Does anyone over here dabble in the early metal Athearn kit cars? specifically tank cars...

well since I have nothing but time....how about flying me out there...I can be a Richard Rawlings and organize that layout and closest of yours.....

and as payment I get to keep whatever "falls on the floor"....

But you don't work on Ford's do you?

I saw some the old boxes.  all the Athearn HO I had were in the blue boxes that they were using into the 1980s at least.  I built many many a kit as a kid.  I loved doing that.

not since 1984 when I gave them up. It was a long four years with that one......but depending what falls on the floor I could again....

jbmccormick posted:

I saw some the old boxes.  all the Athearn HO I had were in the blue boxes that they were using into the 1980s at least.  I built many many a kit as a kid.  I loved doing that.

Same for me. My first new trains were Athearn  Blue box  SF GP 35 and F7 in 1972. Before it was my dads Marx and after it was Lionel . Now it is a mix of everything.

Found a few other vintage ho kits.  The first ones are Globe ho metal side box car kits, this time a PRR Merchandise car  and a 40 foot auto box car

Also broke down and picked up a couple of new MTH ho reefers... my first new ho cars in probably 35 years lol...  Darn I must be getting old..  I love the graphics and man those grab irons are so tiny, but I still love the old metal Athearn cars just as much or better.....

I have this nice Globe metal Mobilgas tanker coming now.  Will have to get rid of those couplers  but I love these old metal colorful tank cars!

Also picked up this neat Bowser K4.  Based on the instructions and sheet metal frame, this was a 1980's ish version.  I've like to fins some of the earlier Bowser and Pennline PRR engines.  I threw the MTH K4 I found for $25  just to compare lol.  I think with a nice Green/black paintjob the Bowser would look pretty nice.

Got another neat one.  This one is an early ho Union Pacific Black tank car in the early Black box with Red sticker.  I think this is the first box that Irv used for the ho trains in 1948/49.  Of course he had been selling O scale cars for 4-5 years by then.

Got about 150 vintage metal Athearn/Varney and wood Silver Streak/Amroid freight cars:

I'm a big fan of these vintage cars from the 50's.  Nicely detailed.  They, usually, need Kadees and Intermountain wheel sets.

Page down to date 2-5-18 for pictures:  Look for individual freight car pictures. 

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/...hern-railway?page=14

page down to date 10-15-18 to see more:  Two different postings on this page.

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/...hern-railway?page=19

Last batch at 4-29-19:  posting near the bottom of this page.

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/...hern-railway?page=26

Here are a few stacked on the Lionel factory. Mix of Athearn, Mantua, Silver Streak, Thomas Ind, Globe, and even a Hand lettered Walthers early prewar kit build car. Love em but have nowhere to run them lol. If I count Blue Box Athearn I bet I have 150 plus cars, maybe getting close to 50-60 early metal ones. If only I could focus on quality and getting nice boxes although I do have quite a few boxes as it is.

Found this on the sidebar.  I was hoping somebody had found an Athearn O Scale tank.  I really liked my HO version - long lost.

I don't do HO, and I don't do plastic, but I still have eight of those Varneys.  Six had metal underframes and roofwalks.  Three of those exploded!

So I took one, sent it to Bob Stevenson, of Stevenson Preservation Models, and he made a mold and cast me enough in brass to replace the exploded ones.

They are not perfect, but way better than the early wood , and later plastic underframes.  And way, way better than the exploded ones.  If you need any of these, check with Bob.

So being nostalgic, I have replaced all my HO stuff including Bowser K11, Mantua Shifter, and all the Varney box cars except the grey CN ice car, and the Dockside, in either O Scale or 17/64.

And good news, the Dockside just got main frames cut in 17/64.

Dropping in, and dropping out.

Bob, I wish Athearn would have actually made the tank car on O scale they began as well.  I've seen the ad's in MR and RMC.  I like the idea of having several matching sets of the ho and O versions of their boxcars and reefers.  I know not Lobaugh, but still very cool.

I have very few Lobaugh boxes and reefers - I prefer All Nation, which are similar to Athearn, but with steel maybe 20% thicker.  They remind me of the HO Varney cars.

I have zero HO tank cars, but indeed that long lost black triple dome UTLX sparked an interest, so I now have some forty similar cars in O Scale.

While we are drifting into box  cars, here are some of my obsessions.  For the Carnation, one of my very favorite Varney cars, I had decals made from a photo of the HO car.  Ditto the PRR Merchandise car.  But the rest were produced in O Scale almost exactly as if Gordon Varney had decided to duplicate his cars in O Scale.  I did search long and hard for the EJ&E, and as mentioned, still have not duplicated the grey CN ice car.  Herewith:

I did put captions on them, but somehow they do not show up.  The top cars are O Scale, with the two green cars Athearn or All Nation.  The green and white matches the early Varney car.

The third photo is HO Varney.  Still have not created decals to duplicate that grey ice car - in the works, soon.

The bottom photos show the original Mantua HO Shifter, and my somewhat larger 17/64 scale version.  I have done the same for my Bowser K11 and just cut the frame for a 17/64 Dockside.

Bob, How'd you manage to get all the wheels of that Shifter on the track??? LOL Your slipping 

I managed to trip over this early wood and metal Athearn Timken  Roller Freight box car with its correct Red box...