Rubber-band diesel engines broke too often from overheating. Good thing many of us got "free replacements" when we got our teeth-braces!
Conemaugh Road & Traction circa 1956
BLI's animated Water tower has to be a silly idea.
(My Model Railroad, My Rules)
These are the opinions of an under 35 , from the east end of, and modeling, the same section of the Wheeling and Lake Erie railway. As well as a freelanced road (Austinville and Dynamite City railroad).
When I was a kid, I had a "voice control" thing for my Lionels. It had a "microphone" that you would talk into. It wasn't really a microphone, just a momentary-off switch that would open on a bit of air pressure when you spoke into it. It interrupted the voltage to the track, thus triggering a cycle of the Lionel engine's "E-unit." So, if the train was running and you said "Stop," it would stop. Unfortunately, of course, the E-unit would then back up the engine on the next cycle, so to maintain the illusion you had to tell the microphone "Reverse" or something, although, of course, saying "Beer" or anything else would have the same effect.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
CSX_road_slug For "just plain bad" I nominate: Horn-hook (X2F) couplers!
For "just plain bad" I nominate: Horn-hook (X2F) couplers!
Ken,Those X2F couplers was needed in their day and when properly body mounted they worked quite well.
You see back then we had couplers,couplers every where that wouldn't mate with other brands and most worked quite poorly.
The X2F was a good idea at the time but,the X2F turned bad when companies like Tyco,Mantua,Life Like and other like manufacturers cheapen them and placed them on the trucks instead of the body.
We have crappy couplers on the market that's worst then the X2F.
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
I had both the vertical launch missile, complete with a gantry tower that pulled back and a crane to lower the missile on to its launch pad, and the flatcar mounted "tactical" missile that I could shoot across my layout and hit .... the exploding box car!
Far from being bad ideas, though, these were good toys that added play value to my Lionels. Is a giraffe car stupid? No, not if it brings a smile to the face of a child.
The Yard Dog track cleaning thing it had a round cotton roll in front to clean the rails not enought weight to clean.
Russell
IMHO any track/roadbed system that has propriatory fastners. Makes it difficult to interface with other manufacturers. Good for first company, bad for hobby.
Dave
Love those Tyco brand name cars, nicely painted and as a buyer for a grocery chain ( since retired ) I dealt with all of the companies listed. I may have to look some of them up next time I'm at a train show.
The car with the propeller on end. MR had ads for it. Could it have been AHM?
Bernd
New York, Vermont & Northern Rwy. - Route of the Black Diamonds
protolancer(at)kingstonemodelworks(dot)com
riogrande5761 wjstix A bad idea from the very early days was giving your railroad a silly name. Thankfully that died out in the '40's - maybe the last well known 'silly' model railroad name was John Allen's "gory and defeated" G&D Line. Now now, You're treading holy MR ground there with John Allen. He is worshipped, er, well respected by many. He did seem to be quite artistic from everything I've seen but to me it was in a Disney Land sort of way. Now there have been some realistic artists since then such as Mike Danneman etc. well I'm biased. He did a wonderful rendering of the D&RGW and scenery. I have to add that Rob Spangler has done some wonderful photo-realistic backdrops and scenery too in this day and age.
wjstix A bad idea from the very early days was giving your railroad a silly name. Thankfully that died out in the '40's - maybe the last well known 'silly' model railroad name was John Allen's "gory and defeated" G&D Line.
A bad idea from the very early days was giving your railroad a silly name. Thankfully that died out in the '40's - maybe the last well known 'silly' model railroad name was John Allen's "gory and defeated" G&D Line.
Now now, You're treading holy MR ground there with John Allen. He is worshipped, er, well respected by many. He did seem to be quite artistic from everything I've seen but to me it was in a Disney Land sort of way. Now there have been some realistic artists since then such as Mike Danneman etc. well I'm biased. He did a wonderful rendering of the D&RGW and scenery. I have to add that Rob Spangler has done some wonderful photo-realistic backdrops and scenery too in this day and age.
John himself came to regret the name in his later years, especially as he became more and more interested in serious operations. So silly names, and including the G&D in that, is definitely fair game, since the builder himself felt the same way.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
Ah yes the Atlas propeller driven "whatever it was" known as the Turbo Express.
http://www.hoseeker.net/AthearnBrochuresAds/TURBORACERFLYER.jpg
I would nominate the combined trainset/slot car sets that pretty much advertised the idea of "Hey kids! Try to beat the train to the crossing."
I read somewhere, by the way, that essentially none of the "horn hook" couplers used in train sets and sold to the public actually followed the NMRA coupler committee X2F design exactly. For one I believe that the actual X2F had a square surface below the hook that enabled trains to run in reverse. Or at least that was the hope. How and why they came up with a design that had no similarity to a prototype coupler I do not know, but it might be that they were trying to avoid even looking like the then pre-magnetic Kadee.
When a modeler was not busy slathering on the asbestos cement onto his mountains and hills, he was cleaning his wheels with carbon tetrachloride. And using raw mercury in small drilled holes to make the turntable indexing work (I no longer recall the whys behind the mercury but it was a real idea).
Dave Nelson
As one who enjoys rebuilding, painting and redecaling Athearn BBS and old Tyco cars I pick up at the swap meets I attend, I must say that Tyco cars can often be reworked to a higher level (see my recent Soo Line caboose in the photo gallery ).
More to the point: many fads were purposefully marketed as toys, nothing more, perhaps much less. Those pink Lionel engines failed to entice very many girls into the model railroading hobby; "cute" names for model railroads may more accurately reflect a hint of dis- ease with being a railroad aficianado, or desire to present ones hobby as actually being held at arms length when shown to others, perhaps to mitigate criticism that you "play with trains" as a mature adult. Who really knows? Fads are momentary, serve a limited purpose either commercially or socially, but one hopes that the pleasure of model railroading will endure!
Cedarwoodron
azrail Yet those "lump tunnels" got Life-Like into the ice chest business (now called Lifoam)
Yet those "lump tunnels" got Life-Like into the ice chest business (now called Lifoam)
Being a life long Marylander who has been in this hobby for 45 years, and who has been in the old Life Like factory, I will tell you that you have it backwards.
Coolers came first - styrofoam tunnels were something they could sell in the winter and make with the same machinery.
Life Foam is still today the largest maufacturer of styrofoam products in the world.
From the tunnels they got into other model train scenery items - grass mats, "grass", "dirt", ballast, trees, etc. Their factory was in a part of Baltimore full of wood working industries - sawdust for "grass" and grass mats was readily available - CHEAP.
Then later they bought most of the Varney assets and became one of the first China produced brands - later they hired a young local modeler who had worked in a local train store - who helped them develop the Proto line........
All that from a styrofoam cooler turned upside down with a couple of tunnel portals cut in the ends and some green paint........
Sheldon
As a young modeler I remember reading the construction articles by E. L. Moore in RMC and some in M-R, and he always had a tongue-in-cheek approach to naming his structure projects. He was a prolific builder and author and many of his structures were used to pattern structures that we still use today.
I guess, golly gee whiz, it was a "clever" aspect of the hobby that has not stood the test of time.
Regards, Ed
Off themed train sets, like NASCAR..........as bad as pink train sets
Steamers without tender pickup.
Sawdust and RIT used for ground over, but then again, that was all we had.
Atlas under track mounted switch machines, good luck with those!
"The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination."-Albert Einstein
http://gearedsteam.blogspot.com/
"The car with the propeller on end. MR had ads for it. Could it have been AHM?
Bernd"
Rail Zeppelin - The prototype
http://www.alspcs.com/rail_zeppelin_03.jpg
The Turbo Express (ad link posted by dknelson) was a toy to take advantage of the slot car craze. More accurate models have been made by others such as Marklin and even Lionel.
I tried to sell my two cents worth, but no one would give me a plug nickel for it.
I don't have a leg to stand on.
Since most of my layout visitors are NOT into trains, I find that putting funny business names on my buildings is a way I can trick these people into being more interested. Once they discover one funny name, they start looking at more and more structures to see what they can find. Before long, they are praising the layout rather than sticking to the "grown man playing with trains" attitude they originally brought with them.
Hornblower
"Switching puzzles" as a method of 'realisitc operation.'
Thank God they disappeared back in the 80s as professional railroaders became willing to admit they were modelers too. I remember for a couple of years MR getting a fair number of letters saying "We'd never do that way, save brakemen's walking time, not moves!" And one letter pointing out that by rearranging the track plan all the industries could be worked trailing point, and with two fewer turnouts to boot.
Disclaimer: This post may contain humor, sarcasm, and/or flatulence.
Michael Mornard
Bringing the North Woods to South Dakota!
IHC Vanderbilt Tender ..... think they over done it alittle
I don't believe anybody has mentiond ASTRAC, "A Giant Step Forward In Model Railroading"
chutton01Would the "Olfactory Airs" layout scents from Mikros around the mid/late '80s be in the running for either silliest and/or lamest?
The Ferro KidHorn hook couplers!
Had it not been for the X2F coupler the HO market would never have taken off like it did in the late 1950s and early 1960s I would put the X2F in the running for a spot on the "7 wonders of the model railroading world".
Geared SteamAtlas under track mounted switch machines, good luck with those!
You mean there is something wrong with them????
wjstixA bad idea from the very early days was giving your railroad a silly name.
Jimmy_BraumBLI's animated Water tower has to be a silly idea.
I really wish those were still around! I would love to add the smell of creosote ties to my layout. To me, few things say "railroad" like the scent of creosote.
Lifoam was making ice chests before life-like was around. They started making train products to keep the factory working in the off season.
Gregg
Modeling the Bessemer and Lake Erie in 1969
Dave, you don't enjoy ramming your Athearn Genesis engines with slot cars?
Jim