Comments Please MTH Madison / K-Line Heavyweights

I run all my 18” heavyweights together, Lionel, MTH, and K-Line. Mostly Pullman and NYC. I think the subtle shading differences are more prototypical anyway, though some have metallic gold lettering and others have Dulux gold.

Pete

Here they are, they're close enough for me to run them in the same consist.

Truthfully, in person, they don't look as different as they do here, the biggest difference is the K-Line on the bottom has brighter lettering than the Lionel on the top.

I don't have any MTH heaviweights in the same colors.

The biggest difference is the K Line cars couple closer together and have smaller more realistic diaphragms.

MTH makes fine cars for the money. My only gripe is the coupler gap and excessively long diaphragms.

Thanks Pete, John an Rick!

Risk based on your comment I may stay away from the MTH as I feel as though the K-Lines already are too far apart.  I realize it is done so the cars can run on O31 or something close to that, but my minimum curves are are going to be O72.

@MainLine Steam posted:

Thanks Pete, John an Rick!

Risk based on your comment I may stay away from the MTH as I feel as though the K-Lines already are too far apart.  I realize it is done so the cars can run on O31 or something close to that, but my minimum curves are are going to be O72.

Ironically, the later K-Line cars will run on 031 as the steps fold up when coupler hits them on a curve. Only a few sets had this feature though.

Pete

While most of my heavyweight cars are 20", I find the MTH, Lionel, and K-Line cars to be comparable and I do purchase them for my headend cars which were often shorter at around 18".  My K-Line and Lionel baggage cars are nearly identical while my MTH baggage cars have the PRR porthole window in the doors.  I really like the tooling of the MTH RPO though.  A really nicely detailed car.  I've never checked its accuracy against any prototype, but I just find them to be very high quality. 

@GG1 4877 posted:

....MTH baggage cars have the PRR porthole window in the doors.  I really like the tooling of the MTH RPO though.  A really nicely detailed car.  I've never checked its accuracy against any prototype, but I just find them to be very high quality.

I agree.  MTH and Williams baggage cars with the porthole windows are nearly identical, probably from the same mold.  They are an accurate, but a little short, PRR B70.  The issue for me with the K-line/Lionel PRR baggage car is the incorrect windows in the doors.

Here is the MTH lined up with a GGD B70 and you can see the MTH is a bit short of scale.  In a train, even next to each other, you can't tell the difference (except color).

MTH put both porthole and slotted windows in the doors of their baggage and RPO cars.  However, MTH copied the car body of the PRR B70 so, depending on what you want, it may not be correct for another road.

I have all three. K-M-W, and I like them all.  Putting them together is a matter of taste.