With auctions you never know who you are bidding against. Just won an item recently where it already had a bid but I bid anyway, my bid just made it go up less than $1 from start, fiqued I would get outbid later and have to raise my bid, it never happened si I won the auction. I have overbid before on an item that I needed, needed one more tunnel portal of a certain brand, I was overpaying because I wanted to finnish the layout. I lost so I had to wait 3 weeks but only paid 1/2 the price of my original bid.
There were over 900 views of this topic. It may or may not have been one of the viewers who bought the locomotive.
Generally when I’m interested in an item on Ebay, the last thing I’m going to do is call attention to it. It only lowers your odds. Keep your eyes open for another, it should come along… Dan
900 Views in one day.
There sure are a lot of lurkers amongst us.
Please join in the conversation!
-Kevin
All because I didn’t understand the relationship Atlas had with Kato. I had no idea the topic would generate so much interest.
I didn’t intend to bid on the item or I wouldn’t have mentioned it. The asking price was a bit too high compared with comparable items. I didn’t notice it had a Or Best Offer option or I might have taken a swing at it. I doubt the seller would have let it go for what I would have been willing to pay for it but I’ll never know for sure.
Back in the day, when model trains were made in the USA, Atlas manufactured its product line in New Jersey. BUT that was long before they got into the locomotive or rolling stock business.
Atlas cars and locomotives have always been made by other vendors, and while I’m sure Atlas has a team of people in charge of developing those products, I have never heard anyone talk about actual detailed design or tooling planning being done here.
Not sure how they are handling the Branchline products, most likely they simply sent the tooling to China.
No one should take my comments as negative toward Atlas, I like the company and the products, I use almost exclusively Atlas track.
But as locos and rolling stock go, the combination of their product choices and co
Katos relationship with Atlas let them dip their “toes” in the water of the HO world. N Scale is Kato’s primary scale they produce as that is the predominate scale in Japan. Their silky smooth drives in those older Atlas engines set a very high bar for drivetrain smoothness and quietness that was nearly unheard of at the time. Athearn blue box diesels, Mantua steam and AHM/Rivarossi were the other main players in non brass HO locomotives at that time. With the popularity of those models, Kato struck out on their own in HO scale later on with the RSC2, GP35, SD40, SD40-2, Dash9 and so forth. While not always the most detailed model or offering as many road names, their silky smooth drive is second to nobody.
My first “good” HO scale diesel was an Atlas/Kato N&W Alco RS3. Silky smooth, excellent headlights on both ends, easy to put Kaydee #5 couplers on with their box with the ears trimmed off. While those models have all the details molded on and not free standing like newer models, they hold their own on a layout and run better than even many new models. Hence the typical higher prices they fetch on the second hand market, especially for harder to find road names.
Don’t know if this pertains to the Atlas/Kato Drives, but the early 90s Kato and Stewart/Kato drives suffer wheel-set geared axle cracking. Obviously there’s a problem at the wheel-shaft to axle bore interference fit causing the ‘Delrin’? geared axle to crack. The cracks are sometimes difficult to see, a tip-off is the wheel-set not staying in gauge. I’ve seen a new-old stock Stewart/Kato Drive loco with all four wheelsets having at least one cracked axle bore right out of the box.
Regards, Peter
I’ve seen many Atlas/Kato/Stewart locos with cracked gears, However unlike the Proto gears the Kato ones don’t crack between the gear teeth but only the hub cracks. They don’t make the clicking sound that the Proto units do.
The gears don’t need to be replaced. I use epoxy to glue the loose wheel set in the correct guage. Usually it’s only one side of the gear that cracks.
Mark Vinski
At the past Feburary train show at Timonium there was a table with maybe over 50 in the box Atlas yellow box locos. Asking price was $50.00 per locomotive.
Now the kicker was the boxs looked liked they were caught up in a flood, water damaged, wrinkled and stained and when I looked in one box there was rust marks on the styrofoam.
Yes. I too have that one. It does not run on a subway layout, but I think I will make a diarama with it on that.
610 views in less then 24 hours.
Atlas yellow box made in Japan by Kato.
End of box markings.
Side of box markings. (made in Japan)
Markings on the fuel tank.
Markings on the trucks bottom gear cover plate.
$30. bucks at a Train show new or lightly used, I do believe I’d have walked away with it after close inspection. If not just for the parts. Not that these locos need repaired much if at all. (But I should check those axel gears at least)
Looking over my records/inventory, Atlas is my #1 supplier coming in at 46 locos.
Stock numbers starting at #7004 SD24 Southern #2504 yellow box up to #9362 Alco C-425 PC #2419 black box classic.
Athearn BB 23, Life Like P2K 20, Athearn Geneisis 5, Bowser 5, Kato 3.