If you could sand or scribe some Evergreen strip to give it a woodgrain look, it wouldn't be hard to just scratchbuild new sides/ends for these cars. 

That one of those commemorative sets with the glossy bright color paint jobs?

I would suggest carefully dissassembling the cab and stripping it and the tender shell.  One problem you'll have otherwise is the lettering and stripes will ghost back through.  And you want to spray paint it if possible, with a flat black enamel or other paint - you want one with a little bite to it; I've had good results with K-mart's cheap brand. 

The Favorite Spot is a wholesale buyer with Bachmann, who dumps items at online auction site eBay starting at like $1.00 US with no reserve.  But they stopped listing these engines in early June, I don't know if they're sold out or what; I bought mine elsewhere and paid a tad more, but I also got an undec where TFS was selling ones with a roadname on them.  They also take a couple weeks off in August running no auctions at all. 

TFS does offer listings where you can Buy It Now but the prices are higher.  The one time I had to ask a question, they were quite rude in reply. 

I just put together a layout using 22" as the minimum mainline radius - I actually used a few sectional pieces to maintain it.  The Forneys pull around those curves fine, but it's difficult to couple it to cars - and cars to one another - on the curves.  I did slip in a couple of spots of 18" on sidings.   Before I rebuilt the layout, I had one tight start to a curve where the Forney would cause longer cars behind it to sway - one a scratchbuilt 40' passenger car - but as long as curves are gradual and sharp spots are minimal, it will pull the Bachmann cars around just fine as far as that goes.

As for track, I had a ton of regular Atlas code 100 flex, switches and some sectional on hand, so I re-used it.  I'm going to get some real cinders to use for ballast (tried before and works well, just sift well, glue, and if you have cats, don't let them find the bucket!) and just bury everything so the ties are invisible.  The prototype I'm following, by the end, was often just a low spot in the grass anyways. 

I also used #6s for most of the switches, again except for a couple of sidings where I ended up with some #4s.

What I did find is the Forney especially does not like sudden changes in grade, your grades need to be very gradual at the start and end.  All of it's weight is on the drivers, so when the front of the engine levels out at the top of a hill, it raises the rear of the locomotive up, which can cause uncoupling.   This makes me glad I laid the mainline out and have test run it - I already raised much of the roadbed supports upward and have a couple spots they need to rise a small amount more.   Some of the older freight cars - the flat and gon in particular - don't like humps and bumps, I had one low spot on a curve that they would derail on, a piece of cardstock under the track eliminated the problem.   On straight track if you want a little sag here and there it probably won't hurt, again other than with the Forney.


But even the 2-6-6-2 handles the curves well and really doesn't look out of place doing it.  It's not like running an HO Big Boy over the same tight curves, for instance. 

Because I'm about to bash an old, nearly irreplacable and somewhat valuable plastic kit into an operating loco, probably an 1880-1890 era Porter or similar IF 2-6-0, based on a 3-foot gauge loco.  (the kit I have is 1/50th, which makes it nearly identical in size to the IF 4-4-0, so a true 1/48 version would still be fairly small). 

I was pleased with the 2-6-6-2, it goes well with the Forney and small 4-4-0's.  In fact I sold my 2-8-0's and 2-6-0 and have concentrated on the smaller engines.  I just wish the Forney and the IF 4-4-0 had tender headlights without my having to add them, since they don't come with a matching spare.  I suppose I'll have to find someone and swap with them.

Some of the ones on that list have been run not too long ago, or are common enough to be cheap used.

The SuperMarket and others that share the same side and rear walls, that front makes a nice bash onto a DPM Robert's Dry Goods, for a city building with a 50s era front tacked on it. 

Really there aught to be a standard for any older product the dies are still around for, if they're serviceable - if they're regularly clearing 5 or 10 times what a new one would retail for on eBay or at other auctions and sales, and getting a bunch of bids... it's probably time to do another run of them.   Not a huge run, by any means, some kind of compromise between flooding the market forever and not making enough to make it worthwhile though.   

Well, it came and I ran it around.  It handles my sloppy track fine, the humps and bumps of shoddy benchwork didn't bother it any.

About the only engine it bothers much is the Forney and only because the engine has that long rear overhang - when the drivers crest a grade they lift the whole rear of the loco, causing it to come uncoupled from whatever cars are behind it.  So of course, I now have two Forneys....  it doesn't much matter though; I need to redo some of the subroadbed anyways to raise it.  What was originally designed for HO operations with 2-3 powered locomotives, has grades that are too much for a single On30 loco particularly with the hoppers and side-door caboose that seem to have more rolling friction in their trucks than the original arch-bar trucks on the boxcars and flatcar-based cars have.  I don't mind if the return connection grade is a tad steep, but the other side, the 4-4-0 aught to be able to handle two passenger cars on.

Warranty replacement arrived today, sealed NIB.  Ran it a couple laps around the layout; these things really should have a coupler on the back with the shank offset to the bottom of the knuckle, but that's a production issue.  (they're low compared to Bachmann rolling stock and come uncoupled at the end of grades and the like). 

Of course after I posted that, I found the info on those engines on Wikipedia conflicts what I have in the two books on the CMR and Ulster & Delaware - the info on Wiki only shows one western 2-6-0 coming to New York.  I suppose unless someone has the company records in their attic, no one will ever know for certain.

I about fell over when I saw they were going last for so little even The Obnoxious... err, Favorite Spot stopped listing them.  No sound were just clearing $100 and sound locos were going around $150-$175.   That was the beginning of June. 

I have one coming from another dealer, but I'm curious if anyone's run one enough to get an idea how they handle marginal trackwork - kinks, grade changes, dips, the like.  I suppose I'll find out eventually what I have to fix.  As it stands other than a couple short spots my minimum radius is 22" and all the main line turnouts are #6's - and even then there's only about three #4s at all.   

It's sad but it's also good news in the sense that maybe we'll see some more action with the product line, there's a lot of decent stuff currently not available new.   So far all I've seen is some slow-moving inventory turning up at discount odd-lots type of stores. 

Guess I should have mentioned that too. 

You know, if suitable data/drawings could be found, a Brooks or similar Porter 2-6-0 of the 1880 era would be a reasonable choice for a new locomotive.  They're 3-foot gauge engines, but very small, and would require few compromises to make them 30-inchers. 

Union Pacific, Denver & Gulf/Colorado Central had a number of these engines, which in turn had many secondhand owners.  The Ulster & Delaware (New York Central predecessor) had four on their Katterskill branch - when it was standardized, two went to a parallell road (Catskill Mountain Railway) and two went into the Adirondacks to a Delaware & Hudson RR predecessor.  One of the CMR engines lasted through at least 1910 out of service behind the enginehouse. 

I'm sure others from this group led a similarly colorful life after the UP sold them off. 

I know the Porter one there must be some sort of drawings, because Nitto of Japan did a static kit of one many years ago in 1/50th scale, which was imported and sold here by MRC in a series with a rickshaw, a horse-drawn streetcar, and a Concorde SST plane (yeah, ) as the MRC-Nitto Transportation Series.  Size-wise in 1/50 it works out to almost exactly the same size as the inside-frame 4-4-0 - the tender is just about identical.  How much bigger it would be in 1/48 I haven't tried to figure out but I doubt it would be much.