Did anyone else buy the $39 Broadway Limited bag of "mystery stuff"?

[dknelson]

As some of you might recall from this posting of mine from years ago

http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/87442.aspx?sort=ASC&pi314=1

I am a model train junkman, hopelessly addicted to buying up bargain bags of stuff at hobby shops and from commercial companies, including the old 3 for the price of one "Funeral Sale" and $10 "Roundhouse Rubble" bags from AHM, as well as the $99 boxes from Train World.  Recently Broadway Limited emailed me about a $39 one pound bag of mystery stuff that they'd send (It is also advertised on their website although not easy to find) so of course I bit immediately and it arrived promptly on UPS.  By the way the $39 included shipping and handling.  It arrived yesterday.

Unlike the mystery bags I usually buy, this one has a lot of small gears, tons of diesel and passenger car side frames, gear towers, speaker covers and other small stuff which, without a parts catalog, is all but impossible to trace to a particular Broadway Limited offering.   I think it is fair to say that a pretty considerable portion of the promised one pound is in the form of this small stuff which might as well have been swept up from the shop floor.   Perhaps I would find it of greater use or interest if I was the owner of a fleet of Broadway Limited offerings.

The actual recognizable train parts are pretty skimpy.  Two frames, painted blue (Conrail?) for some sort of EMD diesel, maybe an SD.  A tender shell from a Pennsy T1.  A loco boiler and cab for a Santa Fe large steam engine.  A tender shell also Santa Fe and looks like it is from a 4-8-4.  A dozen or more full width diaphragms from SP Daylight passenger cars.  the bottom to a steam locomotive boiler.  Various and sundry parts some of which are going to take detailed knowledge of prior Broadway Limited offerings to ID, if I can get that interested. 

While the price was right particularly since they did not charge shipping and handling, I cannot say I found the bargain bag interesting enough to make me a repeat buyer, but I am interested in seeing what other guys got (an adult version of kids comparing their haul after Trick or Treating at Halloween for possible trade purposes).  

Dave Nelson

[selector]

I did a little thought experiment when this was announced.  I imagined myself opening my eagerly anticipated 'surprise' package, reaching inside and extracting a U23 shell from, I dunno, Rock Island or something, and thinking to myself...what the heck am I gonna do with this?  Then a truck for a pre-1900 boxcar.  Nope, that's not gonna work either.  A gear box for....something or other.  Not sure. 

I deleted the email.

[dknelson]

davidmbedard

What did you expect?  

David B

 

Well Dave, I guess I expected, or hoped for, perhaps a steam loco drive train (frame, drivers, side rods and valve gear and piston casting for example), more in the way of shells of engines or tenders or rolling stock, lightly damaged.    I enjoy kitbashing and also enjoy challenging repair jobs, and I guess I was hoping for more fodder for that kind of thing.   If there had been more promising material for repair or bashing I probably would have bought more of the bags from Broadway Limited in the hope of getting stuff that could be applied to the first bag, and so on into infinity.....   Small nylon gears and steel screws and a half dozen trailing truck castings (less wheels) just don't give me much to work with.

 

This is no knock on Broadway Limited.  They shipped what was advertised, no question about it, and if I were to price the things I did get, I am sure I got a deal.  It was offered as a pig in a poke and I bought it on that basis.  I guess I just hoped for more based on prior experience, that is all.

 

The Trainworld bargain box for example consisted mostly of three entire steam locomotives (PRR K4, Santa Fe 4-8-4,  NYC 4-8-4, all Bachmann) that did not run, plus a European train set (engine and 3 passenger cars) that had some damage.   I got my money's worth in parts, and I have not given up on the steamers either.

 

The old AHM Roundhouse Rubble would be a box of entire steam locomotives but perhaps not always a tender, or the cab was cracked off, or the valve gear had been bent or damaged; a few diesels that did not run well and needed motor work; a bag of freight car trucks with salt water damage; a structure or two with damaged packaging or missing parts.  It was quite a deal actually and I enjoyed trying to make the stuff run.   I bought many such Roundhouse Rubble boxes and sometimes what was missing from one box would turn up in another.  Positively addictive!  

 

 I remember in one box I got a complete cab forward but the tender had no trucks, a complete NKP Berkshire but the pilot and headlight had snapped off, a tender to the IHB 0-8-0, tender less trucks and boiler/cab casting for the Y6b 2-8-8-2, and two FM C liners both painted Pennsy where the unpowered trucks were cracked from the frame, plus about six C liner shells painted NYC.  There may have been an 0-4-0 Dockside thrown in as well, probably with no couplers.  All that for $10, and with a  little work and aftermarket parts from AHM I got every locomotive to run.  

 

Another box had 3 USRA Pacifics (one with drivers that had broken spokes), a Bowker 2-4-0 missing only couplers, plus another Bowker locomotive less tender, a Reno 4-4-0, and more Docksides and more FM C liners, plus some EMD GP18 shells.   And it took some mingling of parts to get one USRA Pacific that ran well and was intact, but that was exactly what I loved doing.   But just to have usable USRA cabs and boiler fronts probably paid for the box.

 

Dave Nelson 

[cacole]

A friend has ordered two of them, but they haven't been delivered yet.  It'll be interesting to see what he receives.

[zugmann]

I took a chance on it (figured it was at best a gamble).  Well, the house won that one.  Absolute crap.  A piece of a SW shell, a piece of a steam locomotive shell, a bunch of F unit windows, some single note chimers, a hopper car shell,daylight passenger car diaphragms,  a bunch of sidetruck frame pieces, assorted gears and sprockets (seriously...?), a tangled web of handrails, and to top it all off, they include some On30 parts that accounted for about half the weight, despite no mention of including anything other than HO or N.  Another person I know got one had the same pile of crap (with heavy O scale stuff added). 

And don't bother posting about it on BLI's facebook - they will just delete the comment and ban you from posting.

Serious fail on BLI's part, in my opinion.

[NittanyLion]

The Box of Stuff they did a few years ago was much better. I didn't go in this time, but did last round.

I came out with a mostly functional DC F7A and a Hudson that is drawing current but won't move.  I'm too afraid to open it up and see what's wrong.  There's two more F7As and at least one B that I got out of it that are complete but don't work.

[LensCapOn]

NittanyLion

 and a Hudson that is drawing current but won't move.  

I'll pay shipping so you won't have to, you know, have it laying about.

 

 

Just trying to help.

[zugmann]

An update. 

BLI made good on this, so it's all square.   Won't chance another grab bag, but will but other stuff from them if I see something I want.

[Kyle]

Do they still sell AHM Roundhouse Rubble boxes or Trainworld boxes?  If so, how much? I don't model in the steam era, but they would be great locomotive to test weather techniques, and fixing the parts, and possibly modifying them.

[dknelson]

Kyle

Do they still sell AHM Roundhouse Rubble boxes or Trainworld boxes?  If so, how much? I don't model in the steam era, but they would be great locomotive to test weather techniques, and fixing the parts, and possibly modifying them.

AHM is long gone, as are their Funeral Sale and Roundhouse Rubble deals.  I do not follow the Trainworld ads closely enough these days to know if they offer the boxes of stuff from time to time; perhaps someone else can chime in on that issue.  It was always a very small box in their very large ads.

 

Keep in mind that AHM (which imported Rivarossi as well as other European makes of trains) had a large parts catalog and presumably made money from parts, so in that sense selling derelict trains not only removed an unsaleable item from their shelves, but probably made money for them from the sale of parts, on the assumption that a person might pay to repair what they would never have purchased anyway absent the "bargain" circumstances.  I know that was true in my case -- they did not miss out on the sale of a new in box cab forward or NKP Berkshire because I had no actual interest in those engines, but was interested in seeing if I could make a basket case into a working model.

Dave Nelson 

[rrinker]

 They certainly did have a large catalog of parts - there's a guy who frequents the local trains shows and is known as the "IHC Guy" - he has multiple tables full of boxes of every kind of spare part imaginable for AHM/IHC locos and cars. Need a replacement pin for the truck on a Rivarossi passenger car? He's got'em. Need a drive shaft for the Reno/Inyo/Bowker? He has them. Traction tires for a Rivarossi Berkshire? Yup.

Not sure how he ended up with all this stuff, or where he's even from, but he always attracts a crowd.

                    --Randy

 

[maxman]

I don't put coins in a slot machine because that's foolish.

I don't buy lottery tickets because I think that's foolish.

I don't buy $39 bags of stuff advertised as junk because....well, you get the picture.

[NittanyLion]

LensCapOn

NittanyLion

 and a Hudson that is drawing current but won't move.  

I'll pay shipping so you won't have to, you know, have it laying about.

 

 

Just trying to help.

Some day I'll get over my fear of breaking it and take it apart to see what's wrong with it.  I heard that it's a pretty straightforward fix from someone else that got one in their box too

[hon30critter]

Maxman:

Ya can't win the lottery if you don't have a ticket! OK so I'm a dreamer - give me a break.

Seriously, I think that any company with half intelligent people would be smarter than to sell a pile of useless stuff, especially for $39.00! Talk about a sure fired way to turn off customers.

Dave

[zugmann]

maxman

I don't put coins in a slot machine because that's foolish.

I don't buy lottery tickets because I think that's foolish.

I don't buy $39 bags of stuff advertised as junk because....well, you get the picture.

I came out ahead in this one.  Gotta be in it to win it.