My search didn’t turn up much, but I apologize if this has been covered already. I’m going to be starting in HO soon, and I’d like to have an idea about the various manufacturers’ rolling stock. Is it possible to lay out a spectrum (as it were) among the several brands that shows the range in cost, level of detail, fidelity to prototype, and variety of types. Or is it simply a case that the stuff that costs the most is in every respect the best?
I’m looking mostly for 40-foot, 20s-30s era, Western prototype cars: box, a few reefers, fewer tank cars, and some stock cars. I can’t get a good feel for the differences among Accurail and ExactRail and Athearn and Kadee and Atlas and others I probably haven’t heard of. For now, I think I won’t undertake kits, and I subscribe to the McClelland “good enough” principle in general, but I’m also aware that details too small to be seen in N scale may be an issue when I move to HO.
So can you give me a rough breakdown of which brands provide what and at what price range? I realize that it can’t be entirely objective, but at the risk of starting a tussle, I’d appreciate opinions. Thanks.
If you are looking at 40’ 20s & 30s era then you can pretty much eliminate ExactRail and Kadee from your list. Although both companies make beautiful RTR, I think I’ve only seen one Kadee car that was pre-50s and I believe most of ExactRail’s offerings are 60s and newer.
As far as rolling stock goes, here is my input:
Accurail ($12-$15) - Mostly kits - Underbody details spartan but shell very nice - Limited to boxcars, hoppers, and gondolas. Eras: Steam - Diesel - Modern
Athearn ($12-$30) - RTR - Good to very good detailing. Eras: Steam - Diesel - Modern
Atlas ($15-$30) - RTR - Good to very good detailing. Eras: Steam - Diesel - Modern
Branchline ($15-$30) - Kits & RTR - Come in two flavors: Yardmaster Series and Blueprint Series. Yardmaster (good detaling); Blueprint (very good detailing) - Limited to boxcars and reefers. Eras: Steam - Diesel
ExactRail ($20-$30) - RTR - Very nice detailing from what I’ve seen. Eras: Diesel - Modern
Funaro & Camerlengo ($20-$40) - Kits only (resin) - Very nice detailing but craftsman-quaility. Requires cutting and filing. Eras: Steam - Diesel
Intermountain ($15-$30) - Kits and RTR - Very good detailing. Eras: Steam - Diesel
Kadee ($25-$35) - RTR - Very nice detailing. Eras: Late Steam - Diesel
MDC ($12-$20) - RTR - Decent detailing but there is better. Eras: Steam - Diesel
Proto 2000 ($15-$30) - Kits & RTR - Very nice detailing. Eras: Steam - Diesel
Red Caboose ($15-$30) - Kits and RTR - Very nice detailing. Eras: Steam - Diesel
Tangent ($25-$30) - RTR - Very good detailing. Eras: Diesel - Modern
Tichy ($15-$25) - Kit only - Very good detailing. Eras: Steam - Diesel
Tom’s list is a pretty good summary, although Accurail probably has the widest selection appropriate to your ‘20s/’'30s era while keeping with your choice of no kits. Westerfield has a wider choice in this era, but all are craftsman-type kits.
Accurail offers several versions of single sheathed boxcars, along with double sheathed boxcars, wood or steel reefers, several styles of two-bay hoppers, triple hoppers, steel gondolas, and stock cars. Their 40’ steel boxcars, both single and doubledoor, are a little too modern for your era (mainly the diagonal panel roof), but are otherwise useable. While most are available r-t-r, these are extremely simple-to-build kits - if you’re going to swap out wheels and couplers, the only other assembly is to install the three-piece underbody brake gear, fishbelly underframes, and brakewheel to most cars. Of the ones listed, Accurail are the most economical.
Here are some Accurail cars - I add wire grabirons, more detailed brake gear and often my own paint, but they’re decent-looking cars right out of the box.
40’ 9-panel single sheathed boxcar (these can be had with wood or steel doors in combination with wood or steel ends:
40’ 6-panel single sheathed boxcar (these can also be had with wood or steel doors in combination with wood or steel ends:
Bowser! Doh! [D)] I knew I was forgetting one. Thanks, Wayne!
erosebud, another line worth noting. Fox Valley Models will be releasing four versions of the B&O M-53 wagontop boxcars in RTR. The '37 version will be out at the end of August/beginning of September. Should be some nice units that are also unique. I reserved mine back in February but you might be able to get them online from somewhere.
Wow! Thanks so much for giving me precisely the kind of information I’m seeking. I may have to retire early–or maybe I should follow your advice and work on a couple of kits until the time comes. I’m much obliged for your responses.
Kit’s are a lot of fun to build. The higher end ones can take a good evening to build. I just built a couple of the Proto 2000 Mather stock cars a few days ago and they turned out VERY nice. Since your just getting into the hobby you might want to think about working an extra year instead of retiring early, lol. This hobby can become a money pit.
Great pictures, I am amazed that you can take such quality pictures with your type of camera that you told me about. The exposures are so professional with exceptional lighting.
While I can speak of the era of all there cars I like Bachmann Silver Series. Detail is OK but cost is only around $11.00 or so. Come with metal axles and wheels and roll freely. I have around 25 to 35 of them and no complaints.
I just received mine a few weeks ago, here are a couple of shots (I don’t have one of their underbody, but the brake detail, piping, etc is excellent).
They come equipped with knuckle couplers (right, below) but I think they look even better with Sergents (left, below).
Thanks for that link, Scarpia. [Y] I was looking at those cars in the LHS a couple of days ago, but not too closely. They were on sale at $29.00, and while they were an improvement over their earlier offering, too expensive for something that would require re-lettering to backdate it into the late '30s, plus a little other work. However, on seeing your photos and reading the Trueline info on the cars, I may reconsider. I hadn’t realised (didn’t take one out of the box [banghead]) that the flat roof was available, along with the NSC ends and 1937 BLT dates. They’ll still need those grabirons replaced (especially the ones on the roofwalk) and probably the stirrup steps, too, but the plain early paint schemes do make them more attractive to me.
With almost 40,000 cars in service between CNR and CPR, they should also be attractive to a lot of North American modellers (and modelers [swg]) of that era.
I’m no where near your level yet Wayne, to feel the need to replace the grabions and stirrup steps (maybe someday!). I’m also modeling much later than you, so the mixed paint schemes were part of the appeal for me I purchased a mixed box set from CMT that had two of each paint scheme and unique road numbers, for my small, chest high layout, these cars really fit the bill with their better than average detail.
I agree though, that these could have homes on many layouts if folks were interested, or knew of them. I find CMT to be a great resource, as they contact me in advance when products like this are released.
For others, I took a picture of the underside of one of the cars, so you’d have an idea of what lurks there.
Thanks for your kind assessment of my abilities, Scarpia. [:)] The replacing of grabirons and the like started, for me, with cars with those details cast in place. When LifeLike Canada introduced the 36’ Dominion boxcars, I couldn’t afford them and was holding out for New England Rail Services kit version of a similar car. Part of the “not being able to afford them” was directly linked to their $40.00 price tag, coupled with my opinion that the grabirons, while free-standing, had been done in plastic and were grossly oversize. That worked out to a lot of money for cars that needed a lot of improvement. Luckily for me, a batch of cars were sold with their dimensional data missing and LLC offered to replace those body castings with the correct ones if the original was returned. Unaware of this development, I wandered into my LHS to find six of the original body shells sitting on a shelf at $2.00 apiece. Of course, I bought all six (and could and would have bought many more had I been there a few days earlier [banghead] ).
It was easy to fabricate new underbodies and to add trucks and couplers, but those grabirons had really started to bug me. I eventually succumbed and removed them all, being careful to retain the nbw detail, which was part of the separate grabs. I also replaced all six stirrup steps with metal parts, and the roofwalk corner grabs with home-built ones, and, after breaking a few, all of the brakewheel staffs, too. At 78 holes per car just for grabirons, my pin vise twirling fingers got a real workout. [sigh] I eventually acquired another six complete cars at a much more reasonable cost, and scratchbuilt another four. All, of course, got the grabiron treatment. If NERS ever releases their kit version (the new, unused dies were lost in a train wreck, but eventually recovered, a couple of years later, I think) I’ll buy several. The company seems, unfortunately, moribund, as I’ve not been able to contact
I’ll throw in my opinion on Accurail. Perfect all around item. One of the least expensive there is. Is a kit and yet almost is not. add the weight, snap on the body, attach the trucks and maybe the brake wheel and of course the couplers (which are really not even an issue if you buy RTR as many replace the couplers if they are not K-D anyway and as for the wheels, same there for whatever brand they choose.)
They look very good. The cars are perfect for the Good enough crowd, and they are ready for the more precise crowd to modify. Aside from the removal of some detailing to add better detailing, they are really no more difficutl to do that than a craftsmen or a Blueprint series. And even then would cost less.
Sounds like you need to try an Accurail. They have a wide variety of stock and really are as close to RTR while still being a kit as you can get and really look nice. Hey, even if I didn’t want to do kits, for about half price, I can snap the body onto the floor[8D].[(-D]
Not really. HO cars are all injection molded styrene plastic, which is plenty durable for our needs. Anything carried in a real hobby shop or advertised in Model Railroader, or carried in the Walther’s big book, is plenty good enough. From there on it’s a matter of looks, goodness of paint job, niceness of the lettering, and fineness of detail. Anything that looks good is good.
The pricier models often have nicer paint and detail, for which you pay more. Should you find a model that looks good to you, buy it even if it only costs $2.50. Plenty of low end trainset cars work just fine with a new coat of boxcar red and some decals.
Metal wheels and Kadee couplers are desirable, and you can add them your self, for a few dollars, to cars that lack same. HO is not a collectors scale like O gauge Lionel is, there is little resale value in HO rolling stock so just buy what looks good to you and you will be happy with it.
David, I’ve seen lot’s of stuff that looks great be pieces of junk. For the most part you pay for what you get in this hobby. Usually better IS higher priced. [B]
In many cases that’s true, but it doesn’t mean, conversely, that higher-priced is always better. [swg][(-D][(-D]
Personally, I find it hard to swallow paying forty bucks for a freight car that needs modifications to meet my standards, when I could spend ten on a similar (albeit not as otherwise-accurate) car, and then spend another ten to make it acceptable to me. I get the car I wanted, plus a few hours of modelling enjoyment for twenty bucks rather than spending additional money to bring an already-expensive car up to par. While the work needed may be similar for both cars, the higher outlay strips away some of the enjoyment of the modelling, at least for me it does.
I don’t own very much r-t-r stuff, although if it’s a model that’s otherwise unavailable, I’m not totally averse to buying it. However, to date I have no r-t-r that’s made it to the layout without some modifications. That’s not to say that it was no good, only that I could see areas which I wanted/needed to change.
More or less, yes: I was simply agreeing with what you said but re-stated it and added my opinion and personal experience as a qualifier on the subject. [:)]
Thanks for the list of rolling stock and prices. I am looking to upgrade an aging fleet of rolling stock. Now, that I have decided to prototype freelance, I am looking for particular roads and era specific pieces. [tup]
