Are we going backwards?

There is often much conversation on this forum about proto specific, high detail models and how that is what most modelers appear to want these days.

Yet, a number of recently released models are anything but proto specific - and some are from those very companies who would seem to be promoting this trend.

Finally, after many years of promises, BLI has offered a Pacific that is NOT a PRR K4 - thank goodness - or should we thank anyone?

As it turns out, like their USRA Heavy and Light Mikados, the Pacific’s are generic - but in this case the heavy Pacific is not even as accurate as either of the Mikados.

OK, putting a USRA Light Mikado boiler on a 73" driver 4-6-2 drive yields a credible, if not completely accurate USRA Light Pacific.

BUT, putting a USRA Heavy Mikado boiler on that same 73" driver frame does not make a USRA Heavy Pacific - but that is just what Broadway did. The USRA Heavy Pacific had 79" drivers, spaced differently, and had a smaller, (but higher mounted) boiler than the Heavy Mikado.

And in all the road names offered, light or heavy, not one of the smallest or simplest details was changed for greater accuracy. In the B&O green scheme, they could not even put the correct two different Presidents names on the two different road numbers offered - both say “President Washington”?

It would have been so easy to make the B&O locos more correct with a different bell and headlight, and a Delta trailing truck. Other brands have done it.

And while these locos are not at the upper tier of pricing these days, they are by no means in the “bargain” price range either.

I did buy one, which is already being kit bashed to ATLANTIC CENTRAL standards, but I doubt I will buy any more. Had the B&O versions been more correct, and/or the Heavy version been a true 79" driver loco, I might have bought a small fleet.

So, why in this age of “high end proto specific” locos, is it impossi

Sheldon,

I cannot directly answer your question about the direction that the hobby is headed in this regard.

What I believe is that there are two camps: those who care and those who don’t. And, I don’t mean to say that in a glib manner. I, for one, don’t really concern myself with the differences that you noted in your examples. Others care a lot about this whole issue.

My main concern is for detail and quality in the locos and rolling stock that I buy. I am never comfortable if I learn that a certain locomotive or passenger car is not even close to representing the prototype. But, beyond that, I don’t care all that much.

It will be interesting to read how other feel about this issue.

Rich

That is actually a big part of my point. With just a different headlight and bell location, the B&O Light Pacific would have been more than close enough for most people for the B&O P5 class.

AND, those same details, and a Delta trailing truck - an easily recongnized feature - and the correct lettering, would have even made the “incorrect” Heavy a dramiticly better “stand in” for the early P7.

I mentioned Bachmann and their efforts at proto specific details from one roadname to another. They did this on the Heavy and Light Mountains, Ten Wheelers, 2-6-6-2’s, 2-10-2’s, K4 “versions”, the Berkshires and others - not always getting things perfect, but making and effort to get the obvious stuff close.

And it seems it would have been real easy, and not real expensive, for BLI to do the same here.

Sheldon

I see your point, Sheldon.

In the sense that the manufacturer could easily have made a slight modification or added one or two small details to make the model more prototypical, it is a shame that the manufacturer stopped short for whatever the reason.

That said, I would ask what was the reason for stopping short. Insufficient research? Cost consideration? Indifference?

Rich

As business owners, the people who run these companies have to turn a profit to stay in business. They have to look at the market and decide if the added cost if research and manufacturing will be justified be increased sales. Based on that decision they do or do not make prototype specific models. If they have made good decisions over the years, they are profitable and stay in business. If not, then not. Maybe, if they read these forums, (or their mail) they might decide to offer a wider range of prototype features, but it has to make economic sense. That’s why they call it the bottom line.

And that’s exactly some of the same reasons why Bachmann offerings for the NYC are foobies, Sheldon. Although I haven’t looked at their 4-8-4 Niagaras, their other 4- and 6-driver NYC locomotives are so generic that they don’t even come close to representing what the NYC had in their roster.

I would agree with you that it would be great if manufacturers offered more parts so that modelers could make the needed changes to their locomotive to make it more prototypically correct for their road name. However, no amount of aftermarket parts is going to correct a wrong boiler. This is true - whether it be BLI, MTH, or Bachmann.

So, let your money do the talking when it comes to buying your locomotives. I doubt it’s going to make much of a difference in my case in regards to Bachmann though.

Tom

Tom, I will agree that puting NYC on the Ten Wheeler was not Bachmanns best move, and as I have commented before, the other small locos are generic train set locos - not correct for ANY of the roadnames offered.

As for the Niagara’s , it is my understanding they are pretty close, and the newer drive runs rather well, like the Berk and the new GS4 in the regular line.

Bachmann is far from perfect on this issue, but they have made way more effort than BLI.

It is “easy” to make something very road specific, like a PRR K4 (or any of the long list of ver

I don’t think that sound and DCC have much relevance to whether or not a model is “correct”. In that regard I think the manufacturers are only catering to what they believe, possibly incorrectly and whether we agree or not, is the largest pool of purchasers.

Concerning production costs, I don’t think it costs any more to have a correct dome or trailing truck on a model instead of incorrect items. I think it does cost more to have someone do the research to identify the correct items. And it probably does cost more to make additional detail items to be stocked under the assumption that someone might eventually buy them.

What I’m wondering, at least in the case of steam engines, is if the available pool of people who are actually able to identify the differences is shrinking. I believe that many of us would look at the loco you reference and would believe that it has very fine details. The issue seems to be that the details are indeed fine, but incorrect. I would not know the difference.

Just my opinion.

Well, maybe so, but in the case of the trailing truck, we are talking about a very obvious difference.

Here is a photo of B&O #5300 - note the style/design of the trailing truck:

http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/bo/bo-s5300ags.jpg

Here is a photo of the model with the incorrect trailing truck:

http://www.broadway-limited.com/images/view.aspx?productId=2859&index=0

We are not talking about a pipe out of place or a few inches of some small dememsion

I only offered an opinion. I am not disagreeing with you. What I am saying is that in this case you are well versed as to what that particular loco should look like. I am also saying that I think that the pool of potential purchasors who are equally knowledgeable has probably decreased over the past 10 or 15 years.

That is a dramatic difference and there is no excuse for that.

Rich

Interesting thought that brings up a good point…I think the younger modelers is modeling what they see…

As far as going backwards…Yes,I’ve notice some boo boos on “correct” locomotives.Now,recall I’m not a locomotive detail guru so,if my untrained eyes can see it…

However…

The Bachmann NYC 4-6-0 will sell simply because its affordable.

This Bachmann knows…

Is the hobby going backwards,forwards or sideways I suspect that will depend on the modeler being asked…

BTW…I some times think there is at least four different camps in the hobby today but,we’ll not go there.

Some of it has to do with whether or not a particular manufacturer is willing to work with or take advantage of the various historical societies available to them. And some historical societies are easier to work with than others, or have the needed information readily available at hand.

I know that the NYCSHS has not had a very good working relationship with manufacturers in the past. However, in the past couple of years it has been making some real strides to improve that. The recent announcement of the True Line Trains 19000-series caboose is a testament of that.

As much as we would like it, it does cost $$$ to research and to produce and have extra parts available for the variations of steamers. And, apart from the USRA-versions and unlike diesels, steamers were generally unique to their particular prototype. Another issue is that the producing and keeping track of the various inventory of extra parts could be very daunting and probably end up being a loss for the manufacturer as far as profitability is concerned.

Tom

BTW…I some times think there is at least four different camps in the hobby today but,we’ll not go there.

Only four? Feel free to to take the conversation anyplace the subject takes you, I don’t mind, I like to hear different opinions.

Sheldon

Maxman, and I was not disagreeing with you, but rather in effect asking you if that is a noticeable difference to you? It is a rather major feature - not unlike a diesel with the wrong trucks or wrong style grills on the side.

Sheldon

I totally agree with you, Larry. From a business standpoint, if you know something is going to be profitable with a minimum amount of effort (i.e. in this case stamping different road names onto an identical product), why would you want to change that?

Manufacturers have been doing that for years. And those who aren’t particularly concerned about accuracy but just want a locomotive to run around their layout, they are going to look for the biggest bang for their buck.

Tom

Each variant costs money. With more variants, the production run is fragmented further, driving up costs.Obviously, some of us are willing to pay the extra freight for proto-specific models, but the manufacturer has to evaluate if that market will make up for those priced out of the model when it’s done in multiple versions versus one-size-fits-all.

Economic conditions in general remain poor, another factor affecting the pricing of a model brought to market right now. This makes proto-specific runs an even iffier proposition.

Of course, each manufacturer sees these issues in different terms according to their own cost structures. BLI has to arrange or contract for its production, while Bachmann has more flexibility in terms of its costs. It could use building different versions as “filler” between runs of far larger quantity orders and can stockpile parts for all versions at little cost. That may be why you see one level of detail on a BLI vs the B-mann.

I guess I’d question the premise that we’re all going in the same direction with the same goals – as an industry or a hobby. In fact, I’d argue that this kind of diversity in detail quality is a good thing, with good entry level gear AND more sophisticated offerings for those willing to pay the freight. I don’t think the difference

Tom I agree that in some cases research can be a major limiting factor, but in the case of the B&O P7 Pacific, first, one still exists, two, ten minutes on the web and two or three books and you have all the data to build a new real one from scratch, let alone get a few major details at least close on a model. No one needs any historical society help to build a reasonably accurate B&O P7, especially not today.

With specific reference to this trailing truck issue, for those of you who do not know a lot about steam, many USRA locos, and USRA clones built later, had their trailing trucks changed to the more modern, and easier to maintain Delta design in later years. In many cases like the P7, later clones were built with the better Delta design.

After some requests from modelers, Bachmann recognized this about their USRA Heav

I run a freelanced Southern Pacific, I don’t care if they really had a particular engine or not, if it runs well, if it will run on my layout, is highly detailed, and says Southern Pacific (or an associated name like Union), then it will find a home. As for trailing trucks, getting a trailing truck to work right with a particular engine is a lot more engineering than you might expect, meaning it can cost alot. Spectum has a number of their trucks where the lead or trailing truck is not engineered right, sometimes due to the drivers or sometime due to the truck design themselves.

Yes, of course there are differences and I can see them looking at the two pictures side by side. But the comparison circumstances are different. If I were in west coast land and went to the hobby shop to purchase a steam loco and saw that model, in all likelihood I would make my purchase without any consideration as to whether or not the trailing truck was incorrect or the headlight in the wrong location. And it is likely that it would not even cross my mind to do any research. It would look like a steam loco to me because I just didn’t know any better.

You, on the other hand, live in B&O land and are familiar with how the model is supposed to look so those things jump out at you. My premise is that the number of people who “know better” is shrinking.