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MOST HOBBYISTS HAVE a great amount of affection for postwar Lionel accessories, but not for the crazy prices the accessories sometimes command these days. In the modern era Lionel has offered a range of reproductions of classic postwar products such as the no. 164 Log Loader (CTT, February 1997) and the no. 38 Water Tower […]
IF YOU’VE BEEN longing to enter the world of sound systems but: A) are reluctant to modify the internal workings of your locomotives, B) don’t want to deal with the nuances of combined sound system/reverse unit packages, or C) can’t afford to equip every locomotive on your roster with sound, then this boxcar’s for you. […]
LIONEL’S POSTWAR Celebration series is a tip of the hat to the toy train maker’s golden years by re-creating classic products of a bygone era. Lionel offers collectors and operators a chance to buy fresh versions of childhood favorites that have been gussied up the latest Command-control and Railsounds marvels. The postwar celebration series products […]
THE NEW YORK CENTRAL Hudson! Now there’s a locomotive nobody has done for a while. All kidding aside, the New York Central J-class Hudson is a locomotive that virtually everybody but Atlas O has produced. You have your choice of scale, semi-scale, or toy-like; prewar, postwar, or modern; and in S or O gauges. The […]
A DRUM ROLL, please. This product is unlike any locomotive created in the history of Lionel. This is the first articulated engine ever produced by Lionel. It is the largest engine ever done by the firm and may even surpass the fabled no. 700E scale Hudson in its amount of prototypical detail. This locomotive is […]
LIONEL’S CLASSIC GANTRY cranes combine realistic looks with unmatched accessory action. I’ve wanted one for years, and when Lionel announced that it would include an updated version of the last postwar crane (the no. 282R) in its Postwar Celebration reissue series, I made a place on my layout for one. Then I waited, not always […]
LIONEL HAS BEEN slowly re-creating some of its more memorable postwar O gauge accessories. The company commenced two years ago with reproductions of the nos. 138 Water Tower and 164 Log Loader. Now add the no. 465-99 Sound Dispatch Station to the list. Some of these re-issues have been truer to the originals than others, […]
IN 1887, a New England railroad added a trailing truck to a common American-type 4-4-0 locomotive to better distribute its weight when crossing bridges. Thus was born the Atlantic-type steamer. The Atlantic’s 4-4-2 wheel arrangement allowed for a larger firebox and improved performance. The 4-4-2s also pulled heavier trains faster than the old 4-4-0s. The […]
I FIRST SAW a photo of a Lionel nuclear reactor years ago in Tuohy and McComas’ book Lionel: A Collector’s Guide and History, Vol. V: The Archives. The reactor prototype looked slick, but there were no clues to what it did or how it was supposed to do it. Fast forward to December 2000. Opening […]
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 […]
IS IT A DEAD-RINGER for a postwar powerhouse – a husky pair of handles riding over raw electricity – or is it high-tech instrument funneling digital strings of 0’s and 1’s to rolling receivers? Lionel’s new ZW transformer set is both. It is a conventional and command control device that allows you to operate trains […]
IF YOU ASK collectors and operators of postwar Lionel trains which accessories they prize, most will put the no. 264 Operating Forklift Platform high on their list. They like its reliability, compact appearance, and neat action. Lionel cataloged the 264 for only four years, from 1957 through 1960. That fact and the fascination this accessory […]
