new to this forum and was wondering if any of you would know price or rarity of this H.O. loco “c&fw railroad hooterville cannonball loco” with cars and track (no box i think). thx in advance
Cade[:D]
Do you mean the one made by Tyco in the early 1960s?
Jeff
A photo of it, or a link to it would be helpful. [;)]
You’ll see them come up pretty regularly on E-Bay, that’s the best way to get a current price.
Cade,
I presume that you are referring to the train that appeared on the TV series “petticoat Junction”
I have not seen this exact train but it could be made up from existing kits.
I wish I could be more help. BTW, what does C&FW stand for?
BB
yes . the one by tyco. dont have a way of photoing it. but the loco is in good shape, dusty, but runs fine. havent ran for awhile though.
Cade
c&fw is on the side of the train…??? dont know for sure new to the hobby
Cade
C&FW: It seems even the writers and creators of the show do not know what the initials stand for, a rumor is Chicago & Far Western-this is a guess.
Would like to see a photo of this beauty, preferably in Brass.
It’s not worth much. The locomotive used in the “Petticoat Junction” series was Sierra RR 4-6-0 #3. The Mantua/Tyco rendition of this locomotive is oversize and not rare. The cars are oversize as well.
Andre
not being into trains much, what does oversize? bigger size or not to scale? somebody in the other forum got back to me and said if i had the box it would be worth in the $250.00 to $300.00 range. is this true? or is your “not worth much” mean $20.00 or so?
thx for all the replies, everything helps!
Cade
cf&w is confirmed to mean chicago & far western railroad. looked it up through google and had petticoat junction in “( )”. so hope that helps!
Cade
for some reason there is a “collectible” factor to old Tyco gear on ebay , that’s why the set with the box , preferably never opened (because that’s what collectors want) might go for $300.00 . $20.00 for the loco , cars and track would be low , i’d guess more like $75 - $100 but this is just an estimate , i’m not a tyco expert
It’s not to scale, at least not HO (1:87) scale. IIRC, it’s closer to OO (1:76) scale.
As to “not worth much”, I am admittedly biased. I wouldn’t pay squat for it regardless of condition or whether or not it was in the original box. I would pay the same for a mint in box sample as I would for a sample that had been buried in the backyard for 20 years. That is to say: absolutely nothing.
There are, however, apparently people who actually collect TYCO items. Clean your pieces up and put them up for sale on eBay. You might be surprised. I know I have been absolutely dumbfounded at what some items have sold for.
Andre
The engine and train set were both pretty popular when new but because they were regarded as toys, it is likely that there is collector value due to the destructiveness of most kids. The C&FW version was when new available only in the train set. The tie in with a TV show was considered quite a big deal at the time.
It is modeled after Sierra RR No 3 but as pointed out above, is considerably oversized compared to the correct sized Arbour all metal kit.
Tyco Mantua offered the same engine in more conventional paint and lettering and even included interchangable stacks and wood and coal loads in the tender, a detailed backhead, a special lens for lighting, all of which was considered pretty fancy stuff at the time. The non Petticoat Jct engine kit when new was $12.98
The engine was reviewed in the January 1966 Model Railroader. The reviewer pointed out that the scale of the engine was about 1:76, rather than 1:87. Thus it was to OO scale but ran on HO track - the classic British compromise scale/gauge combo
The reviewer was mostly positive. The engine ran smoothly and had a five pole motor; it could pull about 15 cars. The review mentioned that due to the rigid wheelbase the engine had difficulties with 18 " radius curves. That might have made it less successful a train set engine than Mantua Tyco would have liked.
The same issue reviewed the train set cars. They were simply the old Mantua Civil War cars (as were made to run with The General 4-4-0) but with a new clerestory roof. Thus they were not really models of Sierra RR (or any) cars.
By the way that same article had a speculative article by Charles Small entitled “Model Railroading in 1985?” Pretty amusing and interesting. He said the handwriting was on the wall for HO and that N would take over. That brass engines would become way too expensive but that improvements in plastic molding would replace brass.
Dave Nelson
In the very first episode of “Petticoat Junction,” it showed a model streamlined unit painted up in C&FW livery with the rairoad’s reporting marks stenciled on it on the corporate board room table. Unable to determine what the road’s colors were because the episode was filmed in black and white. I watched it again today, on the front of the locomotive, there was a warbonnet scheme similar to Santa Fe’s. Also, it showed C&FW President Norman Curtis using his pointer on a system map of the railroad, which is when he discovered that there was a forgotten branch line running thru Hooterville up to Pixley and he sent Homer Bedloe up to check it out. I stopped the video at this scene but other than Hooterville or Pixley, there were no cities or staes listed on this map so it’s indistiguishable as to where the exact territory of this railroad might be.
How can someone with 302,278 posts be “new” to the forum???
oldline1
People that have left get lumped under the “anonymous” name as well, so that’s the total posts by everyone who has left, or something like that. At least, those that bothered to remove their accounts. That’s why this Mr. Anonymous has more posts than anyone else. By more than a factor of 10. I forget how high a post count Jeffry (Runnign Bear) had - he was the highest, and so far ahead of second palce that even after this many years I don’t think he was surpassed. I think I was #2 at the time.
–Randy
Yes, that’s one of the locos Harold Minky used for his experiments in non-typical scales. It looks almost perfect with 1:76 miniatures. When I was a kid, I had one they did as a bicentennial version - I guess they considered the loco a centennial edition, it was painted red white and blue with stars and numbered 1876. It was honestly so bad that the only way it would run reliable was to run the screw for the front truck all the way in so the wheels didn’t even touch the track. And horribly noisy, like a coffee grinder. Not liek the growl that the power truck diesels h
I seem to remember the fictitious railroad as being the CENTRAL & Far Western! I saw that show as a kid as well… the engine was Sierra #3 and that engine was in a lot of movies as well as the Casey Jones TV series - I was jealous of Casey Jr!
Cheers from Australia
Trevor
OH! I wasn’t aware of how that worked. It just seemed strange to have that high a count and be “new”!
oldline1