modern flat sold only about 8,000 in N.  Not sure if they had more than one re-run of those flats, but they were another much needed modern car that IM produced.  If you figure out the then $26(?) MSRP price tag and figure IM only grossed 45% of that, the total project gave them less than 100K.  Profit on that?  Who knows but even $20,000 for a year of work doesn't seem like a lot to me.

I still talk to them (Frank and Frank, Jr) when I get a chance.  I told them that I am part of the problem - not really pre-ordering much, but with that new covered hopper (wonder if that will sell more like the flats or grain covered hoppers? Probably the former) and their announced GP 10, I would actually be in for several and a few locos.  My goal was to add a few unofficial pre-orders to get them to commit.  Obviously, LOL, they didn't take me at my word. 

Actually, the whole experience of hearing their honest reaction (not enough pre-orders, especially for the GP 10 in certain road names, and they intimated it was nowhere close to the 300 minimum they wanted per road) made me start pre-ordering more.  Knowing that every year it does seem harder to get certain stuff without pre-order (i.e. recent MT TBox 60 ft boxcars) keeps me pre-ordering.

As someone here said, and I agree, right now I switch my cement plant with some earlier era short covered hoppers and it really doesn't bother me, even if I would have bought a dozen to make my RR look a bit more like the 2000+ era I envisioned.  Similarly, as a large switching layout representing an urban branch/spur to an industrial park, I like the look of second hand locos, leased patch jobs, etc.  The GP 10's would have been a nice addition (and their sound SD40-2's have been great for me)  That said, I have enough locos to run already, and the variety of locos, which I really do love, seems to get less and less "necessary" as time goes on.

I refuse to angry up my retirement years over not having "necessary" locos and cars (although, admittedly, between building 4 N scale layouts over 30 years focusing on both terminal roads that could run everything or branch lines that can run almost anything reasonably construed as second hand, I have formed my layouts around NOT getting every loco of every road) in my quest for the perfect N scale layout.  Hey, I'm not anywhere close to it being perfect in other areas I can control, so I won't blame mfgs or anyone else for that!

As time goes on, I realize that I could probably run the same stuff every time, and not care.  And, in fact, I do. My Kato SD40-2 (modified and painted to be an IHB SD38-2) still runs the best, so I use it most.  My second best runners are scale trains C-39-8, so I run those next.  Most nights, I just leave what is on the track on the track.  Similarly, with rolling stock, I have enough to rotate out so the same boxcar doesn't go to the same spur every time.  My original plan was to rotate some rolling stock out every session, but I don't even do that very often.  With six distinct switch jobs, I rarely think about the sameness by the time I get back around to the same job.

Bottom line, bitching about mfgs seems to be more important on social media than in actually enjoying model railroading, isn't it?

[Tom L]

Everyone needs a few cars modeled after Lionel prototypes so that we know its a model railroad, right? I have an ancient "Mobilgas" car (not sure who made it) that is red with black lettering- I don't think that one has even a Lionel prototype.  But the one I really want is the silver tank with the 2 red Pegasus ( https://www.tichytraingroup.com/Shop/tabid/91/c/mobil-gas1/p/10372-6n-mobilgas-tank-car-decal-6-sets1/Default.aspx ).   And a couple Sinclair black ones (not sure if any of the green variations are prototypical or if all are based on Lionel).  But mostly UTLX and GATX- which make up most of the cars I see in photos.  I think I still have several kits buried here somewhere for the latter.  I've found the key to the IM kits is to substitute Gold Medal or JnJ etched parts for the grabs and other small styrene bits that were virtually impossible to work with (for me, anyway).

I want one because of this photo. 

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Tom L.
Wellington CO