Do you run RARE, "hard to find" cars?

Funny you should mention an orange 6464-100.   Look what just went by on my layout!

 

 

Actually, just for a brief test run. 

 

Jim

Absolutely. I run them all. I do pamper them a bit more.  

Laz that is an intresting question. I will be watching this thread to see what people have to say. For me I don't have any cars like the ones you mentioned. abaut I do have some of my first trains from the 40's and 50's. My grandson (10 years old) Has my first two engines, a steamer and a Santa Fe on display in his bed room so that they don't get used by mistake in the train room. Thanks for your intresting post.

Well, if you consider the Paul Strickland Atlas Natty Boh rare, expensive, and hard to find, absolutely! It was made to run and puts a smile on my face. Doesn't get any better.

 

When I run it on the modular layout, John Q Public doesn't discern any specific differences between this car vs my Atlas Coors car.

 

Gilly

Yes, run them all.  Few, if any actually appreciate in value.  Displays are nice but at the end of the day, if i don't run it i sell it.

 

John

Hi

 I run every car I get be not afraid to run them. 

I keep some of my rare cars in their boxes, so most of the time, I don't mess with them.

 

Yep run everything I have. That is what they are for. But I don't drive my Corvette in the rain.

I've had a mint condition lifesavers tank car in the box since the mid 90's.  It's the nicest one I've ever seen and the only car I'd never actually run. Maybe its not the rarest car in the world but it always felt that way to me.  Before this Christmas it had been out of the box maybe twice but had never taken a lap.  I finally decided that this was time to run it.  Now not only has been around the tree several times it went with me to a club outing today and ran laps for about 3 hours straight. 

 

A small part of me sighs thinking that it will never be that new and nice again, but the smiles I got from people looking at it today were well it.

I run everything. 

I have three 715 tanks in the middle of a train on loop 3.  Do they count as rare?

If I have it, I will run it.  If it is rare and expensive, I will just be a little more careful with it, but that is all.

 

Andy

In my pre-teen and early teen years when other collectors came over to see the collection I would give them a heart attack when I would run rare items. I ran them all and I still do,  gee they are only toy trains

 

I have plenty of rare and hard to find trains, and nothing is too good not to run.

 

Candidly speaking, the concept of "rare" toy trains has ALWAYS amazed me, and there's a part of me that believes it was all a scheme cooked up by "collector authorities" to drive market prices up in the minds of folks who thought it would be desireable to build huge collections and "have it all".

 

This goes hand in hand with color variations as well.  Funny how times have changed today, and I wonder if folks even CARE whether a production run of 1,000 box cars has all red doors, or if 990 have red doors and 10 have burgundy doors.    And in the case of the latter, I just don't think the "collector mindset" exists to even document the fact much less support a premium price for the 10 box cars with burgundy doors.

 

Having observed MANY "moment in time collectables" come and go relative to being truly "rare"...  I'd say run everything you have while you have them to enjoy.  That's what I plan to do once I get to that point in building my new layout.

 

David

 

The UPS boxcar made by KMT-Franks Roundhouse is supposed to be rare. I have a train of about 40 of them that I like to run at train shows.

David:

 

WELL STATED, as well as RATIONALLY expressed!

If I buy it you bet it will run. In the 90's I had sealed pw engines and cars. I would take them out of the box's and watch my fellow collectors hyper-ventilate As i opened them and then ran them.

 

They are nothing but toys so enjoy them.

I run everything including so called hard to find or "rare" rolling stock.  In the 70's and 80's I remember it was 90% train collecting on shelves and only a few train operators.  How times have changed.........for the better I beleive.

 

Steve, Lady and Tex

Citing Atlas reefers as an example, those that would be seen logically in the region

I model, such as Coors, I'd run.  Those from my home state with beer brands unlikely

to be seen in the mountain west, remain sealed in their boxes.  Coincidentally, the

Coors cars and the other Colorado green beer reefer, are common, the home state ones are LHS short runs and WERE once pricey.  I'd suspect their value has dropped.

For the Marx from my childhood, with some cars once very hard to find, with a

lot of trudging through train shows, after I discovered eBay, I found them all over

it, and not rare at all....although some are/were pricey.

If I buy it I run it.  I have no shelf queens.

I have no problems of running everything I have.  I used to say that I had run everything I had but my Flying Yankee.  When I bought it I didn't know that it required wider radius turns then any thing I had at the time.  I have run it since.  I buy trains to roun.

I run 'em all. You know what they say, if you don't use it, you lose it!

I hope I never accidentally buy any rare rolling stock, I'd probably weather it immediately and make a lot of "collectors" angry.  

What is an orange 6464 worth? $150-200? I honestly don't know, but most of my engines are at least double that many 6-10 times that, and I don't hesitate to run them at all. If I have it, I run it.

 

 I don't know how many "Rare" or "Hard to Find" Cars I have, but looking at the descriptions on ebay, it is a LOT. I guess it depends on ones definition of "RARE" but a lot of sellers sure have a much more liberal idea of "Rare" than I do.

 

Hey Laz, Haven't seen you around here much lately, I Hope You and everyone else here has a Happy, Healthy and Wealthy New Year,

 

Doug

Collecting toy trains certainly isn't dead, but properly researched and juried documentation of production, aside from the prewar and postwar periods, certainly is close to non-existent at the present time.  That's kind of a shame because compiling such documentation when it is fresh is certainly a lot easier than tracking down information years later.

 

My feeling is that if you collect prewar and/or postwar items, you're in pretty good shape regarding documented rarity and scarcity, including variations.  

 

If you're collecting more recent production items, you likely don't know much about production numbers, factory variations, and the like…all of which help to establish rarity.  

 

A whole lot of work will need to be done by those who, say 30 or more years from now, decide it's time to begin documenting/recording production from the early decades of this century.  And there will be a need for such documentation as the significant production we've seen over the past 20 years continues to taper off, and as makers of the great toy trains disappear from the scene.

quote:

What is an orange 6464 worth? $150-200? I honestly don't know, but most of my engines are at least double that many 6-10 times that, and I don't hesitate to run them at all. If I have it, I run it.

 

I am not up on current prices for collectable Lionel trains. Recently I have seen a couple of desirable 6464 boxcars in mint condition go up into the thousands. Out of curiosity, I did a internet search for the  orange 6464-100, and found one offered for $1,500.

 

Not all orange 6464 WP boxcars are so expensive or desirable. Lionel also made an orange 6464-250 Western Pacific boxcar

Most 6464-100 WP boxcars are silver, and are not expensive, or difficult to find (there is a desirable variation in the color of the markings)

I have a lot of rolling stock and I'm not sure what is rare and what isn't.  Regardless, it all runs - some more than others but that has nothing to do with rarity.

I would, but I haven't got any.  They're too dang hard to find.

 

Pete

All the time.  I've only seen 2 cars like this in O scale, one built by Ed Reutling and the other built by me:

 

 

I believe there's a brass model of this in O scale, but have never seen a photo of it.

I run all my engines but I do have a Mint 6464-200 PRR Boxcar that has never seen the rails, also a 6447 PRR Caboose in the same condition.  I have multiples of the -200 and many 6417's so I see no need to run those particuler ones.

 

The black 2332 GG1 gets run as does the JLC PC GG1, also the '64 773.  No mercy there.

We run everything! Especially the rare, hard to find "Paul Strickland Natty Boh's". 

 

Age is another consideration when added to rarity. For a time I was enamored of Pre War AF and some engines (2) and cars are about 85 years old and I run them inasmuch as thats the only reason I gathered them up. This gets into resale value and I don't run a business,or a museum.. its a hobby. 

I run them all...they aren't doing anyone any good sitting in boxes or on a shelf.  

 

--Greg

My rare bird: An S Scale C-D models wood/card/metal CGW 4-6-0 from the late 40's-early 50's.

 

To paraphrase the Boss.

 

"Trains like us, baby we were born to run!"

 

Rusty

Thanks GUYZ for all the good info on this subject.  I too have the PAUL STRICTLAND Natty Bo reefers (2) and really enjoy running them.  I also just won the Life cereal boxcar and I am about to start running that too, along with my Smokey Bear tanker and life savers car.  As you GUYZ have said they were built to run.

 

PS.

CHALLENGER 3980 still here, glad to here from you.  Been trying to get a deer with the Flintlock rifle.  And of course working on the layout. Hope all is well out in the NW.

 

As far as rare goes, would you run a box car that has a value of $5,000.? 

 

Paul Edgar

I wouldn't buy a $5,000 boxcar.  And if I had one before it became a $5,000 boxcar, it would have been run.

 

Rusty

To me it comes down to whether you are a collector (where rarity and condition is all important) or an operator, in the true sense of the word. They are both important aspects of our hobby. For me, I consider myself an operator and run it all.