I recently purchased an old Hallmark brass VO1000. This is one of the early Baldwin VO1000s with the round front grill and side radiators.
Does anyone know when Hallmark produced this version, how many & if it followed any particular prototype?
Mine is painted Northern Pacific but, while NP rostered 28 VO1000s, none were of the round front radiator so not sure what to paint it.
Larry B
Hallmark brough in VO-1000's in '71-'72 by KMT and '82 by Samhongsa. The '82 ones came in an early and late version. I believe the '71-'72 ones did, also.
I've got one of the '82's in the late style, and it is one of my faves. Very well crafted and runs beautifully. It's my impression that mine was modeled after a Santa Fe version.
I wouldn't be shocked to find yours, too, was based on a Santa Fe version. They had upwards of 60 of them. And Hallmark was pretty committed to modeling Santa Fe.
You also might find that yours is very close to other VO-1000's. Through research. Then you can decide if you want to modify yours to match. I know that SP&S had a couple of early VO-1000's. You might have a look at the latest issue of "The Northwest's own Railway" (Summer 2016) and see if you can model #30 or #31. Those have the oval intakes on the nose.
Ed
Thanks for the info on the Hallmarks. Mine is one of the 1982 versions.
I have the Summer 2016 issue of the SP&S magazine and have studied the article. I model SP&S in addition to the NP so may try to model the #30 0r 31. The SP&S engines have some differences to the Hallmark model but nothing a little superdetailing can't cure.
The first one of NPs VO660s had the oval front grill but none of their VO1000s did.
Mine is aimed towards becoming SP&S #32. It's a shame to chop off those 4 high exhaust stacks--they're great looking. But not on #32.