So whats new at the convention ?

[Denver Road Doug]

Pretty insignificant for most I' d guess, but I was looking at John Sing's pics of the FVM Soo boxcars and noted that the next RD4 is apparently the TXUX black scheme. 

[ljudice]

TXUX is Texas UTilities I presume?  The RD4's are nice - I have a bunch in NS, although they are a fill-in car for NS's fleet of other cars - I don't think they even own a whole train worth of them.

Thanks Gregg for the update, too!

[Denver Road Doug]

Yes, that's correct.  They have two versions...all black and also aluminum with black ends.

[up1950s]

Paul editing NSC mag . Isn't Paul too connected and busy with Atlas to take on that job . What about conflict if interest ? Maybe Paul is going to the dark side ? Or maybe the Atlas quality has taken on a well deserved respect in the NSC circle . How bazaar .  Will this mean that anybody who verbally poops on a NSC collector car on the Atlas forum will get what fer from Paul ? Will he need to change hats to do that ? Will all this emotional ping-pong match turn him into the Mad Hatter ? This can't be true , can it ?

[up1950s]

Bachmann not going forward with the 2-10-0 and 4-6-0 for what ...... 40 bucks , so thats what over their regular twister , 20 smackers . So this is then is the ground shaker . Not something new , but this bad news for N scale . Talk about poor corporate decisions .

[FrankCampagna]

MTL will do heavyweight passenger cars, but they will only be available in sets - they just lost any possibility of selling me some there.

With new passenger cars going at an MSRP of $40 each, they lost me, also. Guess I keep and upgrade the old Rivarossi. Sad to hear about the final nail in the ten wheeler's coffin, but expected. Shouldn't be too hard for someone like Athearn or Model Power. Here's hoping.

Frank

[Chris333]

MT's new Z scale passenger cars are available separately and they even give you decals for the number so you can buy say 4 coaches.

http://www.zscalemonster.com/mt/550-00-000/

[FrankCampagna]

MT's new Z scale passenger cars are available separately and they even give you decals for the number so you can buy say 4 coaches.

I saw that. Price wasn't that bad, either. Hopefully the person talking to Greg was in error. I could use a couple of good coaches, and head end cars. Not interested in sleepers or observations.

Frank

[amato1969]

DeLuxe Innovations will have 8 ft. doors for the 1944 boxcar in both Youngstown & Superior and 6 ft Superior doors as well.

Excellent news!  There are a bunch of proto schemes for the 8-foot door versions, spanning late 1950s thru 1970s.

  Frank

[Iain]

I saw Atlas' GP-15 model, and the cast on fuel tank actually doesn't look bad at all, and the locomotive is heavier than expected.  Paul Graf said that there is no chance of Atlas doing Baldwin road switchers.  Cory said that Paul had said basically the same thing about the Trainmaster.  I also thanked Cory for doing NS hoppers again (I also had my NS shirt on).

Deluxe expressed interest in doing Norfolk Southern's 8001-8004 series of covered hoppers.

Con-Cor's Aerotrain looks pretty good.

I talked to Walthers about doing 4-6-0s, and their representative promised that it would be passed up the pipeline.

The Micro-Trains guy said that more Norfolk Southern stuff is possible.

The Kato guy said that it is possible to get the 11-105 chassis through official Kato distributors in the US.