I was planning on modeling in n-scale, but after the deal I got today, went back to ho. On the way home from the local wal-mart, my wife decided she wanted to stop at a yard sale. Well I stopped. After milling around for a minute, I saw a couple tubs and my jaw dropped 10 feet. It was full of ho train equipment. I saw 8 loco’s and some various freight, passenger cars and mow vehicles. The thing that made my jaw drop, was he only was asking for 100.00 for the whole kit-n kaboodle. Well, my hand went for my wallet as fast as a gunslinger at the ok corale. below are some pictures of what I got.
all in all not a bad haul for 100 bucks. there was a lot of track, but its pretty dirty, so I’ll probably scrap most of it except the switches. I guess christmas came early this year. lol
Yes I would say Christmas your birthday all came a little early…Thats a deal that only comes along one time in your life and for some of us never comes along!!!Congrats and enjoy…Cox 47
The smooth sided passenger cars are Rivorossi/AHM. Very nice cars, however, before you run them add weight and replace the plastic wheels with metal. Easiest trick is to use lead shot or BB gun pellets and fill the pockets in the floors. Smother in Elmer’s glue.
I’m not certain, but some of the stearmers appear to be Rivorossi. When new, some of them, like the New York Central streamlined Hudson, sold for over $100 years back.
That MRC powerpack, if it was taken care of, is an excellent unit. It’s a Tech II #2500. I bought mine years back and it still performs flawlessly. I plan to use it by connecting it to the jump port of a Digitrax Zephyr, so two trains can be run in DCC.
BTW: I like that rail crane! Regardless of the manufacturer, these have great potential when it comes to detailing and weathering.
The buildings: Just like wreckers, amazing how with some weathering and detailing they can look realistic.
The diesels: I’m only guessing based on the photos, but some appear to be standard Life Likes. Turn them over and look at the undersides as that’s where manufacturers usually put their “autograph”. Got to be honest, the old LL and Bachmann standard locomotives usually had one “truck” powered and were not always smooth runners. Hook up the Tech II and test them.
There now guys, when you kick the bucket and the wifey decides to clean out all that old “train stuff” this is what happens to your layout ( and, by the way, a lot of those engines will be YOUR favorite brass beauties) – I’ve seen it happen twice.
after closer inspection, all the loco’s are bachman, but they seem to run ok, just need a good cleaning and some decent track. the track that came with the lot is the older brass track, so I probabbly will scratch it and go with atlas code 100 track. the streamline passenger cars are riverosi. I plan on repainting them, as with all the locos once I get better at it. Three of the locos are dummy locos, and not in very good shape, so I will use these to practice on first. But at the very least, even not running, they will make good stand alone in the yards for looks. all in all, I am very pleased with the hall.
It seems you made out pretty nicely. Be sure to clean and lube the treasure.
I saw some good stuff in there, buildings can be redone easily to match time
of the layout. My best suggestion, buy new track that can be trusted to run on.
I have seen HO trains at rummage sales; usually it is junk but sometimes you luck out like this. Based on the copper MRC and Troller power packs, I’d say this person was in HO in the late 70s or early 80s.
I model HO but had Lionel had a kid and was always sorry I got rid of it. Now of course the trains I had go for fancy prices at swap meets. One day years ago my mom called and said I got something for you at a rummage sale. I figured it was clothes or books but no, it was a complete Lionel trainset with metal die cast steam locomotive, cars, track, and transformer (not the original box however ;( ) She paid $15!
Then a year later she called and said she got me another train set: Lionel plastic steam locomotive with “chuffing” tender and some cheap plastic cars and track. This time she got the whole set for a dollar! And then she got a Marx tinplate set for $5.
I set these up around the tree at Christmas. `
Dave Nelson
