THE GENERAL ELECTRIC Rectifier was the first of several brick-shaped freight locomotives made by GE to satisfy the limited market for freight-hauling electric locomotives. In the mid-1950s the Virginian Railway, a regional carrier known for heavy coal trains and electric locomotives, sought replacements for its fleet of aging “square head” freight motors. Pleased with the […]
TIME MARCHES ON in both reality and the toy train world. Electric boxcab locomotives often replaced steam engines, streamlined GG1s replaced boxcabs, and finally the venerable GG1s fell victim to the passage of time and were replaced by the AEM7 electric. AEM7 you say? In the mid-1970s Amtrak saw the handwriting on the wall. The […]
THE NEW YORK CENTRAL Hudson! Now there’s a locomotive nobody has done for a while. All kidding aside, the New York Central J-class Hudson is a locomotive that virtually everybody but Atlas O has produced. You have your choice of scale, semi-scale, or toy-like; prewar, postwar, or modern; and in S or O gauges. The […]
THE BUDD RAIL DIESEL Car (RDC) has a time honored place in railroading as well as toy train operation. Prior to World War II, America’s railroads tried to stem losses from passenger service on under-populated branch lines by use of various motorized car units that were collectively dubbed “doodlebugs.” These units often looked like baggage […]
FOR HE WHO stands still in today’s aggressive toy train market, all may be lost, and the staff at Williams Electric Trains has no intention of fumbling around, looking for a map! Williams wants to stay in out in front of customer satisfaction and variety. Williams has unveiled its latest addition to its economical three-rail […]
A DRUM ROLL, please. This product is unlike any locomotive created in the history of Lionel. This is the first articulated engine ever produced by Lionel. It is the largest engine ever done by the firm and may even surpass the fabled no. 700E scale Hudson in its amount of prototypical detail. This locomotive is […]
LIONEL’S CLASSIC GANTRY cranes combine realistic looks with unmatched accessory action. I’ve wanted one for years, and when Lionel announced that it would include an updated version of the last postwar crane (the no. 282R) in its Postwar Celebration reissue series, I made a place on my layout for one. Then I waited, not always […]
MIKE WOLF SAID it: He wants to make one of virtually every locomotive that has ever run the rails of America. He and MTH have offered such unusual locomotives as the Baldwin AS616, the EMD BL2, and the Alco RS-27. Add to that list the AEM7 electric locomotive. This engine differs from the others, however. […]
IN THE WORLD of prototype railroading, these are exciting times indeed. If you’ve ever been fortunate enough to be in a railroad yard and see a modern Dash-9 or SD60, 70, or 90 resting next to an elderly Geep, you can easily see how far railroading has progressed in the past 30 years. These new […]
EVER NOTICE THAT when you visit a layout that has some sort of subway system designed into it, when you peek into the subterranean station, 9 times out of 10 you’ll see a trolley car darting through the dim light? Since 1998 MTH has had a remedy for this: a modern subway train can now […]
ONE OF THE BIG SURPRISES of the past holiday season was MTH’s Pennsylvania RR starter set (no. 30-4023-1). You buy a starter set with certain entry-level expectations. The kick in the pants with this set is how those expectations have been exceeded. Scoring big points on all counts, the Pennsy set packs plenty of attention […]
IN THE MODERN era few locomotives have been as successful as the EMD SD45. This 3,600-horsepower, C-C truck diesel took America’s railroads by storm, and more than 1,600 of all versions of this unit were sold between 1965 and 1975. If the unit had an undoing, it was its high-maintenance 645-series prime mover – a […]
