Any New Lionel N&W J Sightings?

Not mine, but a guy named Sean Mastrocovi posted a picture of his new American Freedom Train version on the O Gauge Tips and Tricks group on Facebook! 

I received my 600 and the paint is flawless.

Yes, the stripe color is as everyone says...probably too much red.

I have the January 1983 copy of Trains magazine.

It features the 611, as the cover, in honor of the 611 returning to steam.

On page 45 there is a half page color side view photo of the 611 and when I place the photo next to my new J, I think the new J reddish stripe looks a lot like the 1983 color photo.

I will get my 600 on the track tomorrow.

If it runs fine, then it is a keeper.

A picture of the J without the older properly colored passenger cars is useless. We all know what they look like in the catalog or on the iPad without color vetting. Does anyone have the cars with the new J?

Received mine today.....it is one beautiful train.......but more importantly it worked flawlessly right out of the box.  Heres a quick pic and video of it in action.  Sorry not to be able to show it in detail, no time tonight, but I am sure other owners will do it justice......

-Pete

N&WGuy posted:

Not mine, but a guy named Sean Mastrocovi posted a picture of his new American Freedom Train version on the O Gauge Tips and Tricks group on Facebook! 

Well atleast they can't screw up fantasy schemes.

Anyone have pictures or video of the 746 J? I hear it was supposed to have a secondary air whistle in it like the postwar version...

Still looking for a side by side of the new 611 with the 18” aluminum passenger cars. Anyone?

Tonight I unboxed the new 746 version of the J, And I think this one is spot on!  

I posed it for photos alongside my postwar 746, and my Lionel 606 (#6-38026 from 2002) and a Sunset Models K2a - this is 3 of my 19 J class engines shown here. 

Also here’s a video of the air whistle - something some folks may not have realized is this one has a whistle meant to simulate a postwar style air whistle. I am in conventional mode here so I did not test out the quilable whistle here but it’s got it. 

Theres a lot of subtle details here that are easy to miss - no builders plate, blacked out marker lights, blacked out handrail on the nose, blacked out headlight ring, curved tender deck, no class plate on the steam chest - many things faithful to the 1958 version of the 746. 

I’m really very happy with this engine!!!

Cool whistle! How about crew talk for the 746? Specific for the engine?

MJ

Now that looks pretty good to match the PW version and the whistle is an awesome touch with the trailing whirl sound.  Love to see more of this one running!  Have fun!

N&W 1218 posted:

Cool whistle! How about crew talk for the 746? Specific for the engine?

Is that prototypical? I don't hear any high frequencies...maybe just at the end of the quilling.

I like the black out paint.

Side note, I am glad Ross Rowland didn't use the real 611 for the American Freedom Train. Who knows where 611 would be today or what shape it would be in! We all know what happened to AFT #1 in the Hagerstown roundhouse fire. And where she sits now at the B&O Railroad Museum in Baltimore rusting away! 

J 611 posted:

Side note, I am glad Ross Rowland didn't use the real 611 for the American Freedom Train. Who knows where 611 would be today or what shape it would be in! We all know what happened to AFT #1 in the Hagerstown roundhouse fire. And where she sits now at the B&O Railroad Museum in Baltimore rusting away! 

As additional information, the "original plan" for powering the American Freedom Train, was for doubleheaded NKP Berkshires, i.e. Mr. Rowland's NKP 759 and the 763 from Roanoke, Va.. The 763 was even moved from Roanoke to a location (can't remember where) for restoration, with 759. 

Subsequently, clearer heads prevailed, since the midwestern and western railroads would have no part of doubleheaded coal burning steam locomotives on their respective railroads. Thus, the oil burning SP GS-4 #4449 was selected for motive power, throughout the west and midwest.

Lionel knocked it out of the park on the 746 version! The AFT doesn't look half bad either. 

Long Live postwar Lionels. This old gal is waiting her turn back on the layout:

M J Breen posted:

Tonight I unboxed the new 746 version of the J, And I think this one is spot on!  

I posed it for photos alongside my postwar 746, and my Lionel 606 (#6-38026 from 2002) and a Sunset Models K2a - this is 3 of my 19 J class engines shown here. 

Also here’s a video of the air whistle - something some folks may not have realized is this one has a whistle meant to simulate a postwar style air whistle. I am in conventional mode here so I did not test out the quilable whistle here but it’s got it. 

Theres a lot of subtle details here that are easy to miss - no builders plate, blacked out marker lights, blacked out handrail on the nose, blacked out headlight ring, curved tender deck, no class plate on the steam chest - many things faithful to the 1958 version of the 746. 

I’m really very happy with this engine!!!

That whistle is pretty neat. I almost thought it had an actual air whistle in the tender for a second. 

BFI66 posted:

Received mine today.....it is one beautiful train.......but more importantly it worked flawlessly right out of the box.  Heres a quick pic and video of it in action.  Sorry not to be able to show it in detail, no time tonight, but I am sure other owners will do it justice......

 

-Pete

The locomotive - ho hum, yet another J re-re-re-release ... wait ... it has a smoking whistle!  Yes, this is a keeper!  I have the Lionel Pocahontas sets from a few years back with the aluminum cars.  Love them but they were made during that period when Lionel discontinued smoking whistle on straight Legacy - I think the smoke effect definitely adds to the fun factor.  Enjoy!

By the way, what is that tall circular stone structure on your layout - the one your new locomotive passes almost immediately after moving out?  I'm a sucker for brick and stone structures and wow, that thing looks awesome!  

Got mine yesterday, I’m not happy with the color of the stripe.

Doug which version did you get? I’m being very patient but things have quieted down on this subject. I’d really like to know what if anything will be done? Can we have a Lionel representative chime in on the subject?

romiller49 posted:

Wow, I just noticed that the wheel flanges are way oversized compared to the real thing. That’s it for me. I’m done. 

One thing I hadn't noticed until looking through a book recently that had photos of scale models from Lionel, Atlas, and MTH Premier - the handrails and piping detail on Lionel scale products are never scale.  It became so obvious when looking at photos of diesel engines in the book I was reading.  The Atlas and MTH locomotives looked "right."  The Lionels generally did too - until you looked at them in comparison to the others, at which point these details made them look sort of toyish.  Even the photos in the post above that show the front of the real locomotive and the model illustrate this.  The handrails (wires) are like 2x thicker than the real thing.  The mind's eye may not pick up on the specific details, but still knows when something looks "off."

No comment on the paint color.  For me, I don't trust old photos or film for accurate color.  Old film color - even in documentaries - is more like a painting than real.  Put a new color photo next to any color photo from the 1950s and it's so obvious from the colors which is new and old.  I'm no expert on any of this, so feel free to laugh at my non-educated opinion on color.     

M J Breen posted:

Tonight I unboxed the new 746 version of the J, And I think this one is spot on!  

I posed it for photos alongside my postwar 746, and my Lionel 606 (#6-38026 from 2002) and a Sunset Models K2a - this is 3 of my 19 J class engines shown here. 

Also here’s a video of the air whistle - something some folks may not have realized is this one has a whistle meant to simulate a postwar style air whistle. I am in conventional mode here so I did not test out the quilable whistle here but it’s got it. 

Theres a lot of subtle details here that are easy to miss - no builders plate, blacked out marker lights, blacked out handrail on the nose, blacked out headlight ring, curved tender deck, no class plate on the steam chest - many things faithful to the 1958 version of the 746. 

I’m really very happy with this engine!!!

I preordered my "Spirit of Roanoke" assuming the color would be similar to the previous versions as seen in M J Breen's previously posted pics above. But, it is almost a red-orange as seen in Legacy Station's run vid. Mine is still sealed in carton for now. I'd like to hear what Lionel has to say also.

I bought the Spirit of Roanoke after seeing the J at Strasburg last month.  I love it except that freaking stripe is driving me up a wall. Everything else is great but that stripe is all I can look at.  Is there any chance Lionel would fix this?  I can’t believe they would get it so wrong, it’s not like they’ve never made a J before.  I’m almost tempted to swap this engine out for the Pocahontas set.  I read somewhere the stripe didn’t line up but at least the color was correct.  Plus I like the green marker lights better than the white ones (even if that’s accurate).  Besides the whistle steam is there any benefits to the new legacy J as opposed to the old?

DJ Haney posted:

I bought the Spirit of Roanoke after seeing the J at Strasburg last month.  I love it except that freaking stripe is driving me up a wall. Everything else is great but that stripe is all I can look at.  Is there any chance Lionel would fix this?  I can’t believe they would get it so wrong, it’s not like they’ve never made a J before.  I’m almost tempted to swap this engine out for the Pocahontas set.  I read somewhere the stripe didn’t line up but at least the color was correct.  Plus I like the green marker lights better than the white ones (even if that’s accurate).  Besides the whistle steam is there any benefits to the new legacy J as opposed to the old?

I as well as others spoke with Lionel at York about the stripe.  It has been discussed on this thread more than once.  They are looking into seeing what they can do.  

Good luck on swapping the shell.  I suspect the smoke unit for the whistle maybe mounted to the shell so a swap may not be possible. I could be incorrect about that but at minimal you would have to make a hole for the whistle steam.

Lionel knows the stripe is an issue, they also said they will look into it.  All we can do is keep asking by contacting them directly and politely express your concerns.  Posting here alone will do little. I am waiting to get mine to evaluate it personally but with what I have seen so far it is not matching anything N&W I have from both Lionel or any other manufacturer.  If Lionel won't do anything, I will be asking for a refund but from previous discussions with Ryan at York, I feel pretty good that they'll be working on a solution.  

I am not gonna swap the shells, I think that would be really hard to do especially with the smoke unit like you said.  I was just going to get the older engine instead.  The only difference I see between to two besides the stripe color is the whistle steam and the colored marker lights.  I want the more prototypical looking engine so I feel like I would like that one better than the newer one.  I didn’t know if there was anything else different between the two pieces.

I actually sent Lionel an email about it and I’m seeing if I get a response.  I have little success getting through to them though.  I hope Ryan does come through with a solution, though I don’t know what that would be.  As I said it’s a great engine but that freaking stripe is all I can look at.  And when I pull it with my Norfolk and Western and Strasburg cars I just roll my eyes.  I guess it’s the problem with being a “rivet counter” but if I’m paying over a thousand dollars on an engine I want it to be done right.  Has anyone here gotten through to Lionel about it?

DJ Haney posted:

 I guess it’s the problem with being a “rivet counter” but if I’m paying over a thousand dollars on an engine I want it to be done right.  Has anyone here gotten through to Lionel about it?

It's not a rivet counter thing.  I know beside talking to Ryan at York others have gotten through and let Lionel know their thoughts.

I am hoping the dealers won't let us down here either.  Ultimately they hold a lot of influence here.  If they say nothing, that's just as bad.

So, what's with the complaining about the stripe. Looks good to me. At least there is one!!

BTW, MJ, that is some super layout you got there big guy!! And you have 19 of those monsters!!??

Wow and Super Wow!!

Rufus posted:

So, what's with the complaining about the stripe. Looks good to me. At least there is one!!

 

The criticism of the stripe is it doesn't match the real engine, at least as far as we can tell from pictures (no one has held it up right next to the engine), or any previously issued cars by Lionel or other manufacturers. 

Here is a photo someone posted of the new and old 611, and attached is a picture of the 611 last month tab strasburg.  As you can tell it’s dramatically different.  Has anyone gotten a response from Lionel or are they ignoring it? My fear is they’ll come back with an answer like that Commodore Vanderbilt engine they made a bunch of years back that was clearly the wrong color but they insisted it was right.

Actually it’s funny to me, even though the correct lettering is Gold I would be fine if they used the yellow.  The real one almost looked like they used Yellow anyway.  But that red is totally an eye sore.

Patience.  They know of the issue.  Last I heard they were still discussing it internally.  What we don't want is to get this thread to the point where it is locked.  The thread has some good discussion so we should keep the focus on that.

N&W 1218 posted:

Doug which version did you get? I’m being very patient but things have quieted down on this subject. I’d really like to know what if anything will be done? Can we have a Lionel representative chime in on the subject?

I have the Spirit of Roanoke version.  I assume all the new ones are the same color.

M J Breen posted:

..., curved tender deck, 

Sounds like they got the tender right. I was wondering if they were all flat topped tenders. Was this carried over to the 600 and 603?

That's a spiffy little tooter you've got there..

I sent a letter to TalktoUs this am. As Marty said every little bit helps. 

I sent an email last night to them as well.  Personally I feel like what happened was they picked the bright red and yellow colors to be on the postwar version and the others were suppose to be the maroon color. But they just made them all that way.  That makes the most sense to me.  We’ll see what happens.  Wish I could message Ryan Kunkle directly but I don’t have his contact info.  Let’s see what happens!  I literally bought this engine after shooting like 6 hours worth of material of the J at Strasburg. I thought it would be cool to have the model version, I just can’t get over the color!

I have contacted both dealers that I purchased My 600 and 611 Version from (Two different dealers). Both know that the color is not going to cut it and I have canceled the passenger cars as they will probably not match these new engines anyway as shown in my pictures in the attached post.

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/...of-roanoke-by-lionel

One dealer has contacted Lionel but I am not sure if he has heard anything. The other is willing to take the engine and few cars that I have already received back at no restocking fee. All items are in the boxes ready to go back to the dealers. The 600 has never been opened. I am willing to wait and listen but my patience is getting short. We may have no choice but to sent it back as the 2005 version is still superior- shame. One dealer laughed when I mention the Lionel's Quality stickers. 

I love Lionel stuff and I have way more than I will ever need. But now I have Alco Pa's , (1) Sd40-2, Missouri Pacific 4-8-2 with the miss spelled tender and now (2) N&W J's that all either have to go to Lionel or back to a dealer. It took a year to get new shells for the T&P F units and they are only OK and they didn't even bother to paint the diaphrams on the end of the units. In my opinion the winner is Scott Mann.

I received an email from Lionel this morning asking me for photographic evidence that the color was off.  Hopefully we can get some momentum here!  I feel like if they aren’t gonna fix it I’ll send mine back to.  It’s a shame.

Does anyone here have the Pocahontas J?  If so how does it compare to the new one?  I know it doesn’t have the whistle steam but is it that much different?

DJ Haney posted:

I received an email from Lionel this morning asking me for photographic evidence that the color was off.  

Now THAT is interesting. Just how does the customer, any customer, provide "photographic evidence" to convince the folks at Lionel that the "color is off"? What about differences in lighting between the real #611 and any of the models?

Hopefully we can get some momentum here!  I feel like if they aren’t gonna fix it I’ll send mine back to.  It’s a shame.

Does anyone here have the Pocahontas J?  If so how does it compare to the new one?  I know it doesn’t have the whistle steam but is it that much different?

DJ Haney posted:

Does anyone here have the Pocahontas J?  If so how does it compare to the new one?  I know it doesn’t have the whistle steam but is it that much different? Yep 

In the other thread I posted pictures of the 2005 606 J (right) circa 2005 and the 611 Pocahontas Legacy J (left) from 2015. 

Gilly@N&W posted:

M J Breen posted:

..., curved tender deck, 

Sounds like they got the tender right. I was wondering if they were all flat topped tenders. Was this carried over to the 600 and 603?

Gilly, I wondered the same thing. Photos posted on page 2 of this thread by NVISICH show the Lionel 603 with a flat tender deck. That they used the curved tender deck on the 746 and not on the 603 was an interesting decision. The curved tender deck would be correct for the 603. The folks at Lionel clearly had the correct tender on hand for the 746 and 603 but I'm guessing they just didn't know any better to use it for the 603.