Bachmann PRR 4-4-0 American

[jleight]

When will Bachmann make an American 4-4-0 in PRR with sound and DCC? They were so close this year. That is the combination that I have been waiting for years to see. You were so close this year. Why make PRR with just DCC Ready? You missed the boat.

[Trainman203]

Why not use decals?  And get a unique engine while you are at it.

[jleight]

Believe me that I have enough to keep me busy. They just announced a wonderful load of Thomas items which I need to work on that layout. I don't need more projects. I don't need unique, I need completed products.

[ACY]

It doesn't take hardly any effort to add sound and DCC to the locomotive, it is pretty much plug and play assuming they have made accommodations for a speaker.

[Trainman203]

There's  a lot more obscure roads that other people  want than PRR but we don't ever get them.   I would like completed items too but I don't expect much to be given to me.

I've spent 8 years now building a 2' x 50' shortline so I know what it's like to have lots to do. 

Ther are always plenty of PRR engines avaible.  Maybe the Alco Mogul would do.. It's got sound and DCC.  The new USRA 2-8-2 will be in PRR. ...  Even though the PRR only had one or two and they were forced on them during WW Ii as I recall.  A competitor of the Bach Man  has at least 5 or 6 PRR steam engines, plus nearly every diesel comes in PRR.  It's not like, as in my case, nothing is there.

[ebtnut]

The Pennsy had a lot of 4-4-0's (like most other roads) back in the 19th century.  However, most all of them were gone by the end of the 1920's except the D-16's.  A few of them lasted into the early 1950's and one is preserved at the museum in Strasburg, PA.  The salient feature of these locos, like virtually all Pennsy-designed steam, was the Belpaire firebox.  This design include visible "shoulders" just ahead of the cab along the top of the boiler.  I believe that this particular loco has only been available in brass.  Gem made one, and I believe Sunset did one.  To date, the two Bachmann models, the Ma and Pa design and the Baldwin do not represent the PRR loco. 

[Trainman203]

Those belpaire fireboxes were used some by other roads, but in the model railroad world they generally make a model distinctively PRR and mostly unusable for any other road.

[ebtnut]

Agreed.  Great Northern was probably the second-biggest user of the Belpaire firebox design. 

[Trainman203]

The Iron Mountain had quite a few belpaire boiled engines.   The 4-8-0's so equipped made it to the late 1940's.