Sir Madog Bdewoody In a sense you can already do this. Buy a cheap IHC locomotive with the appropriate wheel arrangement and then cut off or remove unwanted details. Most steam details are still avaiable and can be easily added to create the loco of your choice. Also Bowser offers steam loco kits of several of the most popular wheel arrangements that again you can customize. Bob - that´s history already. IHC is out of business and Bowser does not make those kits any longer - leaving a deep gap for those aficionados of Pennsy steam power.
Bdewoody In a sense you can already do this. Buy a cheap IHC locomotive with the appropriate wheel arrangement and then cut off or remove unwanted details. Most steam details are still avaiable and can be easily added to create the loco of your choice. Also Bowser offers steam loco kits of several of the most popular wheel arrangements that again you can customize.
In a sense you can already do this. Buy a cheap IHC locomotive with the appropriate wheel arrangement and then cut off or remove unwanted details. Most steam details are still avaiable and can be easily added to create the loco of your choice.
Also Bowser offers steam loco kits of several of the most popular wheel arrangements that again you can customize.
Bob - that´s history already. IHC is out of business and Bowser does not make those kits any longer - leaving a deep gap for those aficionados of Pennsy steam power.
How about hunting and gathering them on evilbay?----there is always that route----
Any argument carried far enough will end up in Semantics--Hartz's law of rhetoric Emerald. Leemer and Southern The route of the Sceptre Express Barry
I just started my blog site...more stuff to come...
http://modeltrainswithmusic.blogspot.ca/
BdewoodyIn a sense you can already do this. Buy a cheap IHC locomotive with the appropriate wheel arrangement and then cut off or remove unwanted details. Most steam details are still avaiable and can be easily added to create the loco of your choice. Also Bowser offers steam loco kits of several of the most popular wheel arrangements that again you can customize.
IRONROOSTERThe problem with steam is the large number of variations in the boilers, tenders, domes, valve gear, piping, etc. The market is just not there to support the investment in tooling and inventory. There are companies, Greenway is one, that make/carry parts in brass, but you can plan on quite a bit of scratch building to get a specific locomotive even if their parts match your prototype. And the cost is relatively high.
And herein lies our problem. Since cost is the prime issue anymore we can now sit and buy only what is available. At the lowest price possible.
I don't see how the cost factor should be the issue here--we have people pre-ordering $600.00 locomotives now----surely to goodness our market should be able to handle the investment in time and $$$ to do this----come now. Yes, the market is fragmented but we should not allow this to get in the way of providing opportunities for those who would want a kit to bash together----
We need people with imagination and the vision to do this----not just the billfold---the cry of "But It Costs Money!" is getting rather boring here---
This was tried many years ago. IIRC there was a 4-4-0 and a 2-6-0 in On3. They were basic and the modeler would add details. I don't think they were very successful.
The problem with steam is the large number of variations in the boilers, tenders, domes, valve gear, piping, etc. The market is just not there to support the investment in tooling and inventory. There are companies, Greenway is one, that make/carry parts in brass, but you can plan on quite a bit of scratch building to get a specific locomotive even if their parts match your prototype. And the cost is relatively high.
Enjoy
Paul
It IS a great idea..............and was tried by a company many years ago. I can't remember if it was Arbour Models or someone else though. They had a generic frame for a smaller engine (2-6-0/4-6-0) and it came as 3 kits: boiler, mechanism & tender. The boiler could be made into several different wagon top configurations with many types of domes, cabs & appliances. The mechanism could be varied too with different valve gear & cylinders.
The problem was it was expensive at the time and took a lot more time & skill than most folks wanted to put into an engine. Personally I thought it was made of crappy too-soft materials.
Most of us building steam kits at the time chose better quality mechanisms and parts & scratch built or just modified Tyco/Mantua, Bowser & Varney engines.
We are in an age where many modelers have difficulty installing KD couplers or assembling Athearn Blue Box kits so you figure it out. I've worked in several hobby shops and seen, heard & experienced people intimitaded and uncapable of the most basic things like changing out wheelsets and using an NMRA gauge to check them out.
Bowser, the last hold-out for quality steam kits just recently gave it up due to lack of response to their kits.
My 2¢,
Roger Huber
I think it would be great if there were several generic frames/platforms from which to chose, and then to be able to add 'details' like the right boiler with firebox, the domes where you need 'em and the right shape and size. The problem might be with the extras, like a feedwater pump, or the feedwater heater, or the air-pumps and shrouds. You get the idea. A person would have to be adept at drilling and applying appliances of all kinds, piping and other ancillary details.
There would be a sizable market, maybe, but I'm afraid I would have to rely largely on an RTR market. Those who are skilled could probably do very well if they could order a kit from generic and then specific stock.
-Crandell
Hi, Folks.
Longtime reader, first time poster. Wouldn't it be cool if model manufacturers could make a steam loco of any particular wheel arrangement and have the boiler and tender set up so that you could add and arange appliances, smokebox doors,pilots,etc. specific to your road?
Everyone builds either a popular one-off {SP Daylight, NW class J} or a VERY generic,and sometimes, not very accurate model. You have to live with what they sell. Kitbash: I've done some with some fair results and some not so good. Brass: I have had some in the past. But who can REALLY afford it.I want a Central of Georgia "Big Apple" 4-8-4. Oriental made a limited run of 100 or so, saw one last year on E-bay...It went for almost two grand! That much money for a 25 year old locomotive with an open-frame motor and straight dc!
Our hobby has progressed by leaps and bounds in the last 10 years, Especially in the steam department.I feel like this might be the next step.
Let me know what you think.