I’m sitting in my train room with a 736 Berkshire pulling a set of Madison cars and a 623 postwar switcher pulling a postwar dump car, gondola, and caboose. The air is filled with the sweet scent of cedar smoke, which almost completely covers the scent of the ozone. The die-cast Berkshire lumbers around the layout with the feeling of power, which is unique to postwar die-cast engines. The noise of the two engines is wonderfully loud. On top of that, it is almost Christmas!
Earl; Your statement made my day…Trains have a special place in “my world” also… right now there are 13 pre-war and post-war lionel steamers on a shelf above my computer that “smile” back at me whenever I glance up…even though they are “at rest” and nowhere near a layout, they still brighten my day when I glance at them…Yes, on the rails; they are the star performers that take a back seat to little else…BDT
YES IT DOES GET BETTER THAN THAT! Sittin in a deer blind at dawn when the dew is fresh on the grass, the sun has just risen, the crickets are chirping, the birds are singing, and you are watching deer feed at the feeder as you raise the rifle to take that huge 10 point buck. Then after you shoot, skin, and process the deer, your mom calls and says "you want to go shopping (female for: Son do you want to head to the local hobby shop to buy expensive train related items).
Oh, yes! I know that feeling. Getting up at 5 in the morning, finding your way through the darkness, finding your stand, sitting there like a motorcycle ready to skim its way up the tree, you enter it, begin to make your way upward, and sit down, and wait in the darkness… Then the darkness, with no moon to show its light, begins to get clearer, and brighter, until you first start to see the pinkness of the sky towards the east begin to get more and more distinguished. You here the birds start to churp and the forest come to life…
You sit and wait in the cold for that big buck to come around after you have been sitting there in your stand for 3 hours. Then, you here a leaf ruffle, or stick break, and there he is! Standing like the kind of the forest, he stops, and you take aim, then…
I enjoy old Lionel trains, but alas, I’ve never enjoyed them fully as many of yuz guys have. I have no idea what they smell like. I have never smelled the grease and oil, or the smoke, or the ozone. I can’t even imagine what it all smells like.
I have no sense of smell. That’s right, I can stink, but I can’t smell.
Still, I enjoy the heft of a post war locomotive. And the unique sound an old air whistle makes. The hum of an e-unit. To some an annoying sound. To me, one of the most recognizable noises those old trains make.
I’ve been running the motor for my 2025 restoration project for over 2 hours today, making sure the e-unit works, the bearings have enough lube, and the rollers and wheels are clean enough to begin the reassembly process. I can hardly wait to bring it all together, hopefully this week, before I go back to work. I have really enjoyed rebuilding these postwar engines. I’m at a point where I am seriously considering selling some of my more modern items, to support a postwar habit.
I sure wish I had a 736 Berk. pulling a set of Madison cars! If I can find a good “junker”, maybe someday… It absolutely doesn’t get any better than that!
Yes, it does. Ya see, I get to sit there with my two little boys watching the trains running around the track. Just this past weekend, my wife got her Hogwartz set in and I put it up around her Halloween display, joining the Halloween train currently running around it. The whole weekend the kids were constantly pulling me over to the trains and having me run them. My two year old Corey would sit in his little chair, lean over and press the whistle or horn button to make the Spooky Sounds Boxcar scream or howl. Then he would sit up and give me this great big smile. Tyler, my four and a half year old, has mastered the direction button so that he can make the Spooky Sounds Boxcar cackle - and he always has me switching engines between the Halloween General and the Halloween Docksider and cabooses.
It actually could get better. The cedar replaced by the original Lionel postwar smoke pellet…not even suppose to run liquid in older engines. I can’t imagine a 726 or 773 smelling like cedar. Sorry but cedar reminds me of hamster/gerbil bedding.