News & Products for the week of December 27, 2007

HO scale locomotivesElectro-Motive Division F7A diesel locomotives. Western Pacific. Five-pole skew-wound motor with dual flywheels, screw-mounted chassis, and operating headlights and Mars lights. A-A set without sound $279.98, with dual-mode sound decoder $419.98. April 2008. Ready-to-run. Genesis. Athearn Trains HO scale freight carsEvans 50-foot double-plug-door boxcar. Wisconsin & Southern Strides Against Cancer. RP-25 contour metal […]

Read More…

Broadway Limited Imports HO BlueLine SD40-2 diesel

Broadway Limited HO BlueLine SD40-2 A factory-sound equipped HO scale SD40-2 is now available as a DC model from Broadway Limited Imports. Part of the firm’s BlueLine series, the model uses the same tooling as the previously released Digital Command Control (DCC)-and-sound equipped version [See the review in the May 2005 issue. – Ed.] but […]

Read More…

MTH RailKing O gauge Crusader

I’VE OFTEN THOUGHT that the Reading Company’s presence in popular culture – and in model railroading – was far greater than its actual importance as a railroad. Nonetheless, the Reading, a two-and-a-half-state regional carrier gone now for three decades, continues to attract a fan base so enthusiastic that you’d expect the line was still running. […]

Read More…

News and products for the week of January 18, 2007

HO scale locomotivesAlco RS-3 diesel locomotive. Burlington Northern, Chicago & North Western, Lehigh Valley, Penn Central, and Pittsburgh & Lake Erie. Upgraded Roundhouse model with five-pole skew-wound motor, Digital Command Control (DCC) decoder Quick Plug, and see-through cab. $89.98. April 2007. Ready-to-Roll. Athearn Trains Union Pacific 4-8-8-4 Big Boy steam locomotive. Union Pacific (four road […]

Read More…

Atlas O O gauge EMD SD40 diesel

IF YOU RECALL the 1970s TV comedy Welcome Back Kotter, one of the more eccentric characters, Arnold Horshack, had a unique way of signaling his excitement. He would get nervous and shout something that sounded like “Uho uho, uho uho.” Well, that happens to me when I see an SD40 or SD40-2s. Forget your 21st-century […]

Read More…

2006 National Train Show final report: Part 2

Baldwin 2-4-4T Forney steam locomotive O scale locomotivesBaldwin 2-4-4T Forney steam locomotive. On2-1/2. Sandy River & Rangeley Lakes and painted black but unlettered. Digital Command Control-equipped, five-pole skew-wound motor, light-emitting-diode headlight, separately applied details, and vestibule cab with operating doors and interior detail. Inside- and outside-frame versions available. $275. Bachmann 0-6-0 and 2-6-0 saddle-tank steam […]

Read More…

Own a caboose

At 17 feet, 5 inches, the caboose cleared all bridges and power lines on its 20-mile road trip. Steve Hendrix Preserving a 25-ton caboose in my backyard wasn’t something that I had always planned on. Sure, I liked trains as a kid and even have a small model railroad layout. But an HO-scale train circling […]

Read More…

BC Rail: Wilderness railfanning

A BC Rail freight rolls along the shore of Seton Lake, south of Lillooet, B.C. Dale Sanders In 1952, British Columbia pinned its future on a frontier railway. But the traffic didn’t follow, leaving the province to look for ways of rescuing its traffic-starved and cash-starved railway. A white knight came in the form of […]

Read More…

Metra

Slant-nosed Metra F40PH-2Ms are seen powering Rock Island district trains, approaching Chicago’s LaSalle St. Station on December 15, 1997. Howard Ande Commuter trains have long been a part of Chicago’s railroad scene, appropriately enough for the railroad capital of the world. Illinois Central, the first railroad west of New York and Philadelphia to offer commuter […]

Read More…

Steam locomotive profile: 2-6-0 Mogul

Canadian National kept its fleet of Moguls in service the longest, until 1959. No. 86 was built in 1910 by the Canadian Locomotive Co. as Grand Trunk No. 1006, and renumbered twice, before it was photographed leading a mixed train through Ontario in July 1957. Herbert Harwood, Jr. The 2-6-0 was an outgrowth of the […]

Read More…

Metra: Driven by its history

Slant-nosed Metra F40PH-2Ms are seen powering Rock Island district trains, approaching Chicago’s LaSalle St. Station on December 15, 1997. Howard Ande Chicago has been North America’s railroad capital for 150 years, and Trains Magazine showed you why in special issues devoted to the city in July 2003 and July 1993. But while Chicago is a […]

Read More…