Pull out the MPC!

Hey for those of you that follow the sort of "days of the week" thread I did use this train over there on "Santa Fe" Sunday, but then I realized it was all MPC, in fact its kind of "early" MPC, so I thought I would post it here as well.

Here is the relatively inexpensive Lionel #8300 2-4-0 with a sort of "old fashioned" boiler casting.  Not diamond stack wood burner but clearly early 20th century in outline.  The #8300 was  offered by MPC in 1973-74 and has only the 3 position reverse to its name, no smoke or headlight and it only has a whistle if you tow a whistle tender.  It came with the very inexpensive slope back but could have come with others...lots of tender switching in those days.  OBTW she is 49 years old and still has no trouble pulling a few cars around my mostly level layout.

Looking at this "caboose run" from the other end, we see the MPC # 9061 caboose.  She is very light, almost all plastic except the axles and has no illumination.  Even the ladders and railings were plastic.  She dates from the earliest days of MPC, 1970 but was kept on the available list until 1976 so quite a run.

Here is a closer look at 9061 and you can see in the lower left hand corner of the body, the name "Lionel" and under that name is the MPC logo.  This consisted of a rectangle cut in about half with the front having MPC in capital letters and the other have having a sort of inclined plane or dividing line one half of which was dark and the other half light.  It seemed a strange logo as it had no real visual meaning but who knows.  I did notice in my pulling out of my MPC for this thread that later in the MPC era they used their logo less and less and simply relied on the name Lionel.

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OK that's my contribution for today.  A starter set for sure but it provided a lot of fun.

Best Wishes

Don

Another gem from my Grzyboski’s trip this week.

Here's MPC's "Capitol Limited" with General Eisenhower doing a little campaigning.

Here is (probably) the last of the extra MPC cars that I have picked up in the past month. We’ll maybe not. This one in particular is really cool. Sadly, I can’t seem to open this box without most likely buggering it up. I will persevere and with some luck…..This is another one that reminds me of when I looked on the shelf and wished that I could.

Use a letter opener to apply even pressure along the flap and to wiggle the inner flaps away. Nice looking car.

@franktrain posted:

Use a letter opener to apply even pressure along the flap and to wiggle the inner flaps away. Nice looking car.

I like this. Thank you franktrain. It’s much appreciated. I have a bunch of other cars to open too. I’m afraid this isn’t the only one that I will encounter with this condition.

@WRW posted:

... Sadly, I can’t seem to open this box without most likely buggering it up. I will persevere and with some luck…

I bought a bag of tongue depressors (large popsicle sticks) and keep several with my train stuff.  They're great for opening boxes, and can also be used as shims.

Thank you Mallard4688!

@franktrain posted:

Use a letter opener to apply even pressure along the flap and to wiggle the inner flaps away. Nice looking car.

@Mallard4468 posted:

I bought a bag of tongue depressors (large popsicle sticks) and keep several with my train stuff.  They're great for opening boxes, and can also be used as shims.

I just use a table knife from the kitchen silverware drawer. Works great.

A real butter knife, maybe, but I wouldn't use a table knife.  They have a serrated edge, however ineffective it might be against meat.  Given my ingrained clumsiness, I'd manage to cut the box.

@breezinup posted:

I just use a table knife from the kitchen silverware drawer. Works great.

I'm not allowed to have sharp objects.

Not to mention hearing "you used the silverware for WHAT??".

@WRW posted:

Here is (probably) the last of the extra MPC cars that I have picked up in the past month. We’ll maybe not. This one in particular is really cool. Sadly, I can’t seem to open this box without most likely buggering it up. I will persevere and with some luck…..This is another one that reminds me of when I looked on the shelf and wished that I could.

WRW,

The traditional method is to use your trusty pocket comb - top, flat, edge.

I just use the smooth side of a large bread knife - it's long enough to open almost any of the train boxes.

Thumbnail for my new video coming out today about railroad ice plants.  My grandfather was a steam engineer in an ice plant and he built this model steam engine photographed with my MPC refer.  The Vermont Milk refer came with the MPC Era Milwaukee Limited - Lionel 1978 Limited Production set. 

The outer tabs are pointed inward on both ends. I suppose temperature and humidity changes over the decades have probably caused this. I like the comb idea. I’d probably hurt myself with a knife.

WRW - Great cars, I especially liked the "Susie Q" with that really neat logo although the D&H crest logo is neat as well.  Great finds!  Hope you got that box open !

Best wishes everyone !  Great MPC stuff!!

Don

Thanks Don! I’ll give it H this weekend. And maybe I’ll set up some track and have some fun with all of this crazy fun stuff.

Thanks again and best, Willard

Here's a pair of Frisco U36Bs I just acquired:

Both are quite clean and came with very nice boxes.

Lord willing and the postman doesn't get lost, a # 7600 caboose should arrive tomorrow.   I'll post a pic of it here.

MPC took a little license here, for the Frisco had no U36Bs.  Both U25Bs and U30Bs were on the roster (as well as later B30-7s).  The U25 series didn't have the wider radiator, but the U30 series did--not quite as big as the U36s but close.

So I am going to claim that my Frisco (after all, this one IS mine) order a single pair of U36s for evaluation.  It makes sense.

A proper report of the new equipment arriving on the property will appear in Breaking News once the somewhat dilatory correspondent wires the story and the photos to the newsroom.

Palallin, I think I did read about the Frisco evaluation of some U36s.  Great looking engines.

@aussteve posted:

Palallin, I think I did read about the Frisco evaluation of some U36s.  Great looking engines.

Thanks for that tip; I'll dig into some sources.

Palallin - Great looking engines is one a non-powered dummy?  OBTW - in my fantasy world, any RR can use any locomotive it likes regardless of what happened in the 1:1 world, which is generally much more dull !

Best wishes , thanks for posting those are really handsome engines.

Don

Thanks for the kind words, Don.  Yes, a powered/dummy pair in the later Mandarin Orange & White scheme.

And, as promised, here is a pic of the new MPC caboose, the Frisco 7600 in bicentennial paint.   The paint scheme is quite accurate, but it is applied to the wrong type of caboose as the Frisco never had an N5c Cabin Car.  It was offered as part of the Bicentennial set, a separate sale set available in '75 and '76.   The set was headed up by a U-Boat in a very similar scheme but owned by the Seaboard Coast Lines.

The caboose is lighted, and the lighting is actually very constant despite only one center-rail roller.

Now, to move forward with more Frisco/MoPac/T&P MPC acquisitions. . . . .

The caboose is lighted, and the lighting is actually very constant despite only one center-rail roller.

I finally added the second roller a few years ago when I saw that all of the new chinese-made starter set N5C's have them on both trucks.

That's a 1982 vintage MPC SP F-3AA  set heading today's "Coast Daylight" on her race to Los Angeles Union Station.

I must say this set looks right at home with the newer Lionel equipment and I love the "muscle car" performance of those dual Pullmor motors!

@aussteve posted:

Palallin, I think I did read about the Frisco evaluation of some U36s.  Great looking engines.

My friends over on Frisco.org tell me that Frisco never bothered looking at the U36s.  The only advantage over the U30s was higher horsepower, whose only impact would have been to raise the speed.  Given the operating philosophy of the time and the concomitant speed restrictions, the extra HP would have had no benefit.  They stuck with the HP figure which served their needs and plant.

But, as my post over on the Breaking News Thread suggests, such an evaluation is an intriguing might-have-been.

My boys wanted to take out “the classics” this morning. Enjoy our all BN special!!

Bumped from passenger service by the newer diesels, an MPC GS-2 heads today's coast freight on her way down California's beautiful coast.

Hey guys, I posted this on another thread but realized its also MPC and actually from about the middle of the era, 1978-1979.  It was actually part of one of Lionel's Service Station Special sets (no I didn't get the whole thing...unfortunately).  However I loved the great livery and colors on this Minneapolis and St. Louis ("The Peoria Gateway") bay window caboose.  WRW - another of those "window pane" boxes that MPC liked.  This one however has no formal stamping of the contents on the end flap.  Instead the contents, including the product number is hand written.  I wonder if this could be just an extra box that was laying around or if it was a sort of standard process if they ran short of stamped boxes...who knows (after all it was 44 years ago).  The car looks like its brand new and even the illumination worked when I put it on the track.  So any way here is my Lionel (MPC) #9271 M&SL  bay window caboose from 1978-79.

Here she is sitting on her "window pane" box

Here is the end view of both the car and box, note the hand written label for the contents of the box.  Note also the "original price"...no it was cheaper than than to me ($17 including shipping).  The car unlike the box shows no sign of wear or even of ever being on the track although that is not possible to confirm.

Here is a little video showing her on the tail end of one of my short freights.

So If you saw this on Tail End Tuesday, I am sorry for double posting but I also wanted to keep this MPC thread alive.

Best Wishes

Don

Thank you Don. This is beautiful! (The handwritten identification reminds me of some of my MTH prototypes and concept tin STD pieces that I have) Be well!

MPC Boxcars are very colorful and are very light. This makes them vert easy to pull. My postwar 736 has no trouble pulling 35 of them. It could probably pull twice that much if I had that many.

@David Nissen posted:

MPC Boxcars are very colorful and are very light. This makes them vert easy to pull. My postwar 736 has no trouble pulling 35 of them. It could probably pull twice that much if I had that many.

Outstanding! Thank you for sharing this gem of a video.

@Don McErlean posted:

I borrowed Don‘s photo to illustrate a point. Why is it only on Lionel bay window cabooses that the brake wheel does not face the caboose walkway?

I would guess it was to keep the conductor from interfering with the way the engineer was running the train (you know - just keep looking out the side window but don't touch)....

@David Nissen posted:

MPC Boxcars are very colorful and are very light. This makes them vert easy to pull. My postwar 736 has no trouble pulling 35 of them. It could probably pull twice that much if I had that many.

Now that’s impressive David.

Mark Spadaro - BRAVO!!  I never noticed that, talk about the obvious being right in front of you.  I have no answer of course probably for the same reason that locally in central Texas the car stores sell tire chains...when we have not had 1" of snow in total in the last 15 years!!  I like Robert Butler's analysis, I will vote for that reason. 

Don

@David Nissen:  Great display.  I agree the MPC boxcars are light, but don't forget the "fast angle wheels" which were a MPC innovation that made the cars roll easier.  What's worse (for me) is that I reviewed your 35 boxcars and discovered that I only have about 6 !!  Guess I have some hunting to do.

Best wishes all

Don

ok,this post got too me,i gave up and got some mpc,the reading set,i always wanted,the quick silver set,and the chessie u36b,the pennsy ep5,which i had never seen but wow !

Terry, does your Quicksilver powered FA have the add-on weight in it?  The set initially drew some complaints because the engine was so light that Lionel added a weight to later stock to increase its pulling power.

A little late - just fit at 93K

@palallin posted:

Terry, does your Quicksilver powered FA have the add-on weight in it?  The set initially drew some complaints because the engine was so light that Lionel added a weight to later stock to increase its pulling power.

i checked this am,doesnt seem to have,i have only run it once,sounded like a coffee grinder,will lub it up and try again,but always like it for some strange reason !