There have been wish lists on this forum in the past, but most suggestions didn't catch on. I should know; I was one of them.

I suspect that the growth of 3-D printing is probably cut into manufacturers' production of new freight and passenger car designs, unless the designs or car types are really, really popular.  Which is unfortunate, because I'd really like to see a nice, short Railway Post Office car with a clearstory roof but without the end platforms that the rest of the Bachmann On30 passenger car fleet possess.

I would like to suggest a new road name for some of Bachmann's production: I don't believe that any real railroad is currently using the Crystal River Railroad road name. The real Crystal River Railroad was an obscure shortline in the Colorado Rockies but the name itself is so generic that it could represent most parts of the Continental US or Canada except for the most arid parts of the US Southwest. That the real Crystal River Railroad didn't have anything resembling Bachmann's On30 production probably wouldn't matter to most people buying starter sets.

The fifty-foot Evans auto-loader built in the 1950's. K-Line used to make them.

Thanks for posting this. I began watching the video just so I could see the Bachmann, but I found the other O scale narrow gauge layouts fascinating. I particularly enjoyed the East Asian trolley and the small seaside set-ups. I also liked seeing the fiddle yards on some of the other set-ups.

I am going to put in a good word for a tank locomotive sized somewhere between the 0-4-0 Porter and the 2-6-0 for those of use likely to build shelf layouts.

In the meantime, I recently bought a  British-prototype Bachmann Branchline tank engine while entertaining evil thoughts about building a new superstructure.

I would suggest a generic heavyweight combination baggage-mail car for the Williams passenger car line. If Bachmann now owns the former K-Line twenty-foot and forty foot intermodal container molds, I'll again suggest  containers 1960's and 1970's paint schemes and road names.


I recently bought two W by B GE 44 tonners (Thank you, Bachmann for making these!!). I plan to use a third-party's 3-D printing to make a generic low-voltage GE freight motor as used by some trolley lines and for certain applications by some steam roads. I'd suggest that Bachmann monitor how these kits sell. If they sell like hotcakes, maybe they should consider making a trolley locomotive. I'm not beating the drums for production of such critters, I'm only calling for a wait-and-see approach.

I know that I've suggested that Bachmann should consider making a CF-7, but I didn't realize just how many O scalers dislike them until someone started a thread about them on one of the O gauge forums.  I dearly hope that Bachmann didn't follow my earlier advice and is deep in the tooling process for making one for their Williams line.

At the risk of being repetitive, I'm again going to suggest a GE U-18 diesel or a former Santa Fe CF-7. If there's a need for short diesels, why bother "condensing" a big DASH or SD unit?

I would have suggested one of the small Baldwin Westinghouse electric locomotives used on interurban lines, but it looks like someone's already making them.

In the meantime, I wish Bachmann would start using the former K-line 20 foot and 40 foot ocean shipping container dies and start issuing containers in 1960's and 1970's roadnames. They don't have to be completely prototypically accurate, but containers in the NYC Flexivan, the 1960's Missouri Pacific scheme and the 1960's Santa Fe piggy back scheme would be nice.

Thanks for the suggestions. I really feel uncomfortable with milkmen dressed in black.

I recently bought a collection of old bare-plastic Plasticville O scale figures. The previous owner had used the paints that came with the sets to paint some of the figures, with variable results.

I plan to try my hand at painting both the unpainted figures and the ones a previous owner started work on. What I'd like to do is to first strip off the previous owner's efforts. Has anyone had any experience at removing the paint from figures without dissolving them, and how did they go about it?

I look forward to sound advice.

--Mister Lee

(Looking forward to having properly-painted postmen)

Those locomotives might not be a bad idea. Not just for regular On30 modelers, but also for those folks looking for an "old time" train for their snow villages.

I would like to see something like one of the small SP/N-C-O ten wheelers. If Bachmann ever decides to release an On30 line based on continental European prototypes, I might be interested in what locomotives they have to offer.

I remembered a splendidly flakey idea I had some years ago: how about a limited-run C&S Burlington Route Everywhere West / Way of the Zephyrs On30 steel hopper car?

I admit that it's NOT prototypical. The real Colorado & Southern never had any narrow gauge steel hoppers, and the C&S logo lingered long on the narrow gauge after it disappeared on the C&S's standard gauge lines because the parent-company CB&Q did not want to be associated with the anachronistic narrow--gauge trains. But it could have happened, at least if the C&S narrow gauge lingered a few more years, and certainly would stir up conversation.

I wouldn't mind seeing a couple of these buildings come back either in the original or in some upgraded version.

I have set up scenery modules using Brand X's Old West buildings, but they're space hogs. They really only work for someone with at least two and half feet of width at least 20 inches of space away from the track. For those of us with On30 or who think happy thoughts about 19th century trains and passenger cars, something like Bachmann's Old West kits would work much better.

And a little more to my rant. Just because a building might be "Old West," doesn't necessarily mean that it can only be used during frontier days. It could also be made to work along Main Street or Railroad Avenue at least up to 1950 and for amusement parks and museum villages after that.

I suspect that those cabooses will prove popular. A lot of people have kit-bashed their old cupola cabooses by moving the cupolas to one end or the other and the logging caboose has been sorely missed.

And Bachmann, don't feel bashful about doing limited-runs for your logging cabooses in Midwest Quarries and Colorado Mining colors! I suspect that 'logging cabooses" would be as likely to turn up on other industrial railroads as they would on logging operations.