K-4 Pennsylvania HO from MTH.

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1


Hi !







I nead some information about the K-4 Pennsylvania HO from MTH.



I read that this is one of the first HO-locos from MTH.



I would like to know more about the driving behavior and the level of detail compared to prototype.



Hopefully somebody can tell me a little bit about the K-4 from MTH.







Every hint ,except speculations, about the modell is appreciated.

Santa Claus

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Hi Santa Claus,

I’ve had an MTH HO PRR K-4, road #1737, the 1927 pre-war model with slotted cow-catcher, for over a year. It’s a beauty, great runner, and has 28 DCC functions which I can address with my MRC Prodigy Advance 2. It’s one of my grandson’s and my favorite locos. We use it to pull 8 Strasburg Railroad passenger coaches. Tony’s Trains has a review dated 8/3/06 in Tony’s Tips/locomotives. I tried to link that review but the link kept defaulting to a Bachmann Shay review with the same date.

The MTH HO K-4 would make a great gift for a PRR fan if Santa is considering that.

Merry Christmas!

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If you’re into smoke, the smoke unit on the MTH K4 is quite impressive. I saw one back in January at a World’s Greatest Hobby (WGH) train show in PA. Even though I won’t use smoke on my layout, it was a lot more realistic looking than the usual smoking locomotives.

Tom

4

Well MTH is a company that people either like or dislike. Those that have it say good things about it. There are four choices currently - Bachman, Bowser, Brodway Limited and MTH. The Bachman is lower quality, doesn’t pull very well, breaks down easily but looks ok. The Bowser is a metal kit that will outpull the prototype and if you enjoy building can give many hours of pleasure and satisfaction to build. The level of detail will be what you as a modeler can achive. The BLI is a very good engine and is at a level of detail comparable to the MTH. None of them will fool anybody when looking at a picture if they are a model or the real thing without some work. Do not buy the MTH Tuscan red engine if you want to be as realistic as possible. There has never been definitive proof the PRR ever painted a K4 Tuscan red. A lot of people have done a lot of research and have not been able to substantiate its existence. Rumors abound however and it might have existed. I’d stick with the DGLE engine. My personal choice would be the BLI. They have produced numerous HO engines and appear to be in the HO market for the long haul. My personal opinion is MTH has done this one locomotive and announced one other. I don’t see them as long term supplier to the HO market but that is my personal opinion. There are also some nonstandard DCC issues as MTH has chosen to market a unique system that uses higher voltage. Others more familiar with DCC can comment in that regard. If you go to the PRRT&HS website one of the Keystone Modeler magazines reviews both the BLI and the MTH probably in different issues. As I recall one of the comments about the MTH was that the area around the front of the boiler didn’t look quite right. There was too much open space around the pilot area. The BLI engines are from the late 40’s and 50’s. The MTH engine is a

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Thanks to all of you guys ( Dave,Tom,ndbprr )

for your answers concerning the K-4 PRR from MTH.

You were all a great help to me.

Sorry for my bad english.

But I´m sure you model railroader guys understand me.

See you again !

Santa Claus