I have seven of the North Pole Central passenger cars with reindeer names that Lionel has been producing over the past few years. I have the eighth (Blitzen) car on order and also ordered the new Santa Flyer to pull the complete set. As an afterthought, I have been wondering about the pulling power of this engine. How well will it be able to pull the eight (and possibly nine) cars? Maybe someone with the Hogwarts or Shakespear sets can answer. I don't plan on any grades on my layout and will be using tubular track.
As for the possiblility of a "Rudolph" car. I understand there are legal rights to the name and apparently MTH currently has paid whatever licencing fee was necessary. If Lionel can not also license the name, then maybe they could just make the car with a blank nameplate and let the purchaser of the car letter it however he wanted. They might also add a red light somewhere or rigging for a rooftop figure and electrical plug.
OHMAN,
I have the hogwarth set and the engine is currently pulling 9 Lionel log cars, the ones with the big real logs on then with cast trucks, wheeels and cast bodies, with no problems pulling what so ever. Hope this helps.
laz57
Ohman,I saw the Santa Flyer on Charles Ro's tables at the TCA Meet in York a couple weeks ago. Nice looking engine and the colors should match well with the passenger cars. I didn't pick it up because I have the NPC Berkshire from 2000 that I intend to pull the passenger cars with. From what I could see I don't see why this engine wouldn't have a problem pulling these cars, it appeared to have some decent heft to it.I don't know how the log cars Laz has compare in weight to the passenger cars, but if you are on level ground the engine should not have a problem. I also have the General from a couple years back and it is quite light, but it did not have a problem pulling the 6 passenger cars I had at the time. Not sure about the newer 2.As for a Rudolph car... I don't see it happening since MTH has the rights to the Rudolph movie. I don't know anything about legaleze so I can't comment on whether Lionel could release a car with the name 'Rudolph' on it, but not using the font. I'm sure there is something illegal about it. I would be fairly certain that they could not release the figures.
Thanks for the response guys! Glad to hear a good report. I'm already thinking about what it will look like pulling some of my traditional Xmas freight cars as well. Wondering if anyone has pictures they'd like to share? I checked on youtube but came up with nothing.
Found it on the doorstep today when I got home. The level of detail surprised me. Some delicate parts on both the engine and tender but I really like it. Plenty of heft and the colors are a perfect match to the passenger cars. I'll be running it either at Trainfest in Milwaukee or at the trainclub open house Thanksgiving weekend. I like the way Lionel did this set. Several cars spread out over several years with a variety of matching motive power choices. Makes getting a nice 027 complete set much more affordable. I would encourage the Big L to do more items this way. The one catch is that you want to stay on top of the new items each year so you don't accidently miss out on something. This happened to me back in the MPC era with the Spirit of '76 set. Missed getting the last three cars and I'm still looking for one of them. So far on the NPC items, I think it's all still readily available.
True Reindeer aficionados will tell you that Rudolph was merely a marketing ploy of Montgomery-Ward. There are only 8 REAL reindeer!
Jon
What is the correct order to place the passenger cars on the track behind the tender? You can't do it by the order in the song: Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, as Prancer is the Observation Car. Should Comet (the baggage car) be the first car behind the tender?
How about this order?
Santa FlyerTenderComet - Baggage CarDasher - Combo CarDancer - CoachBlitzen - CoachDonner - DinerVixen - Central Vista DomeCupid - Full Vista DomePrancer - Observation Car
Just remember it will not handle 31" curves, 36" min.
My HWE is a a great littls set and makes random appearances on the club layout, my only complaint is that the air whistle does not like TPC control but functions well using the MTH handheld.
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My Hogworts is a pretty good puller.
I've had enough cars behind it that I've pulled the tender off of the track in a 36" corner. I'm planning on adding some balast to the tender to help prevent this.
I never did like Rudolph; but, if there's a Donner, then there should be a Rudolph. Donner arrived in 1939, in the same revision that added Rudolph, replacing Donder, who, along with Blitzen, in turn replaced the original Dunder and Blixem in 1823.
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Bob Nelson
Well, I had a chance to run my complete set on the club large layout last weekend and everything ran great! No problems pulling. I let it go for about an hour at moderate speed and the engine was only slightly warm, so I guess the motor was not straining too much. I should mention that the main headlight was a golden yellow LED while the two lanterns that rest below on the frame, were of the superbright blue-ish hue variety. This did not bother me, but I thought going with the more incandecent look for the lanterns would have been nicer.
I asked one of the sales reps at the Lionel booth at Trainfest what he thought the prospects were of a Rudolph car being made. He said he thought it was more likely than not and should be coming soon. Keep in mind this was an opinion and not a sure thing.
Seems odd that Lionel did not do the names of the cars to match the correct order for a passenger train. Then again, this would not be the first time Lionel has overlooked what others might think obvious.
Does your Santa Flyer have an electronic whistle or an air whistle ?
The catalog says electronic but I think one of the club members said his was air.
It's an air whistle.
Here are some pictures of the Santa flyer in action pulling the NPC passenger cars and an assortment of Christmas cars too. Also the NPC passengers with a NYC hudson. This is my first attempt at posting a photo so I'm hoping this turns out. I did it two ways as a test.
http://www.kodakgallery.com/imaging-site/services/doc/5152:812578593309/jpeg/BG
Can't seem to get more than one picture to post that comes up as a picture instead of a link, so.... here's some more links
http://www.kodakgallery.com/imaging-site/services/doc/5008:335658593309/jpeg/SM
http://www.kodakgallery.com/imaging-site/services/doc/5014:141578593309/jpeg/SM
http://www.kodakgallery.com/imaging-site/services/doc/5369:220678593309/jpeg/SM
Hope you like them.
My Santa Flyer, Expansion Set and Blitzen came today. The rest come tomorrow. My family is gonna flip out when I set them up. I have a wall-mounted track that runs around the living room and dining room.
Another thing Lionel did that is odd is that the NPC Passenger Expansion Set has Christmas numbers on the cars (1223, 1224, 1225) and the rest of the passenger cars they released since then do not. Lionel didn't think this set through very well. Or, maybe it is some complicated covert effort to avoid copyright or trademark infringements.
I started collecting these passenger cars when they first started them back a few years ago. I started with the NPC Berkshire since it was the nicest looking red christmas engine they had at the time.The numbers appear only on the 3 cars because they are reproductions of the Postwar 2400 series passenger cars. There is no number on the short vista dome (unlike the Elizabethtown 2400 car) because the vista dome was an afterthought add-on and was not part of the original set. IMHO this is a VERY impressive train when seen in its entirety. I was disappointed that I had to put them all back in their boxes for yet another Christmas. I don't have the space for a large enough Christmas layout to really do this train justice. To really see it you would need at least a 12 - 16 foot long straight away so you could see them running. I also have the NPC Green Hudson, NPC dockside switcher, and NPC General. I bought the General to pull these cars, but it has a hard time pulling more than 3 of them on a flat surface, so it is pretty much relegated to a siding and doesn't do much. The Green Hudson is the freight engine and the docksider performs switching duties. I'm thinking a 16 x 12 layout for Christmas would be awesome... getting clearance for said layout will probably take a minor miracle! Post pics of the NPC Santa Flyer with the passenger cars. I would love to see them!
I didn't know Lionel produced a NPC green Hudson. Could you please post a close up photo and identifying information such as the Lionel product number and the year produced? Thanks.
trestrainfan I didn't know Lionel produced a NPC green Hudson. Could you please post a close up photo and identifying information such as the Lionel product number and the year produced? Thanks.
Thanks for the update.
I thought you might have been talking about the green Mikado, but I wanted to make sure.
I tried to find the NPC Berkshire but ended up getting both Holiday Mikados.
I have all 8 of the passenger cars and here is a few quick photos of a test run with the red engine.
I set up the Christmas scene after Thanksgiving in my office. I did run the North Pole Central freight set and the North Pole Central passenger set on separate tracks. Due to space limitation, I must use O-27 track in order to have more than a two loop layout. The 4-4-2 NPC engine did not pull the entire NPC string of passenger cars very well. The NPC freight car set operated fine with the 4-4-2. I used a 2037 to pull the passenger cars and it did quite well.
I recently gave the NPC freight set to my grandson and made up a Christmas freight using the 2037. I am now using a Williams to pull the NPC passenger cars and it works well.
As much as MTH copies Lionel, it is beyond me why a Lionel Rudolph NPC passenger car is not available. On the freight set we see an elf chasing the red nosed reindeer in a gondola. Who owns Rudolph anyway?
Wikipedia explains:
The story is owned by The Rudolph Company, L.P. and has been sold in numerous forms including a popular song, a television specisl (done in stop motion animation), and a feature film. Character Arts, LLC manages the licensing for the Rudolph Company, L.P. Although the story and song are not public domain, Rudolph has become a figure of Christmas folklore.
I'm trying this again, hope it works
No problems pulling, glad to report.
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