Kato Baltimore and Ohio smooth car set

[Mark5]

It was a standard set with various (mostly) prototypical cars, painted in a bunch of schemes..
(B&O, Amtrak, NYC, PRR, UP, BN, and I'm guessing a few others.)  They did Matching E8s to go with them.

To be clear, the cars in the B&O set are not prototypical for B&O. Some of them may be close (I don't know).

Don't let that stop you from enjoying them. 

The prototypes for the Kato cars are pretty much covered here (scroll down to Kato): http://www.trainweb.org/fredatsf/protopass5.htm

Mark

[learmoia]

  Thanks John.. Yes I am in a suburb outside Chicago. I am fortunate to have two good Hobby stores close to me being Des Plaines hobby and Lombard hobby. I have also had some luck online with Hiawatha hobby out of Wisconsin Tony's trains in Vermont and one other out of Missouri. My normal tax is 10% at my local stores or ebay. But the out of state stores I don't have to pay sales tax. So on a big dollar item I try and shop the online stores. For the used equipment I usually try Trainz.com but I will checkout Mainline hobby. I have not been to a train show yet with my son.  But I see there is one near me in early December I am going to try to make it too.

I guess I should also plug Caboose Stop Hobbies on youtube as a source for for items.
https://www.youtube.com/@caboosestophobbies

[NorsemanJack]

Kato's focus has (rightfully) been on prototypical, complete name train sets.  They've mostly moved on from the one-size-fits-all generic offerings.  I used to have some of those, but they are all gone. 

[mu26aeh]

Unfortunately we don't list used equipment on our website, but more than welcome to check out our new inventory.  Sometimes you can find things that others sold out long ago. 

www.mainlinehobby.com

[Vaderta]

Unfortunately we don't list used equipment on our website, but more than welcome to check out our new inventory.  Sometimes you can find things that others sold out long ago. 

www.mainlinehobby.com

Thanks, I appreciate the link.

[nkalanaga]

N Scale Supply also has a preowned section:
http://www.nscalesupply.com/pon/Preowned.aspx

And, if you haven't bought from them before, their "main page", where the new stuff is announced:
http://www.nscalesupply.com/Newsletter/CurrentNewsletter.html

[brokemoto]

To be clear, the cars in the B&O set are not prototypical for B&O. Some of them may be close (I don't know).

the observation is not that far off.  The coaches are pretty close.  B&O had perhaps one or two lightweight baggage cars, if any.  It had no lightweight full RPOs.  The Cincinnatian had a smooth side baggage-mail but it might have been rebuilt from a HW.  The dome is nothing like any dome that the B&O ever had.  The sleepers are Pullman lightweights.  The Diner does not look much like any photograph that I have seen of a B&O diner.  The B&O never had many LWs.  Most of its smooothsides were re-built from HWs  This goes ll the way back to Willard's preferncer for six axles and HWs.

I sold mine as I acquired more MT HWs. I had two sets of each of the Kato.  I was truly amazed at the prices that they fetched on FeePay.  I had the New York Central sets s well.  They fetched quite the price on FeePay.

Still, I did enjoy them while I had them.  At the time, it was difficult to find any B&O passenger carfs.  You could find older Atlas/RR or C-C/RR s in the "powder" blue.  C-C had taken a hiatus in issuing B&O cars.  They might not have been prototypical nor were most of the C-C/Atlas RRs but they were what you could get so you took them and were glad for them.I have since spld all of my C-C/RRs and Ktos B&O equipment except for some RR HW baggage cars.

[Maletrain]

Putting together prototypical B&O passenger trains is not easy in N scale.  Much easier in HO, where more models specifically made from B&O prototypes are available.

The smooth sided lightweight cars with window arrangements matching B&O are available for coaches and 10-5 sleepers.  There are 10-6 sleepers with the correct window arrangement, but they have fluted siding below the windows that would need to be removed.  Similarly, there is a dome car that is a B&O smooth sided prototype, except for the model was made with fluting below the windows.  And there is also a B&O prototype square-end observation car with fluting that is correct.  But smooth sided, diners, combines, and boat-tailed observation cars don't have prototypical  N scale models available.  Some have reasonably close approximations.

Depending on your tastes in modeling, you can run "stand-in" models for what is not readily available, or get into kit bashing and scratch building.

My philosophy is to run stand-ins until I complete prototypical replacements.  With the menagerie of light weight, "modernized" heavyweight and "streamlined" heavyweight passenger cars that the B&O ran in the early 1950s, I doubt I will ever complete a fully prototypical set of trains that the B&O ran through my modeling locale and era. 

There are drawings, plans and photos available for most of the B&O cars.  So maybe, as 3D printing becomes more and more available, people will start providing prints of the cars that I want.  There may be a bright future there, but I am not sure I will live long enough into that future to complete the train sets I have in mind.

So, my goal is to enjoy the hobby and not let it get ruined for me by obsessing on any lack of prototypicality.

[altohorn25]

Here's a video on how I built my 1956 B&O National Limited.

A few of these cars are from the 6 car Kato set.  As said previously, the majority of them are NOT prototypical for the B&O.  Interstingly enough, the observation car IS prototypical for the train.

[wmcbride]

N Scale Supply also has a preowned section:
http://www.nscalesupply.com/pon/Preowned.aspx

And, if you haven't bought from them before, their "main page", where the new stuff is announced:
http://www.nscalesupply.com/Newsletter/CurrentNewsletter.html

Wow! A California Zephyr set for $500. I'm rich!

Kato made 3 (?) runs of this starting 20 (?) years ago.

[Vaderta]

Wow! A California Zephyr set for $500. I'm rich!

Kato made 3 (?) runs of this starting 20 (?) years ago.

Lol, yeah some of the prices are extreme. I bought doubles of a few sets just because if something breaks and the train is out of production I could fix the problem.  If something breaks on a train you have and Kato doesn't have the parts you are stuck going through ebay.

[Vaderta]

Here's a video on how I built my 1956 B&O National Limited.

A few of these cars are from the 6 car Kato set.  As said previously, the majority of them are NOT prototypical for the B&O.  Interstingly enough, the observation car IS prototypical for the train.

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I watched your video prior to buying the Kato set. Very cool video. You have alot of talent for modifying and altering the cars original appearance.

[Point353]

Wow! A California Zephyr set for $500. I'm rich!

Kato made 3 (?) runs of this starting 20 (?) years ago.

Kato made 5 different runs of the CZ set, plus one set was re-run.
https://katousa.com/past-models-the-california-zephyr/

[OldEastRR]

To be clear, the cars in the B&O set are not prototypical for B&O. Some of them may be close (I don't know).

Don't let that stop you from enjoying them. 

The prototypes for the Kato cars are pretty much covered here (scroll down to Kato): http://www.trainweb.org/fredatsf/protopass5.htm

Mark

I thought the KATO cars in the smooth side set were all UP prototypes, and the streamlined generic sets a mix of ATSF and CB&Q cars.

[C62-2]

The prototype for the observation car was pullman plan 4082 (http://www.trainweb.org/fredatsf/protopass5.htm). The three that went to the New York Central eventually ended up with the Baltimore and Ohio (according to https://morningsunbooks.com/products/b-o-color-gd-to-freight).