poniaj posted:Ed,
Welcome to the wacky world of S. Glad you ran into Francine's crew! I'm interested in all flavors of S, from classic Flyer to scale, but love the feel and look of the old toys. I like to resurrect old items and get them back on the track again. Also scratch build things, either as Gilbert "what ifs" or numbering rivets with the best of them. Weird, right? And Francine, DCC in a K5? Whoa, too hi-tech for me! (kidding). BTW, here's my resurrected K5 (was a junk box item for $15). Straight DC can motor, LED headlight and prototypical paint. It actually fooled one of the scale-only guys in our club... at least for a while.
And watching kids chasing a train around the layout is one of the greatest things about setting up at a show.
Francine - I'm sorry you lost the sound in the Berk! I hope it isn't something major and is just an inexpensive fix or replacement!
Jerry - Your K5 is gorgeous! Getting a junk box loco and resurrecting it is an incredible feeling! I've done it with tons of HO engines! Francine's is neat in that the outside still looks like a stock Flyer K5, but the sound, lighting, control and all is now DCC! It was quite an adjustment to run something that looked stock Flyer through the DCC!
I got the FlyerChief Polar Express set, which puts my Flyer operations into this century, at least! And I will say that I think it's the best train set I've ever gotten, from the aspects of solid build quality, performance and overall feel of being like something Gilbert would have done in their peak years! That was the one set my dad and I always looked at and said we needed to get, but we never got it while he was alive. So some of the duplicate trains I had from inheriting his collection (HO brass and some other engines) I sold off to get that set. I am so glad I did!
Here is the Royal Blue set in action on the Club layout. She ran like a Swiss watch!
