Trainfest 2010 Report

[Ed Kapuscinski]

But they're only $7. That's HALF the price of the IM cars. For that, you can put the $3 after market parts on them and STILL come out well ahead.

I like em, for just that reason.

[mcjaco]

Not all units had them installed, so I presume they are separate parts.  Lots of railroads had them?

Hopefully they'll be available as a seperate part too.  But it is Bachmann....  :

[wm3798]

On the Bachmann Stuff...
The Peter Witt car is hot as a firecracker...  One has to wonder how it will run, though.
The 10-wheeler is also sexy... Does the behemoth tender conceal a motor?  Or can we swap in something more appropriately sized?
The GP looks very promising, provided the drive isn't made of Limburger cheese, and the couplers aren't installed with an air hammer.  WM had winterization hatches on all of its Geeps, a detail which thus far has evaded my work bench...

Did the re-release of the Walther's GP20 really have factory installed grabs?  Or was that for an HO display below the N case?

Nice report, I appreciate the effort you put in to keeping us up to date.
Lee

[mcjaco]

Lee, the tender on the 10 wheeler is there normal short tender.  No motor in there.

[Roger Holmes]

Lee--I agree on the Peter Witt car.  I held it for a close-up look and it is really nice!

Also, the tender on the 4-6-0 looks more in proportion in person than in photos.  I'd seen photos before Trainfest and expected it to look worse than it did.

I think the aerial photo of Mini ModuTrak was taken standing on the concession stand trash receptacle--just a thought although that's the concession stand where all the security seemed to be hanging out.

[Denver Road Doug]

But they're only $7. That's HALF the price of the IM cars. For that, you can put the $3 after market parts on them and STILL come out well ahead.

Until you consider the $4 Micro-Trains trucks/couplers.

[lashedup]

Jamie,
While looking at your gallery, I noticed an apparently fully scenicked 'Franksville' on the Modutrak set-up.
Any chance there would be other photographs of this module in 'finished' state ?

Marc

It isn't actually done. I have five buildings nearly done and some basic scenery. I needed to cover the module in something for the NTS this past summer. I'll take some photos and post up. I'm trying to get it wrapped up by March.

[lashedup]

How did I miss this, and what the heck did you climb?

Fully extended tri-pod that I held over my head with a timer to trip the shutter. Throw in the wide angle and it looks higher than it is.

[93cram]

It isn't actually done. I have five buildings nearly done and some basic scenery. I needed to cover the module in something for the NTS this past summer. I'll take some photos and post up. I'm trying to get it wrapped up by March.

Understand, yet it looks cool at a distance !  ;D
Looking forward to see that beauty again  
Believe it or not, the thread about Franksville solved two issues I've procrastinated upon for way too long :
- benchwork style
- double or single track

Marc

[sirenwerks]

What I wouldn't do if Bachmann would retool its PCC to the same sexiness as the Peter Witt. The GP7s do look promising and, like Ed, I wonder what the deal is with the weather hatches.

What's up with the Deluxe Innovation Armco 'station'? It kinda looks like two Armcos stuck together or that kit has a really poorly engineer joint in the middle. Is it two? And where's the prototype pic from?

[lashedup]

I believe it is a UP prototype. That was just a mockup of what the kit will look like. You are correct that they just used two existing structure kits and bashed them together.

[sirenwerks]

I believe it is a UP prototype. That was just a mockup of what the kit will look like. You are correct that they just used two existing structure kits and bashed them together.

Hmmm, aside from the bad joint and the lack of distance between the roll-ups, it looks promising. I've been seeing a number of these types of replacement stations in Morning Sun books lately.

[bbussey]

The Atlas GPs work fine for me.  I don't see the logic in Bachmann tooling up a GP7.  And, wouldn't the Atlas SD50 winterization hatches work on the Atlas GP7?

[wm3798]

Honestly, the new Bmann Geep could spell the end of the ages old Crapmaster F? that's been going into their train sets since God was a boy.  I think the vacuum that was created in N scale when Walther's moved the team to Indianapolis (2 points for the obscure reference) is going to be filled by reasonably priced, reasonable quality locomotives from Bachmann.

Lee

[mplsjct]

I believe the winterization hatches on an SD50 would be too wide for the GP7.

Thanks for the update, for the most part, all three major shows had little new product announced for N scale, but, I am most pleased by the FVM announcement of Milw cabs.