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Which manufacturers make the best rolling stock, in terms of performance and quality of printing on the cars? (I am interested only in fully designed cars, not blank cars that I have to decorate myself.)
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Kits or RTR?
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How do they perform on standard code track?
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How is the selection of mid-century freight cars?
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How do they perform on a layout next to yellow-box Athearns and vintage Mantuas?
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What are the price ranges of these cars?
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What else should I ask that I have not?
SC,
You might try looking at Tangent and Exactrail. They mainly manufacture more modern (i.e. 80s and newer) RTR rolling stock but also have manufactured some older car-types. (I have particularly liked and enjoyed the Tangent 3-compartment tank cars and the Exactrail ribbed boxcars.) The detailing on either company’s product is beautiful and price ranges are generally $45 and up - depending on the particular piece of rolling stock you are interested in.
I like and prefer kits over RTR but both companies have offered some unique rolling stock that I wanted to include a few of in my roster. And I have not been disappointed with any of my purchases from either manufacturer.
I guess one question that I have for you is: What is your definition of “contemporary”. Do you mean contemporary as in the prototype? Or, do you mean contemporary as for the manufacturer’s offerings?
Tom
For my era, there are limited options for top-notch ready to run.
In my experience, you can’t go wrong with Kadee or Fox Valley.
Not saying others are not as good, just lack of experience with all the products out there.
-Kevin
I don’t own any of their products as they don’t fit my era but see them in person at their shop. They are stunning in my book.
http://www.northamericanrailcarcorporation.com/about.htm
If they do some older stuff I will be buying.
There’s “High-End” as in an $800 brass “Queen Mary” HO flat car and then there’s a reasonable “step-up” from the “shake-the-box” kits.
As mentioned the Kadee line is good. I’ve found them at on-line retailers in the $25-35 range. Their offerings are somewhat limited but they are prototypes from the 1940s into the '70s (some later).
Intermountain is another brand with both kits and RTR available. Good underbody detail and separate ladders and grabs:
Needham_y by Edmund, on Flickr
GE_ILDX_316 by Edmund, on Flickr
NYC_Pacemaker-XMc by Edmund, on Flickr
Moloco is maybe a step up from these. Very limited production. They run about $50 each.
IMG_9263_fix by Edmund, on Flickr
Don’t hesitate to try your hand at some of the “vintage” Life-Like Proto 2000 kits and later RTR stuff. These can still be found in the $20 range.
How fragile are these $40.00 to $50.00+ plastic pieces of HO rolling stock with all the great looking super details?
I like late '60s to early '70s mostly. I run in the Penn Central era. BUT sometimes, I can and like to back date Power and rolling stock and run early '50s to early '60s Eastern Roads. So for ‘‘above normal’’ rolling stock I have Tangent ($54.95 freight and a SWEET LOOKING B&O Caboose $80.00), LL P2k ($23.99), Spring Mills Depot (B&O Wagon Top Caboose $), Exact Rail Platium (not Express), Intermountain, Athearn ($32.99), Bluford Shop (Tranfer Caboose), BLI (Hopper), Walthers ($49.99), Rapido ($52.99). All the above mentioned rolling stock are Beautiful and Ready to Run.
I should say all my rolling stock came from LHS or Train Shows or Auctions.
And thats a good one to ask.
Just a simple rule i live by - treat them like its the last glass bottle of beer on the planet and your on bare cement.
PMR
I damaged a BLMA beer car just getting it out of the packaging. The very fragile brake gear rigging was in pieces.
One of the coupler cut bars fell off while running a train, and caused a derailment.
I don’t really need all of that detail, but the price was right on Ebay.
Mike.
Thanks all for the info!
Shock Control)
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Alot of the manufacturers have different grades, or ‘lines’ or model quality. An example of this is Bachmann. They have Xmas trains sets (your lower grade models) up to whatever is there top of the line now. Which would be aimed at us modellers. You will find asking Railfans their prefernce will yield many varied answers. Rightfully so - because many manufacturers do really make some very nice models. Many of them. Some of those same companys make total flops too. Again, i could use my example here. Plus, we have new companys coming into the hobby who might make something good, or not. Best answer here is to try a few models from diff. makers and build your own preference. See what YOU like. Not all high $$ models roll true and straight.
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This makes no difference. More times than not your RTR is the same as the Kit, it has just been assembled from the factory. Again, this is a personal preference built over time (no pun intended). You may just want to run trains and therefore are fine with buying RTR. You simply may not have the time for kits. Either way, both RTR and kit offer the same thing as far as the model goes. The only difference is along with
Hey Edmund, is that really a Exact Rail Caboose (Blue B&O #C-3016 I-18 Baywindow) in your above post?
I don’t know that I want to get too deep into your questions, but here a few comments.
A lot of what people have recommended so far is too new for your 1963 era cutoff.
If fragile is an issue, you don’t want most of what has been suggested/shown.
The problem is that there are no “detail police”, nor are there preset “quality levels”.
Each company tries to balance things as they see the hobby - they all see it diffrently. and bigger companies like Bachmann, Athearn and Walthers make products at different detail and price levels for different segments of the market.
I have lots of expensive high end RTR, and I have lots vintage 1950’s and 60’s stuff, and I have lots of blue box Athearn grade stuff. And I run it all together with concern for some being more accurate than others.
I personally have no problem with fragile, I was adding fragile details to simpler models 50 years ago - they are still on the layout.
Perform? They roll around good track pretty much the same as an Athearn blue box car, except some don’t like sharp curves - but I don’t like sharp curves either.
Today, even the lessor detailed cars like the Athearn “Roundhouse” line have very good paint and lettering.
The selection in your era (pretty close to my 19
Continued thanks for the detailed responses!
He misspoke: that’s a Tangent caboose.
My wife gave me a Spring Mills Depot I-12 caboose as a wedding present, because it is that nice.
Blue or Red?
As long as the coupler heights are okay, everything should work well. If the Mantuas have truck-mounted (talgo) couplers, that could potentially be an issue, as a car with a frame-mounted coupler could (theoretically) shove the talgo truck off the rails.
I prefer old Athearn Blue Box and Roundhouse cars because I use them on a club layout where people get a bit ham-fisted. (The less add-on detail, the less there is to break.) But the printing isn’t great. Still, can’t beat the price, and at our club the cars are too far away to see detail anyway.
I’ve done well with Walthers beige-box cars as well. They have nice graphics and are fairly simple and durable. I prefer not to pay much more than $20 per car and that’s not a problem.
Along with all the recommendations above, I’d put in a positive word for Branchline Blueprint freight car kits. They are nicely detailed and challenging to build without being frustrating. But the detail is also a bit fragile, and they don’t always roll well; you may have to swap out axles or trucks. They are easy to find for $10-$15 per kit.
I also like the Proto 2000 kits, though the tanker was too much for my clumsy fingers (too bad, I found the kits super-cheap at $5 apiece). I built one of their gons and a box car and was very happy with both.
I also rather like Athearn’s newer offerings. The detail is lovely but they can get expensive.
HTH
Aaron
Tangent, yes. I was getting some of the manufacturers mixed up [:$] Sorry.
Ed
Oh my, no need to be sorry, I just thought maybe you were testing us to see who was paying attention.[:)]
It’s easy to get the Manufactures mixed up with all the great ones we have today. When I started in Model Railroading I could probably count the Manufactures I bought from and knew of on one hand.
Again… I can only speak mostly of Kadee.
The PS-1 boxcars and two bay hopper cars are pretty robust.
The PS2-2 covered hopper cars have a few fragile points.
The tank cars are extremely difficult to handle without breaking something.
The Fox Valley B&O style wagontop boxcars I own seem to be pretty good at standing up to handling also.
-Kevin
I couldn’t help noticing the OP was asking about high end “contemporary” rolling stock, but see lots of replys with rolling stock which by rights, doesn’t fit that description. Words mean things. Or is everyone stretching the term contemporary to suite their personal tastes which seems to go back 40 or 50 years or more. The British have a term for this: “Taking the Mickey”.
Contemporary generally means present day, or maybe rolling stock you would see in present day trains, which yes, could include some older freight cars that are still running.
Tangent was mentioned but most of the rolling stock is 1920’s thru 1970’s, but some lasted into the 90’s and beyond.
I’d suggest looking at ScaleTrains, Atlas, Intermountain, Athearn and Exactrail, who offer more recent rolling stock that would be of interest to contemporary fans.