Polar Express Disappearing Hobo Car?

It is manual operation.

It is hard to say if it is really worth it or not.  If having a complete set is important to you, then yes it is worth it.  If you do not like the function and the look of the hobo, then it isn't worth the cost.

As an alternative, if you don't mind the hobo always being out...

here is what I did on my scale Polar Express.  I wanted a hobo car, so I put an Arttista #1305 "breakman with lantern" figure on top of my observation car.  The lantern is easy to cut off the figure.  The figure is dressed in blueish grey.  I dry brushed his clothes with a little brown and a little black...gloves were painted red.  Added a Woodland Scenics campfire + coffee pot from the camping set and Evan Designs FIRE LEDs.  The FIRE LEDs give an very realistic effect.

I like it.  It's one of those special Christmas time trains. 

I liked the mod done by Keith and wanted to motorize the disappear effect, but ran out of enthusiasm. Also, the hobo can cause tunnel issues,he sits up too high, just like in the movie. Hey, maybe that would flip him down, hitting the tunnel.

I think you need to buy the whistle steam engine which includes the railsounds tender.

Lionel has a note on calling them for the railsounds board part for that package. I thought perhaps I could upgrade my trainsounds tender.

I got the add on car, but whether it's worth getting depends on what you want. If you're just looking to get a complete set it's probably worth it. They show up on eBay once in awhile at reasonable prices (that's where I got mine). If you're looking to make it look like the movie it's probably not worth it, because Lionel's car is a coach and the hobo's campfire was on top of the observation car in the movie. Also there is no lighting effect for the fire on Lionel's car. I think Michigan & Ohio Valley Lines' version a couple posts above looks a lot better, and I'll probably end up modding my observation car following his instructions with the Lionel car going to that great storage yard in the closet.

Cheers,

Ken

I agree if you want a complete set, then it is worth the purchase. You can be the only judge of this position. Also, the hobo figure can be manually positioned for an "in or out" configuration, so if you do not want the figure showing, but want to add to the length of the train, this will work too.

Thanks, I will try to grab it when I can. 

Shouldn't be hard to find, Chas.Ro lists it.