American Flyer All Aboard Thoughts????

From my own experience, it depends on how much patience you have in searching for the replacement pieces if you want to do a full blown restoration. I have a similar situation with a large clockwork layout. I am intending to build and I have Marx and Hafner switches but I found two crossovers and a switch made by Ives that is far superior, but I don't have enough of them to go forward. When to compromise? I am still holding out for Ives.  I would do a thorough, consistent search over time..to find out what is the rarity, the cost, the odds of finding original components..if it becomes clear that this is not an option..after asking AF groups etc..then at least you can make an informed decision.

IMHO, it is all up to you.

I had some of the standard (non-winter) all aboard stuff. The concept was neat, but in reality, the ways to assemble the sections were limited. Plus I am primarily a Lionel guy anyway.
From what I understand, the Winter panels are much more difficult to find.

If you are restoring the panels as a collector's item, then original track is the only way to go.

If you are fixing up the panels to use them, then I think you should use whatever you prefer. I can think of one advantage of using original track:

 you may find more panels to add to your set. With original track, everything will match right up.

Whatever you decide, enjoy you find!

The winter sets are really neat and desired.  You can effectively restore the panel using available pike master track and the rivets.  The houses can be restored as well.  Keep an eye on ebay and a set shows up occasionally to use the pictures as a reference.

I have several of the sets and enjoy them.  Good luck

Jim

Sturgeon-Phish

The winter sets are really neat and desired.  You can effectively restore the panel using available pike master track and the rivets.  The houses can be restored as well.  Keep an eye on ebay and a set shows up occasionally to use the pictures as a reference.

I have several of the sets and enjoy them.  Good luck

Jim

 

Jim

Is there any way you could post a picture of the set? I have never seen one except as a catalog item when they first came out and not the winter version you folks are referring to. It sounds pretty neat.

Bruce

Sure

Jim

For more clips on All Aboard sets check out You Tube.There is a pretty neat Winter Wonderland set on there although I do not believe it to be original.Looks like he updated it with several scenery add-ons.Thanks for the replies guys.I'll check out ebay for pike master track but I diddn't notice any last time I looked.

Thanks for the photos. The old black and white catalog pictures I saw back in the day did not do the Pikemaster sets justice, ( to say the least) In their own way, they seem to anticipate the arrival of the hi-rail concept, although if I recall correctly, they came with an awful low end steam locomotive, which was far from living up to AF's former reputation for more scale like appearance. IM0..the concept still has a lot of potential but these days, I am fairly sure the cost would be prohibitive in an era of $500.00 locomotives or sets whose cost \ value has to compete with electronic toys  . I have to congratulate both of you on finding these and preserving them as a largely forgotten part of toy train history..All I can say is wow. I will check out the Youtube videos ..thanks for the tip. A really interesting subject. The fact that they survived in a decent condition or any condition, like a lot of "childhood stuff", is pretty amazing.I don't want to count the decades since I first saw them in a catalog.

Are those pictures of the standard All Aboard panels, or winter scene panels?
I could be mistaken, but they look like standard panels to me, perhaps with a few extras added.

Here is a site dedicated to the panels.
It has pictures of the standard panels. I didn't find any pictures of the winter panels.
There is a picture of the Flyer catalog page with the winter set shown.

http://www.trainweb.org/allaboardsets/

http://www.trainweb.org/allaboardsets/66cat3.jpg

The pictures are of a regular set.  I believe the winter set was a 600 or 6 panel set, painted on the panels and houses with white paint and glitter to look like snow.

I don't have a winter set, yet.  I've thought about taking a regular set and paint it to look like a winter set.

Lots of fun

Jim

All,

I have recently begun collecting a number of All Aboard panels and the last bunch came in with cracks.   Any ideas as to how best repair these plastic panels?  I figured that I would need to stop drill them, but I'm not sure if I should use gorilla glue, a glue gun or what?  HELP!

Robert

Robert - Welcome to trains.com!

After reading the posts, then enjoying the photo's it makes me wish I had not sold my All Aboard set.  Enjoy your find!

there are 2 versions of pike master track. the original versions had all identical ties. the ones for the All Aboard sets had modified ties on the 2 or 3rd tie from the end with a enlarged disc with a hole for the tubular rivet to hold the track in place to the panel.  you can try using the 1st version if you're careful in drilling out the tie but it will crack either during the drilling part or when you rivet it to the panel. or you could try small screws and washers if you don't care about a factory appearance.

Gargraves won't fit because the size to match the small pikemaster radius of the curve tracks hasn't been made. you would have to make it from the flex track stock.

as for repairing cracks, i have had some luck using thick Slow Jet Super glue, followed by sanding the underside with 40 grit paper and then using fiberglass resin and mats from autobody repair kits.
a little green touch up paint and the crack becomes invisable.

hope this helps you.

I have used epoxy to repair the cracks in my panels.  clean the area underneath the crack and spread epoxy on it.  Repairs have held up very well.