MTH is always such a bothering company. The moment Athearn releases the advertisements for their Vendera Turbine for Union Pacific, guess what MTH releases at the iHobby Expo?

A Union Pacific Vendera Turbine.

In fact, Broadway Limited Imports and MTH are immense competitors. I like to see what models they make to see what new moves and how the game goes. So far, MTH has tried to combat some recent good vibes from Broadway Limited Imports by releasing a Nickel Plate steam locomotive and a Little Joe...

Some say that the N&W J class was created just to irk the Broadway Limited people. However, no matter how much they boast the J class, the 9000 class was the real star. I saw some die-hard BLI fans pre-ordering them.

Bachmann, if you release the GG-1, please go for harder plastics with it. I want to be able to turn it silver...

http://www.northeast.railfan.net/images/tr_prr4872a.jpg

Cheers,
Joshua

Redone:
I receive their essays and state, "You obviously don't know what a sentence fragment is. You think commas are a type of Parmesan cheese that you sprinkle on your words."

He just got corrected by a 13 year old... Of course, I do take advanced English and Literature.

Cheers,
Joshua

Oh! Bach-Man, I want you to ask the idea of up-grading the tooling with a flashing LED instead of a giant bulb!

Cheers,
Joshua

Huh, I'll have to take a look into those...Hehehe...

Cheers,
Joshua

Yes, we cannot forget the rolling ease will allow either more cars or less. Metal wheels are a great improvement, allowing great smoothness.

So, if your going to have 4% grades, remember to get some metal wheelsets.

Cheers,
Joshua

Ah, a case of detail and actual power. Usually, you go with detail, but if your going for long trains and grades, detail might suffer over a better engine. I think Walther's makes a great engine in there locomotives, same with Atlas, but Bachmann is always good as well.

Usually, Crazy-motives (As I call them) are those very cheap locomotives made by Life-Like from Walthers or Model Power that have those little cheapy motors in them that go some 200mph scale! I think we had a Model Power F7 hit near 250... until the camera on the train rolled. I'm going to have to get that footage out on YouTube to show you guys sometime.

Cheers,
Joshua

EDIT: Darn you jward!  You got it out my point first! Hehe.

jward,
Especially when you find books about model railroading. Usually it's Kalmbach Publishing once again, but sometimes it's something else. I love to go to Barns and Nobles, just to see the real train books. I found a good read in a $45.00 New York Central book that I sat and read for 10 minutes and I couldn't put it down...

Great reads everywhere!

Cheers,
Joshua

Trainz! Trainz! Trainz Classics 1&2! Twenty dollars, but the best you can probably buy. It is better than MSTS, it takes time to get some real good content, but just look at some of the stuff you can get for free:

http://rrmods.com/images/spsd4502.jpg
http://www.jointedrail.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=66&Itemid=91

The user-interface is remarkable too! It's very easy to create routes and places to drive.

Cheers,
Joshua

Although I may not be suggesting a magazine (All of my bets are taken!), I can safely say the neatest thing about this hobby is both the minuature wonders, and saying, "Now that I can do ______, how else can I do it?"

Just touching up with Ray!

Cheers,
Joshua

Looks like a modified B-unit. You can see that the snow is high on the rotary, and it's the same on the B-unit.

Cheers,
Joshua

Ray,
Is that why we don't like mid-life?

Great adage! (That's what it is, right?)

Cheers,
Joshua

Sparks,
What's the point of a breakdown train? We have workbenches!  Now, that my humor is gone, I think it'll be funner to make one! Of course, I prefer if they would make one. I'd love to see if they would make an ATSF crane again with that tooling.

Cheers,
Joshua

That's pretty nice! I love the setup. I have some questions:

Are you using DCC?

What's the size of it? Sure looks pretty big!

So, is this your first layout?

Sparks,
Long time, no see! I see that your compliments are still rare. I do say that this layout deserved it!. 

Cheers,
Joshua

Well, I'll leave the cleaning supplies to the rest of the board, but I've had this interesting link for some time...

I have a few Blue Box kits myself!  (2 SD40-2s, 1 U20B, 1 GP40-2, 1 GP25... some too old!)

http://www.mcor-nmra.org/Publications/Articles/Athearn_TuneUp.html

They shouldn't be that old. Heck, just about every shop still has a couple.

Only problem is I've had to cannibalize an engine to fuel another. I'm only missing springs. If I could order a load of them, I could get about the other half of my entire fleet running!     

Cheers,
Joshua

Your asking questions for a kit bash. Scratch built is were you build everything. For example, you buy wood, scale corrugated metal, and build a shed in a scale.

Since they are Narrow Gauge, parts shouldn't be in kits. If you mean truly Narrow Gauge, that would be HOn3.

Do you mean your building them for HOn3 or HO?

Cheers,
Joshua