Just gawking on the “net” and I find a site selling brass stuff, so I start peeking at the “stuff” and this is new production, seems like nice stuff, I have no idea how many are being made but the price is @$1700.00 (it’s a diesel A-B-B) so I check my bank account–no deal— then I read further–they are all pre-sold. I keep being told by forum members that this is not a cheap hobby, tell me, how do you guys do it??? Somebody is buying this stuff , and I would sort of assume they may be model railroaders. jealous??? no, just amazed.
I’d guess that many of the buyers (maybe most?) are collectors. Some large number may never even leave their boxes!
But these guys are a relatively small proportion of the model railroad market place. However I wonder how much the cost of brass is sucking the price of plastic locos ever skyward?
Charlie
BCSJ:
Brass purchasers buying them for collections and not to run is one of those old, VERY tired ‘Urban Legends’ that’s been running around for years and should have been put to bed a long, LONG time ago. It might have been true in the '70’s or '80’s, but it doesn’t hold water now, with the de-valuation of most brass models on the collector’s market. Brass is expensive because each single piece is hand-crafted to a specific model of a specific railroad’s locomotive. It’s not plastic USRA’s or generic F-7’s, or the latest Big Boy, it’s locomotives like NP/GN/SP&S Z-6 Challengers which will probably never be produced by people like BLI, PCM or Genesis. Or C&O 2-8-2’s, or NP A series 4-8-4’s. They’re the locomotives that people who model specific railroads want to haul their trains and are willing to pay good money for meticulously detailed, good-running locomotives that they don’t have to kit-bash the life out of from a generic plastic steamer.
I model Rio Grande steam. There IS no Rio Grande steam in HO save a Genesis UP-clone 4-6-6-4 which the Rio Grande had forced on them and got rid of as soon as they could. And a USRA generic plastic with ‘Rio Grande’ decals slapped on the tender is NOT the same thing. Ergo, for Rio Grande steam locomotives, I have to go brass. Most brass is–or can be ‘tinkered’ into very well running locomotives. Right now I have a Sunset Z-6 GN 4-6-6-4 on order for the price of about $960. Why a Z-6? Frankly, I think they were one of the handsomest Challengers ever built and I’ve always admired them. Several years ago I spent over a thousand dollars for a Rio Grande F-81 2-10-2 which has seen yeoman service on my model railroad and has run absolutely flawlessly. Brass has heft, detail, and it’s easy to work on if one has to ‘tinker’ a bit, sometimes. Oh, and
For my RR I probably won’t use brass locos; I’m all diesel. Although they may be more prototypical than a plastic model, the detail in plastic is catching up.
A friend of mine has a Brass GS-4, and a Spectrum one. They look the same detailwise, and run about the same, but the brass does pull a little more.
As for diesels the only models in BN I’ve seen are U30Cs, GP30s, SD24s, and some SD40-2. But for around 300-700 a piece I’d rather get several plastic ones, then buy details to bring them up to par. I could have gotten a Brass overland GP30 for around 300, no DCC or sound, but for 100 bucks I picked up 2 P2K GP30s, another 40 yielded decoders, and 28 yielded the detail kits. So for under 200 bucks, I had 2 plastic GP30s that would probably outpull the brass ones.
However, for certaint locos, they probably will only be made in brass. (S2 Northerns, Yellowstones, etc.) but some do get made in plastic or diescast (Triplex, Class J)
I buy brass whenever I can’t find a suitable plastic item which accurately depicts the prototype. As I model the Alaska Railroad, that’s fairly often. I’m 28 years old and have neither the skill nor the time to start kitbashing and painting flared radiator SD70MACs, so I picked up three of the four that Overland put out a few years back. Same for ARR Geeps with all of their ‘addendums’ and modifications. As for “how I do it” … well, like I said, I’m 28, unmarried (which really, really helps 
) and am lucky enough to be in a field where I have some disposable income.
From the time that a lot of brass is announced, to the time that it is actaully released can be a looong time (some running in to many years). This gives me time to save the cash for a particular brass model I may be purchasing. The only thing that really kills my pocket book is when I see something I really NEED on eBay.
The price of this new brass is just to darn expensive. MSRP for many of the new steam engines is quite close to $2K. With the cost of living increasing so fast, that value is tough to justify. Some of these manufacturers want you to reserve a product without even having the price available.
I wish I could afford it but it’s too much for me.
The last passenger car I reserved was without a price (TCY). I e-mailed them, and they gave me rough estimate of what it should be when it is finally in. I also did this with the Overland hospital cars, but when I saw the price, I said no way!!!
If you think 2K for an engine is a lot, check out the ads in MR for brass tractor-trailers and construction equipment - bulldozers etc!! If you really want a thrill, check out the price for a dragline excavator or tall construction crane!! I’m sure they dont sell in quantity, but there are enough retired laywers/doctors/Rod Stewarts out there to buy a few - probably the same folks who buy a complete layout!! [:O]
Great responses, they explain a lot. there are some really beautiful used brass locomotives for sale on the same site, some as low as $200.00 and in good shape, as one said, if you model a specific road, brass is the only alternative. I’m still on the fence about “collectors” I have yet to meet a real “collector” (and it’s still a mystery to me)
tatans:
I’ve been model railroading in HO scale since about 1954 and I’ve YET to meet one of those fabled ‘brass collectors’. As I said in my previous post, I think it’s an Urban Legend perpretrated by people who also subscribe to the “Flat Earth” theory. When I have seen a ‘collection’ put on sale at my LHS, it usually consists of painted, weathered run-in brass from the estate sale of a modeler who has passed on. In fact, some of my best-running brass has come from these ‘collections’. Even the unpainted ones have been run in to some degree. And I’ve gotten a lot of them at bargain-basement prices.
Tom
I’m not buying $1,700.00 A-B-B s in HO, but I’m spending a fair amount on the latest sound equipped engines, including the Sunset Northern Pacific A-3, A-4, and A-5. I’ve got two Z-6 challengers on order.
How do I do it? I don’t spend my money at the bar, on a boat, on a summer home, Harley, two seat sports car, 60s vintage restored car etc.
I’ve also sold off my vintage brass, such as my Fujiyama A-3 and A-5, and Oriental A-4 to help pay for the latest sound and DCC equipped stuff. I operate, I don’t collect.
I am passionate about my hobby, just as others are passionate about the above items.
It helps to have a wonderfully supportive wife, and children that also share the passion.
regards,
Jerry Zeman
I recall a couple of years ago that someone was selling off all the brass from the estate of a deceased MRRr. According to the description, he never took any of it out of the box, and judging by the pics that were provided, that may have very well been the case. There was a LOT of high end models with these auctions. Of course this having been on eBay, I do take it with a grain of salt, but anything is possible.
This alone doesn’t support “collectors” being widespread, but I suppose there may be the few out there.
I guess I was making the mistake of talking contemporary, new brass. The stuff that costs $1500+ per model. I think the buyers for that are different than the buyers for the older, used stuff just because of the price differential. There aren’t that many of us that can afford to spend $20,000 to keep a round house filled with the nicest/newest stuff. But at $250-$500 the game changes radically (heck that’s the price range of current plastic steam engine models).
Whether or not the prices of brass are justified or not by the amount of handwork that goes into them (they probably are - I have one really nice engine - a Challenger Imports GS1 and it looks a lot nicer than the plast models I have) really doesn’t make a lot of difference. It’s still awfully expensive stuff (to most of us).
My LHS discounted brass and I used to see boxes of Challenger Imports passenger sets sitting behind the counter waiting to be picked up ($3000+) by a guy who never ran it.
Whatever,
C.
BCSJ–
No argument from me on the price of a lot of current brass–as I said in a previous post, the last new brass loco I bought several years ago cost me in the neighborhood of $1200–but it’s proven to be worth every penny I saved for it. Very powerful, very smooth, and VERY handsome.
Oddly enough, some of the newer Sunset brass models are ‘relatively’ inexpensive. I’m thinking of their promised Z-6 Challenger which without sound and DCC is offered for under $1,000. Considering the prices that USED Z-8 Challengers are going for these days (average about $2,000), it’s pretty much of a ‘bargain’ (if new brass can ever be called a ‘bargain’, LOL!). I know that Division Point and Precision Scale locos are quite a bit more expensive, but it’s nice to have at least one brass company that has scaled back their prices a little.
Brass has always been more expensive–I remember my first brass loco cost me around $50 back in 1961, when you could pick up an Athearn F-7 for about $10, and that was a pretty good chunk to lay out, especially for a college student in those days. And three years later, my second brass loco cost me about $106–still a considerable chunk of change. So it’s never been cheap, which is why most of my brass locos have been bought second hand.
But for those of us who run models that are ONLY available in brass–we’ve learned to ‘bite the bullet’ and either save up our sheckels or haunt swap meets and MR shows and pile through the offerings of large brass dealers like Brasstrains, Caboose Hobbies, Peach Creek Shops and others.
As I said, I’ve got the Sunset Z-6 on order without DCC, sound or the other bells and whistles (I’m strictly DC), and the price to me seems pretty reasonable for what I’m after.
But brass isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, so to speak. Frankly, if I were running diesel instead of steam, I wouldn&
In town here, there’s a facility where lime is loaded from trucks into covered hoppers to be shipped to whatever place needs that much lime. I’ve always thought it would be neat to build a module or something of that place. Of course, its filled with those cylindrical covered hopper looking trailers they move lime in, when its in a truck. I looked high and low for a company that made HO ones. Turns out someone did. Given that I’d need about six or seven of them (two or three in position to be unloaded, a few parked, a few on their way in or out)…let’s just say that seven of them would cost more than this computer. And my monitor alone was $600.
Right out the window went that idea.
Actually now that I think about it, two of them would have cost more than just my monitor.
I’m very happy with my brass, although I don’t have a “pike” per se I do break 'em out and run them on the dioramas I construct.
Another thing to consider regarding the price of brassis how weak the dollar is. That is essentially the reason why the costs have become so prohibitive for new production runs. We don’t have buying power overseas.
Anyhow, stuff from the likes of Key, Division Point, W&R, Challenger, and Railway Classics are absolutely worth it.
Superb models that not even the best of plastic approaches.