Perhaps this…
Wayne
[quote user=“riogrande5761”]
traindaddy1
Because of phisical limitations, I’ve gone from HO to O.
It sounds like the OP is switching from HO to O scale. Yet everyone is answering about HO stuff? Or am I missing something?
[/quote ]
I thought it was about how much/many freight cars you have in RTR, kit or scratch built. Or favorite manufacturer.
These are RTR cars. I don’t do anything else with them.
All of my freight cars are from Atlas. Close to at least 70% I believe. With a mix of Micro-Trains, Bluford Shops and Trainworx with Kato Amtrak passenger cars.
I have one CR LO from Athearns, going to have 4 boxcars and maybe coalporters from Intermountain (I forgot I have some Auto Racks 3) and a BLI NYC XM.
First of all, thanks to everyone who has posted replies.
Just to clarify. I was in the HO world for more than fifty years until “this old body” couldn’t work with the small stuff. While in HO, enjoyed both the building side as well as the cab control operational side.
My questions were not intended to specify any scale in particular. I was just thinking back to “the days of yore” when I was an avid modeler and was wondering what the present day modelers are doing.
Again, thanks for your replies. To be sure, I’ll keep reading.
That was what I gleened from your first post, but people tend to latch onto certain things in this forum and run with them when they may not be what the OP was trying to get at. Too much model train trivia tucked away in those brains wanting desperately to get out! It’s pretty typical here. [*-)][:o)]
Beautiful cars indeed but,I go cheap and buy the operator cars.
I kinda miss those “days of yore” seems things was simpler back then.
I dunno…Maybe ignorance was a bless back then when compared to the instant knowledge we have at our finger tips today…
Twenty five years ago almost all my rolling stock was Athearn kits. Then I started adding Accurail kits and Bowser kits to my collection. I still do an occasional kit but with the arthritis in my hands I’m doing fewer and fewer. I really don’t need anymore rolling stock ( or engines ) so I haven’t bought anything for a while. What I have bought is RTR.
Do they make them in the Operator ?
Russell,I dunno since I have no need for carbon black cars on my ISL.
I picked up several 5188cf 3 bay covered hoppers in the operators series.
In my case, I have a little bit of everything. Freight car wise, I have probably about 10-15 Athearn RTR as they are cars that I need for the era I model, a quantity of MDC cars that I have stripped and repainted for both my freelanced road and one the prototype road that I model, a small quantity of E&C Shops cars (Mostly woodchips), a few Accurail cars, a dozen or so Walthers cars, a bunch of Tyco caboose (with Athearn caboose trucks), as well as the occasional onesy or twosy from other manufacturers. However, most of the freight cars I have otherwise are BB Athearn. Some of those Athearn BB have been bashed to fit a specific purpose.
Passenger cars are Athearn BB streamliners (with upgraded weights and repainted with custom decals), about 18 or so MDC Overtons, and three older MDC Harrimans (also repainted with custom decals).
On the engine side (40 or so), a Walthers SW1 (original run, with plastic tubing for drive which I upgraded using NWSL components), three P2Ks (2 GP18s and and SW1200), a pair of old AMH U-boats, three Atlas yellow box S-4s, four Model Power 2-6-0 switchers, and the rest are either complete Athearn BBs or else use Athearn BB drives in a kitbash (8 Tythearn GP20s and a Bachthearn GP30).
All of these use some sort of knuckle coupler. (Kadees mostly. The rest will be converted as the need arises.)
My old BB and MDC stock was assembled for years before I finally sold it off. I guess I’ll have to hold my nose and admit I buy RTR now.
I like the wire grabs and thin roofwalks and replacing the BB/MDC stuff with those details was more work than I wanted to do. Its simply easier to by it already assembled instead of adding stuff to my older models.
I have a smaller layout than many, with a need for only about 50 to 75 cars total. So replacing the older cars with RTR cars was not much of a cost issue when factoring in the proceeds from selling the BB stuff and not buying the details to upgrade them.
I guess I’ll count myself in the cheapskates group. Out of ~100 cars, I have about 1/3 Athearn BB, about half cheap cars that I’ve tuned up and added Kadees, and the remainder some sort of high end or craftsman car.
I do enjoy fabricating “believeable” projects, such as the RC idler/flat car, and detailing or reworking locomotives. I remotored my Bowser T1 and bought the Bowser running gear for my Bachmann Niagara. My freelanced freight road is a custom paint and decal job with enhanced lighting (I still run DC).
I’ve often thought that hours of pleasure per dollar spent is a good metric for success in the hobby.