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J Daddy posted:

Is there a way to drop the body down lower over the trucks... the " high water flood " look is really bothersome. 

Not without significant changes to the truck bolsters. The stamped sheet metal bolster would have to be lowered and then the top of the third rail pickup would have to be insulated to keep it from shorting to the sheet metal frame of the car.

I really like the packaging change. The 4 Pack has Windows on both sides of the box. It took just a few minutes to get all of the cars out if the box and on the tracks. I don't need an individual box for each car. The injection molded snap top plastic cradles are perfect. Way better than all that styrofoam. 

Dome lighting or not, as many people have said, I'm very Happy with these cars. They look great traveling around my layout. Thanks Lionel for making the Bluebird a part of my collection! 

TrainingDave posted:
J Daddy posted:

Is there a way to drop the body down lower over the trucks... the " high water flood " look is really bothersome. 

Not without significant changes to the truck bolsters. The stamped sheet metal bolster would have to be lowered and then the top of the third rail pickup would have to be insulated to keep it from shorting to the sheet metal frame of the car.

That is a real bummer. I like the cars but they look like they are way too high off of the trucks.

Ever notice how hard it is to see outside when in your house at night, with the lights on? Turn the lights off and you can suddenly see outside! Amazing how that works.

Now, if we installed a lighting PCB in the vista dome it would have required screws to mount it to the roof of the vista. This would have made it visible from the side PLUS there would be wires running down to the car body (we haven't quite perfected wireless power yet, but its likely on the same container with Fastrack Expander Paste!).

Had we installed lighting in the dome, passengers would complain about the reflective glare and that they could not view the stars at night. Hence, no lights in the vista domes!

Thanks!

Mike

Last edited by Mikado
Mikado posted:

... Had we installed lighting in the dome, passengers would complain about the reflective glare and that they could not view the stars at night. Hence, no lights in the vista domes!

...

Passengers?  Complaining?  My set didn't come with any passengers, so I don't think we'll be hearing anybody complaining up there in those domes.  

Subtle floor lighting might have been a real cool effect.  Perhaps for V2.0  

David

Last edited by Rocky Mountaineer

Almost bought the Wabash set at the Allentown show today.  Pete Costa had a 6-car set on display in boxes.  Catl'g pics do NOT do these cars justice!   Very smart-looking appearance for this set.

Would have been quite the impulse buy, but then I'd need to find some motive power for it too.  One thing always leads to another.  So i excercised a little self control.   Perhaps another day.  

David

Last edited by Rocky Mountaineer

Personally, I would much prefer lighted domes primarily to spark memories of those magical and beautiful silver Lionel (and Flyer) passenger cars when we were kids.  Great memories too!

Would seem there have been several excellent suggestions for modifications when you are adding the much-needed passengers. Perhaps drilling the holes and maybe covering them with translucent tape would be the easiest and best? That would add the light from the floor and appear the most prototypical...

NSBill posted:

I'm asking this for a friend. How were these cars packed? Did the boxes come with bags? Were the 2 packs packed two to a box?  ...

Bill, unless you're looking for something specific to the Wabash 21" set, take a look at my "first look" Texas Special thread from last week.  There are pics of the packaging there.

My Texas Special set came from Charlie Ro with an outer shipping carton that was created from the 4-pack's shipper, then extended a bit to hold the 2-pack product carton as well.  So everything arrived in one outer box, if you follow what I'm describing.  And I'm sure Charlie's crack shipping staff used the 2-pack's outer shipping carton for other product they were shipping.

Each car is wrapped in clear plastic, and then inserted into white PLASTIC liners -- not foam as with prior products.  All cars are visible through window cut-outs in their respective product cartons.  The 4-pack has window cut-outs on both sides of the product box:  2 in front, 2 in back.  The 2-pack only has window cut-outs in the front of the 2-pack product box.  The cars are not boxed individually anymore.

Hope that helps.

David

Last edited by Rocky Mountaineer
Rocky Mountaineer posted:
NSBill posted:

I'm asking this for a friend. How were these cars packed? Did the boxes come with bags? Were the 2 packs packed two to a box?  ...

Bill, unless you're looking for something specific to the Wabash 21" set, take a look at my "first look" Texas Special thread from last week.  There are pics of the packaging there.

My Texas Special set came from Charlie Ro with an outer shipping carton that was created from the 4-pack's shipper, then extended a bit to hold the 2-pack product carton as well.  So everything arrived in one outer box, if you follow what I'm describing.  And I'm sure Charlie's crack shipping staff used the 2-pack's outer shipping carton for other product they were shipping.

Each car is wrapped in clear plastic, and then inserted into white PLASTIC liners -- not foam as with prior products.  All cars are visible through window cut-outs in their respective product cartons.  The 4-pack has window cut-outs on both sides of the product box:  2 in front, 2 in back.  The 2-pack only has window cut-outs in the front of the 2-pack product box.  The cars are not boxed individually anymore.

Hope that helps.

David

Thank you for that info David. Were the boxes themselves in plastic bags. The friend I'm asking for is a bit of a stickler about the packaging. He thinks that Pete probably gave him the set you mentioned in a previous post, and it's missing the outer bags and shipping carton for the 2 pack and so now he's all worked up over it.

 

Bill

Bill, i do not recall the 4-pack or the 2-pack product boxes coming in bags.  If your friend is thinking back to the days when these sets came in a product box surrounded by a clear plastic bag with a piece of tape labeled "factory sealed", those days appear to be history.  

All the importers are cutting corners everywhere they can.  Last year, I purchased two "premium sets":  Lionel's N&W Pocahontas passenger set, and an MTH CSX freight set with loco and Gunderson cars.  Neither set came packaged inside a fancy "set box".  Just individual product boxes packaged inside a brown shipping carton. 

I see in another thread that MTH is due to ship the CSX Safety Train set in a couple of weeks, and I'm not expecting any set box for that set either.  We'll know pretty soon.

In the big picture, there are certainly worse things to "get worked up over".  So tell your friend to just enjoy the trains.  

David

Rocky Mountaineer posted:

Bill, i do not recall the 4-pack or the 2-pack product boxes coming in bags.  If your friend is thinking back to the days when these sets came in a product box surrounded by a clear plastic bag with a piece of tape labeled "factory sealed", those days appear to be history.  

All the importers are cutting corners everywhere they can.  Last year, I purchased two "premium sets":  Lionel's N&W Pocahontas passenger set, and an MTH CSX freight set with loco and Gunderson cars.  Neither set came packaged inside a fancy "set box".  Just individual product boxes packaged inside a brown shipping carton. 

I see in another thread that MTH is due to ship the CSX Safety Train set in a couple of weeks, and I'm not expecting any set box for that set either.  We'll know pretty soon.

In the big picture, there are certainly worse things to "get worked up over".  So tell your friend to just enjoy the trains.  

David

David thank you for replying back. He's always giving me a good laugh about how anal he can be with this stuff!

Bill

I'll just reiterate what seems to have been said.  The domes are definitely wrong for these cars.  (I rode this train many times, by the way.)  They are styled after Pullman Standard and not the Budd curved glass design.  The glass at the ends of the dome is also done differently between those two prototype manufacturers.  (Yes, one Pullman Standard dome was added later with smooth sides because they couldn't get another Budd built one fast enough.)  If the car has fluting, it should have the curved glass dome.  The look of the train, to my eye, is very dependent on having the correct domes.  And it is true that the Observation should be front of center.  There are a number of other nits and picks I suppose, and I didn't expect the quality of Golden Gate cars, and these are not at that price point, either.  But wrong domes and misplaced domes is certainly less than what I expected.

Chuck K.

Chuck K. posted:

... I didn't expect the quality of Golden Gate cars, and these are not at that price point, either.  ...

As many here should know by now, I'll be the first to take Lionel to task for their pricing structure.  But for the most part, the prices of their passenger cars remain "reasonable".   Now we can argue that ABS cars should be considerably lower than their aluminum predecessors.  But we're also paying for the new tooling, so the price-points of ABS are essentially picking up a shade below where prices of aluminum cars left off.  Over in my Texas Special "first look" thread, I calculated roughly $110/car for the new ABS cars -- not including the StationSounds diner which skewed the average price/car to $125.

As a point of comparison, I just received a GGD El Capitan 60' RPO car from Scott Mann today.  It must have been an unclaimed "left-over" from the first production run, since I had an RPO and an extra lounge car on standby.  Very handsome car, by the way.  But we're talking $279 for this gem.  So that's where prices are heading for finely detailed aluminum passenger cars today.

David

 

Last edited by Rocky Mountaineer

I contacted Lionel's customer service mainly about the incorrect domes and got the sort of reply I expected:

"We apologize this is not as expected.  We did check and this is how they are manufactured.  We are not remaking the roof or shell to correct this difference."

The person answering did not even understand the product well enough to realize that the dome is a separate part not requiring a new "roof" or "shell".

Interestingly, the K-Line California Zephyr cars did the iconic Budd dome rather well.  It's ironic that Lionel now has all the K-Line assets, but couldn't get the Blue Bird's dome right.

Chuck K.

Gosh folks, last I looked this topic is posted in "Hi-Rail, O27 and Traditional 3-Rail O Gauge" forum, not in any of the Scale forums.

I still think its a darn good looking set. Of course, I am more into  operating fun than minute details of any of these trains. I am one of the outliers who isn't into all the minutiae some are. Perhaps that discussion would be better left to the Scale Forums.

As long as the set is being enjoyed by the originator of this topic, then so be it. I for one would love to have a set like this in the 15" Class of passenger cars that would run on my layout.

To each their own.

rboatertoo posted:

I have the 4 pack and 2 pack of the Wabash cars.  I purchased the Lionel e8 a while ago.  When, I put them together I notice that the blue color of the cars is not the same as the blue color of the engines. 

That's a big disappointment!    I wonder if folks who own the Legacy FM Trainmaster locomotive or F3 ABBA's (I think Lionel did F3's recently, yes?) will fare any better.  I only saw the passenger set briefly at the Allentown train show last weekend, and the cars had a very striking appearance to them.  I consider myself very, very lucky that the new Texas Special passenger cars match the SD70ACe locomotives that Lionel produced almost 5 years ago.

David

Last edited by Rocky Mountaineer

Interestingly, the K-Line California Zephyr cars did the iconic Budd dome rather well. 

Interesting indeed.  I had the K-Line NP dome car here for a while, and found the dome undersize and toylike.  I use brass parts and make my own domes.

And while I too am dazzled by the realism demanded of toy train hobbyists, I am grateful for it, since I can now purchase almost anything i want in 3-rail and convert it to run on more or less realistic track easily.  Keep demanding scale models for your tinplate track!

bob2 posted:

So far, four different posters have suggested that domes were not lit up on real trains, and one of them actually rode a dome at night.  Do you guys still think that Lionel made a major mistake?

If you are trying to look out the window at night, interior lighting completely destroys the view.  On the other hand, folks outside can see what you are doing with your girlfriend.

There had to be some lighting, no one could walk up there and head down the stairs in a rocking, moving train without some lights. Seems all they wanted was a soft glow. 

There was lighting up in the dome.

What today would be called “task” lighting, for each row in a downward facing position. Probably (hopefully) very dim.

What I don’t know is if there was floor or stair lighting. My guess would be yes, but I don’t know for sure.

The lighting does not bother me, the shape of the domes, that would bother me more.

I should also add, the color is pretty close and the detail is very nice. Once populated with people, the domes will make a nice focal point.

Otherwise a nice set. I too would like to see these in 18 inch cars… and lowered.

 

Charlie

Last edited by Charlie
Chuck K. posted:

I'll stand corrected about whether Lionel kept K-Line tooling.  However, I will also say that Lionel didn't seem to inherit K-Line's acumen in building a reasonably accurate passenger car.

Chuck K.

You're absolutely right about that! It's a crime that the old K-line tooling is still sitting unused.

Bill

NSBill posted:
Chuck K. posted:

I'll stand corrected about whether Lionel kept K-Line tooling.  However, I will also say that Lionel didn't seem to inherit K-Line's acumen in building a reasonably accurate passenger car.

Chuck K.

You're absolutely right about that! It's a crime that the old K-line tooling is still sitting unused.

Bill

How do you know that the K-Line tooling, especially for passenger cars, is "still sitting unused"?

Hot Water posted:
NSBill posted:
Chuck K. posted:

I'll stand corrected about whether Lionel kept K-Line tooling.  However, I will also say that Lionel didn't seem to inherit K-Line's acumen in building a reasonably accurate passenger car.

Chuck K.

You're absolutely right about that! It's a crime that the old K-line tooling is still sitting unused.

Bill

How do you know that the K-Line tooling, especially for passenger cars, is "still sitting unused"?

I was referring to scale passenger car tooling there. Last I heard Sanda Kan had it, and had no intentions of releasing it. So are you suggesting somebody is using the scale passenger car tooling? If so, who?

Bill

Wow, these are really poorly done, given that they are supposed to be scale, and thus prototypical.  Only the paint job looks something like Wabash.  I pre-ordered, trusting Lionel to get them right, but I am returning them.  Lesson learned.  I am pretty tolerant of errors and generic variations grom the prototype, but this is ridiculous.  I will wait for GGD to do them right.  Why couldn't Lionel just copy the K-line domes?  Those were much closer to the correct Budd dome.

I guess we know now, that these Lionel 21" cars are not intended to compete with the Atlas or GGD 21" cars, or even the old K-line 21" cars.  They are scale length fantasy toys.  A big step down from Lionel's own fairly correct 21" Texas Special cars from a few years ago (but those were really reboxed K-line aluminum cars).  I am very disappointed.

Last edited by Jtrain

There is a common thread running through most of the comments in this thread.  It would appear that Lionel doesn't care enough to get some of the most basic stuff right and then stiff-arms us when, having pre-ordered the pig-in-a-poke, we're stuck with serious defects in both design and execution.  How can they get so many things right and then mess up on something as basic as the shape of the dome in an all dome train?  It's not as though they haven't made a Budd dome before...

Having been deeply disappointed by my recently acquired Lionel "Olympian Hiawatha", I'm wondering if there is anyone out there anxious to part with a K-line 21" aluminum Milwaukee Road dining car in UP colors, No. 122, and any other of the cars in that series?

I just returned a 4-car and 2-car set and cancelled a still pending order for the diner.  It's just too wrong with the domes.  I'll sell the E8 units I had previously purchased - oh well.  I could probably have tolerated most of the other faults in these cars (although somebody at Lionel should be embarrassed - but I suspect they aren't - and perhaps that's part of the problem).  In the "Lionel 2015 Signature Edition" catalog, page 3, "Of course you'll want some new scale rolling stock to run behind your engines, and we certainly have a lot of cars and paint schemes to choose from in this catalog."  They use the word "scale" and in subsequent paragraphs differentiate "traditional".  So what they are claiming in THIS catalog isn't exactly "toy" trains.  Page 76 says "...cars appropriate for each road" next to Blue Bird cars that, dome-wise, are represented correctly in the catalog.  Well, "appropriate" turned out to be a be a false claim.

Chuck K.  

Chuck K. posted:

I just returned a 4-car and 2-car set and cancelled a still pending order for the diner.  It's just too wrong with the domes.  I'll sell the E8 units I had previously purchased - oh well.  I could probably have tolerated most of the other faults in these cars (although somebody at Lionel should be embarrassed - but I suspect they aren't - and perhaps that's part of the problem).  In the "Lionel 2015 Signature Edition" catalog, page 3, "Of course you'll want some new scale rolling stock to run behind your engines, and we certainly have a lot of cars and paint schemes to choose from in this catalog."  They use the word "scale" and in subsequent paragraphs differentiate "traditional".  So what they are claiming in THIS catalog isn't exactly "toy" trains.  Page 76 says "...cars appropriate for each road" next to Blue Bird cars that, dome-wise, are represented correctly in the catalog.  Well, "appropriate" turned out to be a be a false claim.

Chuck K.  

Yes, I agree.  I returned the cars and got rid of the E8 AA too.  Too wrong to spend so much money on, or any money on, really.

3rd Rail is doing the E8, and you only need one A unit to be correct.  I will wait for GGD to do the cars.

Last edited by Jtrain
Jtrain posted:

I predict that we will see a lot of these cars on the secondary market in the near future, where they will sell for about $50/car (or less).  They might be good for a repaint to something more correct, if the price is low enough.

I suspect not.  For every one person dissatisfied with the cars, there are probably ten that don't mind the inconsistencies and will keep them for their visual appeal.

Rusty

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