How Many Athearn Cars do you have?

[Anonymous]

For a company who produced what some might consider a low end product I am guessing many of us have a considerable number of Athearn cars running our rails. I'm still counting!

[Anonymous]

I've got more than a few Athearn cars. Mainly because when I started in HO I couldn't afford anything else, now I'm on the look-out for the last few specific cars to complete my fleet - especially a 5-unit double stack car (the blue box kit version, not the megabucks RTR version!). Hoping to pick up another set or two of Impacks - they seem to be planning another production run this year judging by the Walthers website.

[BentnoseWillie]

Not as many as I had - I'd guess fewer than 20 out of a "fleet" of 60ish.

Last year I sold off around 60 cars in a purge of cars that didn't fit my road anymore, and a lot of older Athearn stuff went in that. Fergus, if you bought used stuff from Jack at the Truro or Dartmouth shows in the last year, you probably have something from my fleet! [:)]

While many standard Athearn models have been surpassed by later releases, they're still a great value. I kept most of the modern 50' boxcars I had, and recently got more of the PS5344 with wire grabirons, and what they label as the "Railbox" boxcar. I watch for their other modern 50' boxcars used for various projects.

[Anonymous]

I've got over 500 pieces of rolling stock from many different manufacturers, including Athearn. I'm not sure how many of them are Athearn, though.

[Anonymous]

About 30 or 40.

RMax

[Anonymous]

No freight, No locos but have ten older passenger cars.

[Martin4]

97 Athearn cars out of a roster of 398 freight cars. Only 2 of those Athearn are RTR and I wi***hey someday offer the same detail quality in kit form.

Martin
Québec City

[dharmon]

Almost twenty. For a long time they made up the bulk of my rolling stock. Now it's a pretty even number of Athearn, Walthers and MDC kits.

[AggroJones]

Some where between 160-180. I haven't looked back to count exactly how many.

[orsonroy]

I've got far fewer Athearn cars than I did ten years ago, mostly due to the high quality and accuracy of their competition, and due to the fact that I'm looking for more realism in my steam-era freight car fleet. I think Athearn is a fantastic deal for beginners, but not so hot for advanced modelers. Athearn's cars were nice during the 1960s-1980s, but we now have manufacturers like Bowser, Accurail, Red Caboose, Life Like Proto, Intermountain, Branchline, Tichy, F&C, Westerfield, Sunshine, Stewart and BLI, who all have more accurate (and better looking) freight cars for similar prices.

I'm down to about 30-40 Athearn twin hoppers, and less than five each of their flats, cabooses and passenger cars. I do own ten of their Genesis 2-8-2s, but no diesels.

[CP5415]

I have about 75 cars to date.
28 locomotives to date as well

Gordon

[lupo]

around 30 - 40, I think them nice to build,
I once held a Modelling party , I give all the guests a Athearn Kit , beer and chips and we all sat around the table building, great fun and it is quite something different than playing Monopoly or Risk

[michealfarley]

Around 175. For durability, price, and quality; you can't and hopefully never will beat an Athearn. BTW these cars are pulled around the room by around 75 Athearn locomotives. I hope to continue to purchase their product, regardless of where the hobby shop gets them from.

Micheal Farley
Fargo, ND

[Anonymous]

I have close to 200 Athearn rolling stock. I started buying their kits 20yrs ago. When I first started getting them, they were some of the best for the price on the market. They are easy to modify to run very well. Metal wheels, weight, and Kadee #5 make Athearn go a long way. [:)]

They are fun to weather and detail. I have a couple of their newer RTR cars, but only because the price was very right. I think RTR takes away from the hobby in general.

I have a lot of Accurail and Intermountain, etc. kits as well. In many ways these kits are better than my Athearn kits, but that doesn't mean I don't like my older Athearn kits too. I do, however, tend to buy other brand kits now instead because they are a better starting point for about the same price.

Warren

[cacole]

Well over 200 if you count the ones that were custom decorated by other companies, such as BevBel. Despite statements to the contrary, I wonder what will happen to Athearn now that it has been sold ?? In case you haven't heard this news, check the lead headline on MR's home page.

[Anonymous]

I love (I'm afraid soon I'll be saying "loved") the Athearn Ready to Roll series. I own several of these cars.

[Anonymous]

I will say that I have built a considerable number of Athearn Kits. Now, I count about 64 Athearn cars in my rebuilt fleet. I have about 4 more to get before I have to explore one hobby shop yet for more athearns.

I have begun to keep one of my resolutions in organizing my collection. Walthers are about 12 peices, Accurail roughly 14, Branchline 4, P2k's 10, Atlas 6, Trainmaster and Spectrum 1 (a Baby trainmaster needs completing) I did not include the intermountain because those are ready to run cars for a very specific niche in my fleet.

I dont know if this is a typical colection or not, but it is a work of 2 years and counting.

[AntonioFP45]

30 plus freight cars. Am currently removing roofwalks from all 50 ft. boxcars, filling in the holes and airbrushing with Modelflex paints. I always purchase and install the PROTO metal wheel sets. I will continue to purchase Athearn freight cars. They're pretty decent and look great with minor detailing. The competition's cars are more detailed, but so are the prices.

Got rid of all my 72ft. Athearn passenger cars as the Rivorossi's are the correct 85ft. length and look much better. I will be purchasing the Walthers pass. cars as they look really nice!

Locomotives: Planning on one more Santa Fe FP45 cowl and only because Athearn is the only manufacturer that makes a decent one. I will be looking more towards Kato, Atlas & Stewart Hobbies. These units draw very LOW AMPS & seem to work well with the Soundtraxx DCC decoders. (I've read that most HO Soundtraxx decoders are "allergic" to high amps!)

I'll consider a Genesis unit only after I see one or two in a test run at a hobby shop. My wife's cousin bought an SD75M, and to my surprise, the trucks on this unit were pretty noisy! I guess I've become pickier as the Stewart Units spoiled me with their incredibly quiet running!

[AltonFan]

In my HO stuff, I've proabably got a dozen or so including some passenger cars. (Some of the freight cars are Athearn cars painted by a third party painter.) I also have one Athearn locomotive and three or four Stewart locomotives with Athearn drives.

The four-truck heavy duty flat car was my favorite.

[CBQ_Guy]

Gawd, since Athearn was the backbone of probably most of the layouts built up until the past ten years, the oldsters in the hobby probably have a majority of Athearn rolling stock in their fleets. I got back into the hobby after being out for around 15 years, about a dozen years ago now, and the vast majority of the cars I bought were the old standard "blue box" kits.

I'm guessing here, but I must have something like 600-700 pieces of rolling stock packed away until I get the new basement layout started, and I'll bet well over half are Athearn. The rest are mostly kits by all the others out there, but I've picked up a fair amount of the so called RTR stuff here and there the past few years. Luckily, I have acquired most of this stuff before the spiraling cost virus hit the hobby in recent years.

I'm keepin' and buildin' the Athearn stuff with no qualms whatsoever, I'm more of a model railroader than a railroad modeler, and also one of those low life "good enoughers". But so is Allen McClelland so at least I'm in good company!

[Anonymous]

lets see 1 2 3 ...............50 51 52 53 54............81 82 ...... 101 102 103 104 105........150
there you go 150.

[nfmisso]

Frt 95/677 approx.
Pass 23/73
Caboose 11/23
diesel 21/165 (includes RPP shells on Athearn)
steam 2/43

[Hawks05]

i know for sure i have at least 7. but the rest of my stuff i bought with out boxes from a guy at a show. i think all of that or most anyways is Athearn. so probably 90% of my rolling stock is and one locomotive.

[Anonymous]

I have so many Athearn pieces of rolling stock, engines and passenger cars that I can't count them on my hands & toes. I bought the 1st one in 1972 & I still have it in the box. Happy New Year from the frozen tundra of eastern Washington. Charlie

[Anonymous]

Never owned an Athern product on purpose. May have gotten one or two out of the LHS dead pile for weathering or air brush practice targets. Wrong era and poor relative quality are the reasons.

I don't imagine the recent purchase of the company will result in many changes for the retail hobbyist. Athern has its position as an entry-level manufacturer firmly established. Hopefully the new situation will result in an expanded product line more interesting to advanced modelers.

[sparkingbolt]

I have 15 Kits that are assembled and on the rails, another 11 kits waiting to be assembled, and 1 RTR caboose. so 27 constitutes less than half my fleet. I am looking for SP 40' flatcars. Or anything else in SP for that matter. Dan

[Anonymous]

I finally got around to it and I don't have as many as I thought, Final count is 90 which is about 50% of my total, not including one "Mike" [V]

Where did those diesels come from?

[Anonymous]

I have over 200 metal Globe, metal Athearn and plastic Athean freight cars. Some are still on the layout, but are being replaced with high end detailed kits. I do have some Accurail, Walthers and MDC wood side cars going on the layout, but only after new free-standing details and full brake rigging have been added. The rest of the fleet comprises detailed resin kits.

Keep steaming.

Tom

[Anonymous]

most of my fleet of about 175 cars....I am guessing about 90 or so. They were at the time extremely reasonable in price when I was just getting into the hobby. They had their niche.......maybe not for the top end modeler but for most everyone else what an easy way to make a fleet of cars in a hurry.

[EMDSD40]

i have close to 600 freight and passenger cars and 250 diesel locomotives. 75% are athearn products. i have had very good luck with their engines and have spent many hours building the "kits". all have kadee couplers and various levels of detail. only one problem to mention- the genesis sd75 locomotives i received had bad trucks, athearn sent replacement trucks quickly and the matter was resolved. many of my engines are painted in PRR livery. for the money and better than two decades service you can't beat there line. SOOOO we'll see what Horizon Hobbies brings to the table