THE NORTH WESTERN’S E-4 class Hudson represents the high water mark of locomotive streamlining. In fact, when Superman’s creator coined the phrase, “faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive,” I suspect he had an engine like the North Western’s E-4 class Hudson in mind! The 4-6-4 locomotive was powerful and unique in […]
OPERATORS OF STANDARD gauge trains, your switch has arrived. Announced in the 1999 MTH catalog, the first mass-produced Standard gauge switch readily available since the 1930s showed up in hobby shops earlier this year. For years, fans of Standard gauge trains had two choices: resuscitate old products made by Ives, American Flyer, or Lionel, or […]
SHORTLY BEFORE its sale to Great Planes Distributing, United Model Distributors added a terrific trolley car to its Industrial Rail line. Based on a general body style familiar in pre- and immediate postwar America, this snappy little O gauge rapid transit car has a lot going for it: can-style motor, electronic reverse unit, reverse bumpers, […]
WILLIAMS ELECTRIC TRAINS continues to field unique, detailed locomotives that are, in the words of the retail trade, “priced to move.” The latest two engines from the Columbia, Md., firm are an Alco FA and an EMD BL2. Both locomotives come from the electrifying days when the direction diesel motive power would take was still […]
YOU’VE HEARD THIS story before. Big, six-axle diesels meet passenger trains and it’s love at first sight. Big, six-axle diesels take the trade by storm and become icons of modern railroading. Times change and railroads dump the once-revered diesels. So runs the tale of Electro Motive Division’s E8 diesels. Between 1949 and 1953, EMD sold […]
COAL IS TO LIONEL what ground beef is to McDonald’s. Where the fast food giant transforms its staple product into patties, melts cheese over it, and stacks it higher and higher on sesame seed buns, Lionel lifts, dumps, slides, and drops the bits of shredded plastic it has called coal since the late 1930s. During […]
IN AN ERA OF digital sound systems and programmable command control locomotives, the MRC Sound Station 312 is a welcome throwback to a simpler time. The Sound Station offers 18 user-controlled sound effects at the push of a button to enhance the pleasure of any layout in any scale controlled by an operator of any […]
A HANDFUL OF locomotive designs are elegant, and the streamlined look of the New York Central Dreyfuss Hudson 4-6-4 may be the most stylish of all. MTH Electric Trains has added a scale-sized version of the Dreyfuss to its Premier line, and it’s a doozy. Before World War II the New York Central set out […]
THE NORFOLK & WESTERN was the last major U.S. carrier to forsake steam power in favor of diesel. The railroad, deep in coal country, was renown for its fast passenger engines and hefty articulated freight haulers that could seemingly move mountains. The last and most advanced of the steamers operated by the N&W was the […]
FOR MORE THAN 25 years, Weaver has produced a vast array of rolling stock, brass steam locomotives, and great diesels in plastic. The latest challenge the Northumberland, Pa., firm has tackled is a die-cast metal locomotive. And not only is this the company’s first die-cast steamer, it is also its first steamer to include Lionel’s […]
WHILE STIFF COMPETITION among the bigger boys of the toy train world pushes O gauge locomotives to new levels of sophistication, Williams has found its niche producing well-made toy trains – minus some of the frills – at a price that is well within reach of most operators. Among the newest items on Williams’ list […]
ONE OF THE HOTTEST locomotives ever made was the streamlined Pennsy K4-class Torpedo. The rocket-shaped steamer looked ready to launch even when standing still. In the 1930s, when the Pennsylvania Railroad re-designed its signature train the Broadway Limited, management wanted the train’s 4-6-2 locomotive to be just as striking as the passenger cars. Industrial designer […]
