Little Lionel Layout at the NTTM

Love this layout at the National Toy Train Museum in Strasburg. Standard gauge, not a whole lot of space and a wonderful painting of Lou Redman on the right....

Marc

Dorfan Goodness

Ok, nobody seemed interested in me posting pictures, so I posted them anyway. I went to Strasburg and saw everthing that had to do with trains 2 weekends ago. I already want to go back.

I spent a ton of time at the National Toy Train Museum. Man, I love that place. I saw so many trains that I've never seen before. It's hard for me to take them all in. It was hard to drag myself out of there. I really would love to live much closer to Lancaster, PA. It's just such beautiful country and it has so much history and stuff to do and see. Check out the pics, if you like them, I have about 200 more I can post.

Marc

Busy Weekend

Here's the itinerary from my weekend:

1. Have a horrible Friday with customers extremely angry and basically everything that could go wrong, went wrong.

1.5 Left for Pennsylvania at 6:30 pm (probably too late in the day but I had to go).

2. Went to the biggest friggin airshow and WW II event I have ever seen: The Mid-Atlantic Air Museum's 20th Anniversary WWI Weekend.

3. (Sunday) - Went to Strasburg

Went to the Caboose Hotel Gift Shop/Restaraunt (very cool by the way)
Went on the Strasburg Railroad
Went over every inch of the PA Train Museum
Went to Choo Choo Barn
Went to The National Toy Train Museum

4. Drove home.

I wore out the batteries in my camera and my cohorts that went along with me collected about 2 terabytes of pictures with high quality Nikon Cameras. I need to pass out now.

Marc

PS Anyone interested in seeing more pics? Drop me a comment and let me know!

Happy Memorial Day!

Get out from attic or basement and stop playing with the trains for one minute! Honor our the Great Women and Men of the United States Armed Forces!

Marc

Spring Windup

You have to check this out. This is some kind of festival in Denver, CO that celebrates wind up trains and toys. Go in about 2 minutes and 45 seconds. This is one of the best Youtubes I have seen in years...




Marc

Trains at Hamleys

So I am hanging out in London today and my cab flips by Hamleys. Hamleys is easily one of best toy stores anywhere in the world. It's well into the class of FAO Schwarz and a few others (I've mentioned them periodically on the blog).

Suffice to say, they have 7 floors of amazing toy goodness. And to cap it off, they have a really nice British Toy Train area. I didn't take too many pics, I felt kind of wierd as I was taking pictures in a toy store. I just had to capture a few for the blog.


Above - they had quite a few wonderful Hornby OO sets. Very reasonably priced as well. I was tempted... But I didn't. Tons of Scaletrix race cars as well.

Lots of wonderful trains in the display cabinet. They had a tremendous number of buildings and options to choose from as well.

This is where it got interesting. Some seriously nice Basset Lowke in the displays. I've always seen Basset Lowke pop up and I never got why people like it so much. I'd never seen it in person. Got it now!

More seriously nice Basset Lowke above.

A really cool remote control car display. The cars where whizzing around in front of the display controlled by hoards of kids. I liked this store because they really do run almost everything in the store. They have wonderful displays plus incredibly helpful staff demonstrating product and giving advice. Checking out took all of 1 minute (not kidding). Probably the best toy buying experience of my life. The store isn't inexpensive or cheap to be sure, however the access to the selection and quality is worth it. This is an old line toy store that everyone should try and visit if you are in the UK. These kinds of places carry a special magic that just doesn't exist anymore. I guarantee whether you are 8 months old or 80 years old, you'll like this place (plus they do have a running train layout with slot cars).

Marc

A desk can be cool...

I must be getting older, I think a desk is cool...

Marc

PS This desk was made in 1940. I wonder what my desk will look like 70 years from now?

largest poured concrete bridge....

Ok, again, not much to do with trains except that everyone loves a cool prototype bridge. So....

For those of you that want to be very proud of American ingenuity - I give you a new bridge, right by the Hoover Dam, that is the largest poured concrete bridge in the world. To see this thing in person is amazing.

Marc

Standard Gauge Desk...

Ya, I know it isn't a train. But damn, this thing is ridiculously cool. It is a solid metal desk! This isn't that flakeboard crap we have to deal with. It's actually one of two control desks from the Hoover Dam. Notice the built in heater on the bottom. Just tell me this isn't the coolest thing outside of a 400e you've ever seen! No, it doesn't have anything to do with toy trains. No, it isn't ergonomically designed. No, it isn't eco friendly. And man, I'd love to have one of these... If you could see this up close, it is built and will last FOREVER! It just reminds me of why I like so much old stuff like toy trains. Metal is king and there is no substitute for skilled craftsmen making great stuff.

Marc

Route 66 (The Grand Canyon Railway)

So I was hanging around Route 66 last week in Williams, AZ and I caught this quick pic. I love Route 66.

This town in Arizona is special because it is the home of the Grand Canyon Railroad. I jumped down there kind of late in the day and grabbed some pics as fast as I could before it got dark. The Grand Canyon railroad is really something. I've never seen so many fluted steel cars in one place at one time that were still in great operating condition. Check out this gorgeous postwar Lionel car (ok, it's the real thing, just pulling your leg...)
They had a couple of absolutely MINT ATSF Cabooses hanging around both in the train yard and at the place below. There is a little motel/RV Camping area outside of town that uses old train cars as offices, etc.. The cars were in really good shape and were interesting to see off the tracks.

The Grand Canyon Railroad also has a hotel that is spectacular and an absolutely beautiful station. If you like trains, get down to Williams, AZ. And the food..... More on that later...

Marc

Nevada State Railway Museum Cont.

More Pics from this great train museum in Boulder City. Check out the "Jackass and Western"; I love that. I also love the below work car. Very cool prototype.

Nevada State Railway Museum

Just out at the Hoover Dam earlier this week and I passed by Nevada State Railway Museum. Utterly fantastic. I actually first saw these cars on a siding:
They caught me completely by surprise. Like a typical train nut, I hopped over a small bunch of stones and started taking some shots. My haste was probably not a good idea. I forgot where I was (Nevada). I looked down and there were about 30 well dug, very neat little holes, one of which had a very large reptilian tail sticking out of it. I promptly hopped right back over that little stone wall and took pictures on pavement. I then proceeded to the Hoover Dam thinking that was the end of it.

Well, after the Dam I doubled back and checked out the train museum again. Here is the first pic of what I saw:

More pics later. This was one heck of a nice museum. They had a wonderful authentic car barn as well. I wish I was there while it was open, it is actually only open on the weekends. Still, it was a heck of a find I wasn't expecting.

Marc

Operating The LeLand Monorail

I have an original Detroit Leland monorail installed on my upper level where I run my 2 inch gauge trains. It operates smoothly and the wheels do not slip. My powered car pulls three upowered cars with ease. Maybe it's a weight issue? I don't know how heavy the MTH power car is but the original is pretty hefty.

Stout Today? April 17, 2010

Did anyone check out the Stout Auction today? Pretty damn good deals if you ask me. I was watching on line and the tinplate deals were excellent. I saw some wonderful prewar Flyer and Lionel going for reaonable $$$'s. Quite a substantial amount between the $200 and $600 range.

Did anyone grab anything of interest?

Marc

The Times, They Are A Changing....

So I made some big changes to my layout. I dumped the Gargraves track. Was just too difficult and always looked kinked. I flipped to MTH Standard and O gauge Realtraxx. The stuff is really quite nice. I do enjoy using it. It makes a different sound and set of sounds versus tubular. The contact is way better though and I don't think it will age the same way tubular does. We'll see, I'm pretty happy with it right now. I've backed out some of the buildings in the interest of putting up the Monorail. I haven't managed to get the wiring right yet and I have to add an AIU and TIU for the DCS stuff.

My Monorail wheels really slip ALOT. I'm trying to figure out what I need to do to keep them from slipping so much. There really isn't any grade on the surface of the layout. Any thoughts on stuff I should add?

Marc

Pride Lines

Sad news - John Davanzo of Pride Lines passed away April 6, 2010. John was beyond knowledgable about toys, toy trains and he was a pivotal member of the toy train community. His innovation and courage will be missed.

Marc

2010 Lionel Catalog

Coincidentally the Lionel catalog (from Lionel the LLC) came out last week as well. It isn't loaded with tinplate however it is loaded with Postwar goodness. I actually cracked this catalog (Signature) readying to be heavily critical and mildly irritated. I wasn't. I was really impressed at the style and content of the catalog.

Again, while not loaded with prewar excitement, Lionel under Jerry Calabrese has really found its' niche and hit its' stride. The two items that struck me most was the 700e and the jet powered passenger train. Lionel also did a great job of integrating some new accessories and K-Line items. Check out the above.

Marc

New MTH/Lionel Tinplate Catalog

Impressive, yes. Do I need to have every item in it? Probably not. But I have to say this is one of the strongest toy train catalogs to come along in almost half a decade. The Brute was a huge step forward in 2009 for MTH/Lionel. The addition of the scale State Cars, some really unique American Flyer sets and the addition of the Blue and Silver Streak are substantial offerings for any company, especially in a fragile economy.

As always, when I see an offering as strong as this one I hope that the catalog has legs beyond us tinplate toy train nuts. I really hope that others will adopt some of the outstanding products offered inside the catalog.

As I've said on this blog before, the opportunity to open a brand new Blue Streak and run it with your son and daughter or grandkids will only happen once in a lifetime. That's one heck of a catalog MTH.

Marc

Interesting way to run O gauge...

I have to hand it to Bluecomets, he's a hoot. He figured out a way to run O gauge track over standard gauge. Ultimately he's probably right, it is probably one of the best ways to run O gauge trains with standard gauge track. Check out the Youtube.



Marc

MTH Ready To Run Catalog

MTH's new Ready to Run catalog is out. While not earth shattering from a Standard Gauge perspective, it's not a bad place to start for a Christmas set. Take a quick look and start holding your breath for the new Lionel Corp. catalog. With MTH saying that most of the catalog will be brand new tinplate, 2010 should be a great year for standard gauge!

Marc