Hello, I’m new to the registry, but not new to this forum. I’ve been reading a lot of interesting things on this forum. My question is, I have a "AHM C-LINER " shell and the road name: is Burlington Northern. I purchased it as a dummy (non powered) and I have a “Athearns” F7 chasis, (Noisy) I took the "C-Liner shell and mod it to a Athearns F7 chasis. Now I have a powered C-Liner. What I’m highly thinking of doing is getting a “P1K” C-liner chasis and flip flop shells. P1K don’t make C-liners in Burlington Northern road name. This is the reason why I’m considering to do this, plus My C-Liner is very rare to have today. I was wondering if I get a PK1 C-Liner chasis, would it fit a AHM C-liner shell or is there another manufacture chasis that would fit a C-liner shell better. I really don’t want to buy a PK1, because there not the quietiest locos around. I would prefer Stewart or Kato or even Atlas. If I’m limited to buy a P1K, then that’s what I’ll do. I’m modeling in HO Scale.
The AHM C-liner shell is not to scale, and a rather poor rendtion of a C-liner.
The Burlington Northern never had FM C-liners, which why LL P1K will not ever do a factory painted version.
The AHM C-liner is rare today because all of them where trashed when the P1K model was introduced, totally eliminating thier value as a model railroad (as opposed to toy train) item.
Mehano produced the C-liner for AHM, and until recently for IHC, and it may still be in production.
The old AHM shell is real junk - I would not waste time on it. There are a lot of P1K engines that run very good. BTW - BN never had any C-Liners and what you have most likely has a poor paint job to start with. I had 3 A units and a B unit in my junk box until the P1K units came out. I think I sold a box of old shells(including the AHM C-Liners) for about $5.00 at a model train show about 3 -4 years ago(one less box to haul back home).
I’d say to get hold of a P1K and repaint it - Trainworld have them for $19, I doubt you’d be able to get a mechanism any cheaper. The P1K C-Liner is a fine loco - it’ll pull almost anything, is well detailed, and is nearly silent.
As Nigel said, BN never had any C-Liners - they were all retired and scrapped long before BN came on the scene. I was wondering if one of the roads that became BN owned them but I don’t think they did, however, if you want to paint one for BN I’d suggest taking a look at the E8/E9s they ran in Chicago-area commuter service for many years and basing your paint scheme on that. There should be plenty of photos at www.railpictures.net of these locos. Hope this is of help!
Thanks for all advice. I think I’m going to scrap the whole thing. When I saw the AHM C-Liner at my hobby store, I knew it was a rare loco so I bought it thinking I could use it in some way. I like the C-liner style, so I may just buy a P1K . I didn’t know that “BN” didn’t have a C-liner in they era. The paint job on my shell could use some re coloring. I guess that explains why it looks the way it do, but in so many words, I don’t like to quit on something. I may just keep the darn thing and some how fix it up real nice. If that do happen, I’ll post pics. I can’t mess around with 6 axle pick locos because they are too long for the curves on my board. I have 18’ radius curves on a 4x10 layout, so the "EMD E9 is out of the question. I’m looking to move forward to the “Stewart F series”.
I have a few old AHM C Liner shells (I intended on following an old RMC article and making an Erie Built out of them using an Athearn PA frame - never got around to it) and it appears that at some point they changed the tooling a little. Likewise at some point they changed the trucks from a fairly decent version of the Fairbanks Morse to some odd mix of FM and ALCo., or maybe the other way around
My recollection is that the original C Liner shell was Rivarossi, going back to the 1950s, but AHM in the 1960s then had its Yugoslavian source make a knock off. I think both Mehano and Pocher may have been involved.
The P2K is finer and more accurate but junk is a bit harsh for the AHM.
By the way somewhere I have an AHM C Liner “B” unit - that is rare.
Dave Nelson
I am a ahm and rivarossi collector for fourty years calling the ahm cliner junk is unfair and harsh i got my start in model railroading because they were affordable and easy to work on I bet many others did too I also liked the informationthey gave you about the certain locomotive i just bought iam not going to junk any locomotives ive got
The AHM C-LINER can be made into a decent looking model with some work. The oldest ones with the 5-pole motors also ran pretty decent. They got pretty hit and miss later on though, as they kept getting cheaper and cheaper until they were essentially a toy you’d find at department stores.
I’ve got quite a few “junk” trains myself. They’re nothing special, but some of them are kind of fun!
The mechanism from the Stewart AS-16 is pretty-much a drop-on fit for the AHM C-Liner shell, and Detail Associates offers C-Liner sideframes which are a push-in fit for the Stewart trucks.
With a little work, the AHM loco can look quite decent. I did this one for a friend:
Paint and lettering are Accupaint and Accucals respectively.
