Kansas City Southern locomotives were full of surprises in both the steam and diesel fleets. Steam locomotives saw a gradual evolution, from 2-8-0 to articulated 0-6-6-0s (an oddball in the industry for road service) and 2-8-8-0s and eventually the much-vaunted 2-10-4s of 1937. The 0-6-6-0s were the largest group of the type built […]
Type of Train: Diesel Locomotives
How to install a SoundTraxx Blunami decoder in a Lego locomotive
I love Lego, and I love trains. When I first saw the SoundTraxx Blunami decoder being demonstrated inside a Lego locomotive at Trainfest, I knew that I had to install my own decoder in a Lego locomotive. What you’ll need Obviously, you will need a locomotive. Trains.com producer Ben Lake donated his Lego Creator No. […]
Gregg Condon’s Milwaukee Road in HO scale
Explore Gregg Condon’s HO scale (1:87.1) model railroad based on 1950s-era Milwaukee Road operations along the Shullsburg Branch in Wisconsin! You’ll enjoy following the action over the rails, plus all the realistic scenes, structures, and details modeled around and about the right-of-way. All of this is a pre-cursor to even more in-depth coverage of the […]
Gregg Condon’s Milwaukee Road in HO scale
Explore Gregg Condon’s HO scale (1:87.1) model railroad based on 1950s-era Milwaukee Road operations along the Shullsburg Branch in Wisconsin! You’ll enjoy following the action over the rails, plus all the realistic scenes, structures, and details modeled around and about the right-of-way. All of this is a pre-cursor to even more in-depth coverage of the […]
Lehigh & New England Alco freight diesels
An A-B-A trio of 1,500 h.p. Alco freight diesels (in later nomenclature, two FA1’s and an FB1) rolls a train on the Lehigh & New England, a 178-mile anthracite hauler and Pennsylvania-New Jersey-New York bridge line that dieselized in 1949. Alco-GE photo […]
Diesels from long-defunct U.S. builder Davenport still operating in Thailand
Thai State Railways (State Railway of Thailand or SRT) still has at least three diesel locomotives built 71 years ago by long-defunct American manufacturer Davenport Locomotive Works in regular service. One, at Nakhon Lampang in the north of the country, is used regularly to switch cars into Chiang Mai-Bangkok services with passengers onboard. The units […]
Landmark diesel: CNJ 1000
Central Railroad of New Jersey box-cab No. 1000, built by an Alco/General Electric/Ingersoll-Rand consortium, gained the title of “first commercially successful diesel-electric locomotive” when CNJ put it to work on October 22, 1925. After a three-decade career, the unit was retired to the B&O Railroad Museum in Baltimore. CNJ photo […]
Norfolk Southern’s Saluda Grade
The famous Saluda grade in western North Carolina has seen its last train. Railbanked in December 2001, nature has slowly but ever so surely reclaimed the right of way. Now, in 2023, an agreement has been reached to sell the railroad to become a hiking trail. Let’s take a look back to the years when […]
News & Products for the week of March 27th 2023
News & Products for the week of March 27th 2023 Model railroad operators and builders can get the latest information about locomotives, freight cars, passenger cars, tools, track, and more by reading Model Railroader’s frequent product updates. The following are the products Model Railroader editors have news on for the week of March 27th 2023. […]
A one-of-a-kind Conrail locomotive
Conrail locomotive Locomotives fascinate us, amaze us, and move us across landscapes — and our imaginations. A railroad selects locomotives based on factors that include operational need, affordability, maintenance cost, applicability for a certain service, and what models might be available at the time. Stories are woven throughout the industry’s history of locomotive models that […]
SP “Black Widow” F units
An A-B-B-A quartet of Southern Pacific F units dressed in the distinctive “Black Widow” livery lift an eastbound freight up into the town of Tehachapi, Calif., in 1949. Exhaust from a 4-8-8-2 cab-forward helper rises in the distance. Linn Westcott photo […]
Twin Zephyr hoopla
Crowds swarm around Burlington Route 9901 and 9902, the original three-car Twin Zephyr diesel trains, during a publicity event before the pair entered service between Chicago and the Twin Cities in April 1935. CB&Q photo […]