No laffin', OK?

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=tac%27s+track+20th+Sept+2014

WE had fun, by the way.  Dunno if anybody else did, they never said.

I'm the one wearing the Tillamook Oregon hoodie, BTW, in case anybody wondered.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

Me and a couple of pals will be running out teeny LGB-based layout at the Barnwell Garden Show this weekend.  It's only 12x8 feet, but has lots of track of a necessarily tight radiii - smallest and next one up, so that we can run ALL of the Bachmann geared stuff on the outside loop.  The geared locos never fail to attract an audience - unusual does not even come close as most here in UK have never seen ANY kind of a logging locomotive.  Those gorgeous Bachmann spectrum models sure do attract some serious attention, that's for sure.  Comment and question come thick and fast, and Youtube is used to show the real thing when we can get a decent wi-fi signal.

Between us we have five Bachmann Shays, a Heisler and Climax, plus a live-steam Shay and a couple of small live-steam locos.  I'll also be running a few LGB littlies, and a couple of AccuCraft's snazzy little Baguley-Drury dismals with suitable rolling stock.

There will be tea and cake for the locals, and coffee and pie for me and Bruce.  You are all more than welcome to to drop by - outside the village hall behind the Montague Arms pub, which will, or course, be open during the show.

All donations will be going to help offset the enormous cost of adding on a small washroom to a building put up in the early 1600's for the 'poor and G*d-fearing gentle people of the countie thatte they maye bee accomodated in close fellowshippe with their more advantaged fellows', Pastor Latham's Almshouses in other words, a Grade 1 English Heritage jewel that still houses people - widows and widowers, born in the county and are 'welle-deserving'.  The add-on has to be built using the same stone from the same quarry - still owned by the same family BTW, using correct 17thC recipe mortar and hand-smithed ironwork.  For the same price we could have a good-sized three-bedroomed home on Vancouver Island...

There will be a couple of little movies on Youtube, I have no doubt, that's if we can get persimmon from the parents to upload them if they have their children in them.

tac, ig, ken the GFT & The Richard III Society Boys

I can see a time when parts like this one, no longer available from Bachmann, are going to be 3D printed instead.  Here in UK we already have one company who prints narrow gauge slate cars in FIVE scales - from 009 right up to 7/8ths.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

Quote from: veetwelve on August 20, 2014, 11:54:16 PM
Just got my sale flyer from MicroMark via e-mail today, and they have the Spectrum Forney on sale for $325... that's the lowest price I've ever seen on that bad boy!  And just in time for Christmas, too!  Just thought I'd pass this along.

All the best,
Jay

Hmmm, that's around $950 less than the yUK price......

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

That was a great post, Steve, and a reminder that not everybody can blow a month or two's spending money - maybe more - on a single loco, rather than boring stuff like food, utilities, clothes and so on.

A while back I tried sending some stuff to a contact in Melbourne - all in vain.  By the time he had received my model train 'care package', with a genuine declared value of £95.00, it had somehow 'grown in value' to north of AUS$500.00.  We never tried that again.

Best down there, Sport.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

Quote from: Chris9017 on August 12, 2014, 11:32:15 PM
I would really like to see re-runs of the Heisler locomotives.   They were good engines with some electrical quirks, and the drive shaft didn't rotate well without modification, but overall it had metal trucks, a metal drive line and was pretty much well ahead of its time.  It wouldn't need too much retooling, just a better drive shaft, and even more DCC ready with cooling fan and the electrical upgrades the Climax had.   It would sell pretty well for the Large Scale recession we're in, and a lot of my fellow model railroad club members, want to see Heisler re-runs.   So, Heisler re-runs should be a must.  Not much re-tooling, just drive shaft and electrical upgrades and maybe different road names.

I agree  with you 100%.  My Heisler, to whch I've made a couple of little 'fix-it' mods to make it run smoother, is always a centre of attraction at any of our open days - but then, ANY geared loco here in yUK is a novelty, and I'm lucky enough to have all of them made by Bachmann, including three Shays [2 x 2-truck and 1 x 3 truck]. I've lettered mine to reflect our support of the Pacific Coast Scenic Railroad in Oregon.

I lucked in to my Heisler at a train show a couple of years back, and swapped out the coal for an oil bunker to make it more prototyical, even though it's a three-footer, and not standard gauge like the Oregn loco.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

Quote from: Kevin Strong on August 10, 2014, 01:32:17 AM
If I recall the most recent discussion on this correctly, Bronson Tate does not have the "Masterclass" passenger car kits for sale anymore. No one does. However, the plans are available for download. All you need to do is find someone with a laser cutter and give them the files to use. There's no charge for the drawings, so long as you don't use them for commercial purposes. (i.e., don't go making kits to sell.)

I would agree that some early board-and-batten coaches with rounded windows would be a great addition to the large scale line--especially given that they'd be of the same vintage as the 4-4-0/2-6-0.

Later,

K

With some careful bending you could build them with the prototypical 'sway-back' that so many of them have now...

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

Quote from: Yardmaster on August 04, 2014, 02:34:22 PM
Sorry. Not trying to treat you poorly. Just pointing out the obvious. Large Scale is in a bit of a slump at the moment and it would not be prudent to spend money on tooling that probably wouldn't sell well enough to pay for itself. I understand that you believe this to be a good idea - under better circumstances I might agree but not at this particular time.

'kay.

I accept that.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

Quote from: Yardmaster on August 04, 2014, 01:27:10 PM
It's easy to speculate when you don't have to pay for the tooling...

This has always been the case, Sir.  We don't disagree about that, but on the other hand, we don't need our noses rubbed in the fact that these things cost money.

These days that is clearly understood by anybody who has more than a double-figure brain-cell count.

A friend of mine, in a different line of business, has a full-length mirror facing you as as you walk into his store.

Over the top is a sign, it reads - 'You are now looking at the most important person in this store'.

Those companies who make products that nobody wants will find it out the hard way.  Clearly Bachmann is not one such company.

All I was doing is what many others have done on this forum before me, and made, in MY case, a wish for a single locomotive to be modelled, and what happens?

I get treated like a a bad smell.

That's not a good way to treat a customer with literally thousands of dollars [converted into pounds] spent on your products.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS   

Quote from: Kevin Strong on August 04, 2014, 10:32:45 AM
Tac, note that those are very limited production, hand-built locos, with production runs often in the 25 - 100 range. I had to wait 4 years for Accucraft to generate even 20 orders for the EBT mikado before they finally decided to produce it. (That was a "mere" $3K loco--and the only one in that price range I'm gonna be buying for a l-o-n-g time.)

While I lament the lack of "new" product with this most recent announcement, I can certainly understand the costs involved and Bachmann's reluctance to launch the "next thing" if they've still got models from the last one sitting on warehouse shelves.

Later,

K

I'd like to say that I agree with you wholeheartedly, but I'm sorry to say that I don't.  Over a million passengers paid HUGE fares last year to ride the WP&YR.  IMO a great marketing opportunity has been overlooked by both AccuCraft AND Bachmann here.  A simple pad stamp change of lettering for those lovely passenger cars would seal the deal, IMO.

Here in poverty-stricken UK I personally know five people - who have wives, although that doesn't count on this occasion - who are both Fn3 modellers and WP&YR fans, having 'ridden the rails'.   As one of them told me last year when we were admiring your EBT loco on YT, he'd never heard of the line, simply because cruise ships don't go there, but wouldn't it be great if AccuCraft had made the #73 instead?  He had seriously considered buying a #12 to convert it to look like #73.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

 

Quote from: Yardmaster on August 03, 2014, 04:21:40 PM
Unfortunately tac, nothing sells like ice creams at Coney Island on Independence Day in Large Scale these days....especially big expensive steam locomotives!

Sir I beg to differ - two makers of Gauge 1 live steam have produced, or are in the process of producing -

The Allegheny

The N&W #611

The UP FEF

The CPR Selkirk

The 'cheapest' of these models is around $7000 - the most expensive way north of $10K.

tac

Me, I'd really like for Bachmann to produce the White Pass Mike #73.  I'm convinced it would sell like ice-creams at Coney Island on Independence Day.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

Quote from: mikeC on July 18, 2014, 10:21:46 PM
WHY IS THERE SUCH AS SHORTAGE OF THE BACHMANN G SCALE  FORNEY?...IT TOOK ME FOEVER TO GET ONE.

Hey, come over to UK - no shortage of 'em here, although the $1100.00 price tag might put you off. 

Guess that's why very few folks over here have bought one - savin' 'em, y'see, for you guys over there where they are cheap.

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

My vote was for a Spectrum-grade model of the White Pass mike, #73.  Only LGB/Aster has ever made one in large-scale, and IMO an affordable model would sell like ice creams on Independence Day.  A Spectrum-quality model of THE mike from the world's most popular and most-visited NG railway?

By me that's a no-brainer, given the original 50/50 chance of getting a lemon in the wrong scale, as I did - twice in a row.  But when there is nothing else.......

tac
Ottawa Valley GRS

Chuck - there ARE earlier than 1880's models out there, but they are pricey Baldwin 4-4-0 live-steamers and a Mason bogie, or electrics made by Bachmann and HLR. 

tac