MTH small Hudson 5405

[sarge]

That's quite generous. Although my model-bashing is limited to the two-rail world, that would be worth pursuing for anyone with the MTH versions for spares if nothing else now that MTH has pretty well folded up their tent. I hope someone rises to the occasion.

[ScaleCraft]

I have no idea why the cylinder/pilot assembly is gone.
I mean, swapping bits around was what we did, but then there should have been the cylinder/pilot assembly from the engine being modified.
I know the cast tender went behind another engine, as it is same shape as the cast and plastic Lionels.

I searched all the boxes and bags that came here, and nothing, so this is it.

Woulda made a good "fix" for your Commodore Vanderbilt.

[sarge]

That Commodore is long ago gone to a new home. It had the same Railsounds thing as Healey's L1, and would never shut up.

You might wonder why a neurotic scale guy like me would have these, and it goes back to when my wife and I first married. I had space for a good workshop to build models, but not for a layout. She collected those Department 56 ceramic buildings and we decided a tinplate layout using them, a lot of the stuff I had as a kid (Hornby and Lionel), and my uncle's postwar would be a fun project. It actually was; kept very much in the postwar genre. The local hobbyshop there was owned by a Canadian who was an MTH dealer and aficionado, so he was the one (not really knowing what he was dealing with) who tried getting me into the fold with that Commodore.

Later, my dad and I built a classic 4x8 for my son. We still have the tablework my dad built, and lately we have re-assembled the layout after my son used it for Lego during his adolescence.

No MTH though, not because of any brand loyalty or anything, simply because there was plenty of the old stuff in the family and MTH was too oriented to the modern hobbiest, someplace we didn't have the interest in going. The few modern made things we had fit the genre, like the K-line Hudsons, or were things my son wanted when he was young, like Thomas, a Hogwarts Express, and a Polar Express. Still have it all, and my son gets the opportunity to add his contribution to family heirlooms one day.

[ScaleCraft]

Part of the modifications we have done to these Genius locomotives is gut them.
My buddy started out buying dead PS-1's at train shows for literally pennies on the dollar.
We'd completely gut them, install a QSI DCRU or later a Dallee. No sounds. No clang of death.

Then modify them.

Funny, one of the biggies for me was developing a functional front coupler for Lionel steam.
Not all of mine are so modified, but enough that I can put an unmodified one the point and SIX behind it, plus helpers on the rear.

225E boilers, cab backs, Elesco delete, front couplers, cab and tender grabs, NP lettering, engineer and fireman, oxide roofs and red windows.
For a while I looked at cab interiors, but with cab backs just didn't seem to be needed.

[healey36]

We'd completely gut them, install a QSI DCRU or later a Dallee. No sounds. No clang of death.

I suspect that will be the fate of the L-1 someday.

The only other MTH steam I have is a "Bantam" GS-4 from their Rugged Rails line. I bought that new for next to nothing, part of a set. It's comical in appearance, very toy-like, which was the attraction for me. I suspect they didn't sell many of them, nor the Bantam versions of the S-2 or the N&W J. The GS-4 hasn't been run for 2-3 years, so it might be dead-on-the-shelf. We'll have to see.