I see that Athearn is coming out with a Chessie System AC4400CW. I think this is a brave move on Athearn’s part and I am glad to see it coming.
And, according to their website, WP, MILW & DRGW, too. That’s bizarre.
The WP & D& RGW has a prototype.
http://www.cnw-rail.com/images/heritage/1983side.jpg
http://www.cnw-rail.com/images/heritage/up1989b.jpg
Chessie is a wild card much like the John Deere cars and locos…
Going to catch flack for that one…
The DRGW & WP’s are SD70ace’s, which Athearn is supposedly releasing someday soon in their genesis line, so it’ll be interesting to see what they’ll do with those.
The Chessie’s should be interesting. I’ve seen freelance Chessie wide cabs before, and they look pretty cool, as long as they use the large cat on the nose.
Cool! I thought it would be neat to see a big diesel in Chessie paint. (hopefully Sunburst scheme)
It’s says Chessie/B&O. Bet it will be the boring all blue B&O scheme though.
As others have said, wrong type of loco, but also Athearn is doing all the wrong numbers for those. These are I suspect simply foobies (YEAH! GOTTA HAVE MORE!) er-hm. that Tower55 was gonna do that Athearn got in the buyout/trade/what have you that gave them the heritage locos.
That said. Gimme a CHessie, or three or four. You bet I’m getting these, and probably at least one of the other roads as well.
I bet not.
Also, Brakie: These aren’t the right niumbers to be the UP heritage. I bet these are just foobies that came over from T55 withthe heritages.
YEAH! GIMMIE Er-hm. Pardon. I mean,…
interesting! I wish athearn would have more switchers like the sw1500 and sw1000 in more road names.
At least it is a real railroad and not some made up line, like Western Mountain Express or whatever other names companies like Tyco used to come up with just to put a paint scheme on an engine.
Yea but MILW??? Milwaukee Road probably went defunct before GE even thought of making the AC4400. It seems like they’re making this new one into a few “what if” engines. I mean don’t get me wrong, I’m a big MILW advocate so I will probably get one, but still. It is kind of nice to see that Athearn decided to use real names though, not like as mentioned and just made some up to through a paint scheme together.
I model my own freelance shortline, so this would be a good begining point of a Milwaukee Road collection.
Your right! Just got an Email. It IS the sunburst scheme![8D][tup]
It states very clearly in the Athearn Newsletter that the AC4400’s are “Fantasy Roads”.
HO AC4400 Fantasy Roads
Don Z.
Whoa up guys,I knew it was the wrong type of loco…
All I am saying it has a prototype…I never said a correct prototype.
Fantasy Scheme? Chessie?
…more like a nightmare… Blecch.
And sorry, the B&O sunburst scheme isn’t “boring”… it’s stately and tasteful. Chessie on the other hand, is a product of the 70’s, just like polyester leisure suits, matching belts and boots, disco music and the Ford Pinto… Better left for dead…
Lee
DonZ-Yeah, I know it’s a fantasy scheme. I had actually talked to a painter here on the forum about doing a custom AC or Dash 8 for me. Guess I don’t have to go that route now.
wm3798 -I meant the blue with plain white lettering B&O scheme would be boring…(yawn)
Sigh, now if they would just do them in N scale.
Lee, Want to talk about a real nightmare; Imagine an AC4400 in WM circus paint…
.
Jeff, Would be a nice dream, but CSX has trouble just washing their fleet let alone come up w/ exotic and costly paint schemes
Of the UP predecessors, C&NW and SP had AC4400s and C44-9Ws before their UP mergers, and Athearn has offered those too in previous releases. UP could have selected ES44ACs or even AC4400s for their heritage fleet, but chose EMD SD70ACes instead. The only thing that’s missing are fantasy MP and KATY locos.