@christopher N&W posted:*snipped*
Thanks for the detailed reply! I see what you're talking about now. I'm not an N&W guy so some of those particulars can escape my eye (different matter when we're talking about the B&O, though lol). I just thought these class A's looked really awesome and figured if I picked one up I'd want to ensure it was true-to-life, just to satisfy my rivet-counting sensitivities.
I think we can hope Lionel will get it right, especially since they already own the tooling, although it's also possible that the other tender's tooling is located at a different factory and potentially even in a different country!
I'm sure at this point no manufacturing has commenced so now is the time to make the adjustments. I would reach out to Lionel directly if I were you.