TYCO.
A name to remember to forget. Sound like a song.
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I still have my Tyco Baldwin RF16s packed away somewhere. They ran fine at first, but after a few years (I only had the trains up at Christmas) they started running poorly. By the mid-1980s, the drives were shot, and I'd retire them. A shame, since nobody had an RF16 then. Before long, I'd found that a Bachmann train-set F9 drive would slip into the Baldwin shell quite easily...after I'd trimmed the drive's mounting tabs. Still haven't fitted Kadees to the pair, mainly because I don't want to screw up the Johnson Wax paint job. I know, the Bachmann drive isn't much better...but it's reliable, and parts are easier to come by. In fact, both of the F9s were about five bucks apiece!
Oh, and as to the freight cars...once you've replaced the wheelsets with metal ones, body-mounted the couplers, and added additional weight, they're fine. As much as I like free-standing grab irons, I find them prone to bending or breakage. That's why the majority of my rolling stock doesn't have them.
"Tyco Toys is a division of the Mattel toy company. Not to be confused with Tyco International, with which Tyco Toys has never been affiliated."
Unquote
Until being purchased by Mattel Tyco Toys was indeed part of the Mantua company.If memory serves me correctly Mantua was origonally a division of the The Tyler (Tyco) company.
FYI- the two Tyco covered hoppers both used Athearn shells,Thevreason I know this is because I installed the Athearn floors in all 20 of my Tyco hoppers.(paid a buck a piece for them when K-Mart quit selling trains at christmas)
Tyco was a money pit draining funds from very good Athearn Blue Box engines at the time. That is one item that should never have gotten into the family. But hey, what did we know?
They were good for destruction for it's own sake. Now that Tyco has been dead these few decades never again will junkers run on my layout. It will run well or get sold. LOL.
My dad got a Mantua brass 0-4-0 camelback swicther in 1947, it ran better than his Varney locomotives. In the late 50's I did research on USRA locomotives. I found that Mantua's model of the B&O 4-6-2 was based on the USRA Pacific. I also found that the frame and running gear of Mantua's 2-8-2 kit, which I had measured were the same as the USRA Makado. I ordered a 4-6-2 boiler from Mantua and found it screwed together with the Makado frame and it ran great. I wrote a letter to Mantua asking for two kits consiting of the 2-8-2 frame and running gear and 4-6-2 boiler and details. Mantua sent the two kits, to my knowleadge the only like kits they made.
Have fun, Rob
After spending a few years with a Marx Commodore Vanderbuilt train set, about 1954 I got myself down to an LHS with a small (I may have been 9 or 10)handfull of life savings and purchased:
1: Mantua streetcar kit
2:Mantua train set with 12 15" radius track sections, one 9" straight, one terminal section, a power supply that was about a 2 amp AUTOTRANSFORMER, Booster 0-4-0, flat, gondola, and bobber caboose. The rolling stock had the old Mantua loop and hook couplers. Oh yah, the set also had a roll-on rerailer and a little spring uncoupler ramp. I think I still have the motor, drivers, main rods, cylinders, and crossheads from that loco.
3: Mantua kit for a B&O twin bay hopper. To be assembled by RIVETING the components together.
4: Mantua kit for a tank car, also riveted together, and both being beyond the skills I had at that age.
I still have a large number of Mantua and Tyco steam and rtr locos, but nothing in their diesels, and only a couple of the cars. Even found an NIB Mantua Shifter kit recently in an antique salvage store. Blue box bottom with a basket weave pattern on the hinged top. The small parts bag even has a pair of the old hook and loop couplers. The die cast Zamac arch bar truck frames have disintegrated though.
Once laid out a string of flex track on the basement floor, and stung out all 68 freight and MOW cars I had at the time behing one of the kit built 2-8-2s. It pulled the whole string. And that was before Delring RP-25 trucks and wheel sets.
I also in the last couple years bought both the new Mantua 2-6-6-2s, and the 0-6-0 Camelback. Decent looking and so far, running. I still have a project to use some of their 53" drivers on a milled frame combined with an old AHM 0-8-0 boiler to make a nice heavy duty 0-10-0.
All the steam locos I got from the company(s) seem to run just fine, and the 4-6-2 is supposed to be a decent reproduction of the B&O P-7. Never was impressd by the diesels I've seen, and I used to want the Mantua Talgo Train, till about 8 years ago I found one in a Knic-Knack shop up in Houghton-Hancock. Didn't buy it. I am not too interested in tinplate.
The Tyco I am most familiar with nowadays is a large multi-national corporation that seems to be engaged in purchasing companies that make electronic connectors and relays.
stebbycentral wrote: I have a brother who in the 70's and 80's was in the medical supply business. There was a company, also named Tyco, that made small medical instruments for doctor's offices. Things like stethoscopes, thermometers, scales, and those gizmos the doctor uses to examine your ears and throat. I have been following some of the links in this thread back to the company history, and I wonder if the medical equipment company was in fact a branch of the same company as the model train company. About the only clue I can find is where it states that towards the end, the firm branched out into "other businesses".One similarity, according to my brother, was that the medical supply company's products were junk as well...
I have a brother who in the 70's and 80's was in the medical supply business. There was a company, also named Tyco, that made small medical instruments for doctor's offices. Things like stethoscopes, thermometers, scales, and those gizmos the doctor uses to examine your ears and throat. I have been following some of the links in this thread back to the company history, and I wonder if the medical equipment company was in fact a branch of the same company as the model train company. About the only clue I can find is where it states that towards the end, the firm branched out into "other businesses".
One similarity, according to my brother, was that the medical supply company's products were junk as well...
As Rosanna Rosannadanna would say; "Nevermind." I just answered my own question on Wikipedia, which says this about the subject:
Tyco International it appears was the parent company of the medical supply company Tyco Healthcare.
We now return you to our regular programming...
I have figured out what is wrong with my brain! On the left side nothing works right, and on the right side there is nothing left!
jecorbett wrote:Tyco was entry level quality. It was OK for newbies who simply hadn't acquired an eye for better quality. That was certainly the case for me. I can't imagine why anyone would want to acquire old Tyco equipment for their layouts today but if you look on e-bay, you will find there are apparently some Tyco collectors. One man's trash...
BTW: A good number of the old Tyco, Bachmann, IHC, and Life Like strutures show up on ebay. Some of them are over priced, but in a number of auctions they go reasonably cheap. The stuctures I would especially look at are the ones where the owners say there are some scratches, light damage or mssing parts.........and the sellers start with really low bids.
As stated before, imho, any modeler with basic detailing and weathering talents can change these types of structures into realistic looking creations.
"I like my Pullman Standards & Budds in Stainless Steel flavors, thank you!"
TA462 wrote:Really??? I always thought the slot cars came first. You learn something new everyday.
Here's a bit of HISTORY on Tyco/Mantua.
Wayne
One thing to keep in mind is anything Tyco you buy now is going to be at least...what, maybe 25 years old??
Mantua started making kits in the early days in the hobby (1930's?) and at one time their couplers were very commonly used (Kadee's didn't come along til about 1960.) Mantua steam loco kits go back at least to the early fifties and were considered good for the time. John Allen had at least one (a 2-8-2) on his GD Line. Tyco (TYler COmpany, from owner John Tyler) was originally the RTR version. Eventually Tyco made (or imported?) train set quality stuff for, well, train sets. The cars weren't bad but weren't great even for the time.
By the mid-1980's I think the Tyco brand name went away and just Mantua was out there, both RTR and kits. Mantua added Sagami can motors and enclosed gearboxes to their steam engines around 1990 and had retro-kits for repowering earlier engines. These engines tend to run pretty well. Some of their newer (1980's) introductions like their 4-4-2 and 2-6-6-2 were pretty well done.
Mantua was purchased by Model Power early in this decade, and now they're reissuing some engines with improved detailing and DCC-ready. I haven't tried one yet so don't know how good they are, but I sooner or later will probably get a 2-6-6-2 with tender and try it out.
Tyco was making trains long before the slot cars. I have a "Little Six" that I got in the '50s, and it was used before I bought it.
My late Dad bought me a Tyco Santa Fe set back in 1973. Locomotives were an F9 A-unit powered, with a B-unit dummy. A unit was equipped with the 3-pole "truck motor" running quality was terribly jerky. From that set I still have the green Santa Fe 50ft flat that has an imitation wooden deck. Funny thing is that it's a decent looking car, though there's no accurate prototype for it. I'm freelance-converting it into a heavily weathered SCL "M.O.W" car.
I kept the F unit shells as test subjects for my airbrush paint jobs but eventually got rid of them.
BTW: For those not aware, the Tyco GP20 had a great looking shell and the correct hood width. This unit made for a great project. MRR magazine had a good article back in the 1980s on how to modify and detail the GP20 shell.
Also some of the structures, such as the freight depot, had good potential. Easy to make them look realistic (installing glass on the windows, exterior weathering with flat finishes and India ink, adding details such as gutters and antennas.
I do rip up on Tyco, but appreciate that it was my first exposure to HO.
It just proves again that there are people who will collect anything.
I agree, it's money better saved or spent elsewhere, but if you come across a crate full of old cars for $5 at a flea market or yard sale, why not? The metal handrails from old tank cars can be recycled into grab irons, etc. Someone else mantioned here that the flatcars can be decent, and much cheaper than spending $40 on a kit, especially when you need many examples.
AntonioFP45 wrote:Quote from the late, great Chester Holley ( model railroad pioneer and close friend of the late Bill Walthers) T RAINSY OUC AN'TO PERATE!
Quote from the late, great Chester Holley ( model railroad pioneer and close friend of the late Bill Walthers)
T RAINS
Y OU
C AN'T
O PERATE!
LOL!!!1
That's funny! :)
I don't mean to bash Tyco, but the 'good period' was definitely before I got into trains. I never saw one of the metal frame steamers.
My reference point is Tyco train sets from the mid 1970s and on. These were plastic diesels and had the thin gear drives. Electrical pickup was rather minimal.
Not good, but bearable for a beginner, and the power packs will eventually be used for accessory power if needed.
As I said, the old rolling stock of the right length for my chosen period will do stand in duty until I have enough good car kits built to fill the roster. I cut the truck coupler mount off, install Kadees and modify the cars where necessary to get them up to minimum NMRA standards for operation.
They work OK. Some were early weathering projects, good practice, and I recommend this for anyone who wants to get started weathering, practice an cheap disposable cars before trying it on more expensive 'keepers'.
Their freight cars are fairly decent if you're willing to invest a little effort into upgrading them and since you can find them at almost any fleamarket in the country they make a good cheap starting point for kitbashing projects.
I also liked their buildings especially the Burger King and Pizza Hut both of which fit perfectly in my 1990-1999 timeframe on my layout.
As for their locos I agree with the majority of the board here they are junk.
Many of us got our start with TYCO products, but once their lack of quality was realised it became evident that you had to go with better equipment. I started with the Silver Streak set and was thrilled with it, still have memories but it didn't last long. The "Power-torque" drive fell apart in no time, that big gear that drove the wheels would wear through in a matter of weeks, it was a disaster. I wish I still had some more of my original Tyco stuff as it is collectible, and I've just been nostalgic lately. A good source for info is the Tyco Resources page accessed through Lycos-Tripod. It is a fun place ot visit and you can learn some history too.
I know Tyco is gone from the model railroad scene, once they relied on rediculous TV and toy related tie-ins it was time to go.