Price: $49.99 each (Nos. JP5973 police car or JP5978 blue coupe) Features: O scale detailing, detailed interiors, illuminating lights, a variety of vehicles are available Order online at www.WoodlandScenics.com
Some O gauge layouts have vehicles crammed in every nook and cranny, while others have streets so empty you’d think a nuclear alert had been issued. Of course, one of the challenges about vehicles in Traintown is largely that they are either 1:43 or 1:50, not 1:48 (unless you go into big bucks collector models). Woodland Scenics is offering a collection of tidy, well-detailed vehicles clearly at home in the late steam and early rock and roll era. Plus, they can be illuminated using Woodland Scenics Just Plug system.
Designs
First up is the No. JP5978 Blue Coupe. My first thought was, “Looks like a hot rod.” But I scoured the web, and my most educated guess is this is a 1938 Oldsmobile coupe. The slope of the model looks a bit more graceful than on most of the similar coupes I checked out, so it could also represent a modification made by another owner in the 1960s.
The car is a nice royal blue neatly accented by all the chrome work. The car has nice grillwork, bumpers, running boards, and chrome hubcaps. There are also wiper arms and a driver’s side mirror. You’ll find accent stripes running up the sides and over the doors. These are subtle and not overdone.
Next is the police car. I found quite a few vintage pictures of police coupes, so it must have been a thing, and not just for supervisors. I found the most similarities to a 1949 Mercury coupe, though the grill is notably different on the model. It has a hood ornament, chrome-colored headlight frame, grill, wiper arms, and bumper. It also has chrome-colored rear mirrors, handles and bumpers.
There is a radio antenna on the passenger side and a red bubble gum machine on the roof. The car is black with white doors. There are a six-pointed star and an eagle on the doors and the word POLICE on the doors and trunk. It looks good, and has period decoration. If Broderick Crawford’s character Dan Mathews had worked for city police and not the highway patrol, he might have had this baby. While it may not be Adam-12, it is at least Adam-6, Adam-12’s granddad.
Power
The power line feeds out of the bottom of the vehicle. The instructions suggest you decide where you want it and then drill a hole to feed the wires below the benchwork. It also suggests that if you plan on shortening the wires, do it at this point. You mate the wires with the linker plug (a simple step) and plug it into your Just Plug power port.
There is a slight difference with the police car. You have two wiring options, headlight on or flashing red bubble light. There an extra wire for the red light option. Both are simple tasks to accomplish.
Woodland Scenics had served up the first in a new series of vehicles that will find a home on many layouts. You might want to get them sooner, rather than later!
