and he notes - Don't blame Athearn for the error in the Blomberg trucks - they weren't alone. Both they and MR took the shape from EMD's erection drawings which were not meant for scale modeling. Model Railroader's early plans for F and GP units had the error as well as a number of manufacturers including Athearn's models. Varney also used the incorrect drawing for their F unit trucks and Dayton had the error in their S Gauge F unit trucks (so did GMC, later All Nation in 0 Gauge).
If I recall the story correctly, it was Lev Kemalayan (Kemtron) who noticed the error when making truck patterns for their 0 Gauge Geeps. By then Athearn had tons of stuff already made and tooling costs didn't warrant the change until the dies had to be replaced. It's interesting that AF used the general shape in their F unit trucks but Enhorning didn't. John Enhorning was an engineer who worked for one of the freight car truck manufacturers and obtained the correct drawings from EMD (or General Steel Castings who made the truck frames). The S Gauge F units were supposed to be desk top display models for EMD's marketing department but Enhorning took so long getting them made, plus the fact that most of the moldings had the familiar hump that the company canceled the order and handed out Athearn models instead, error and all! These were engineering drawings - and it would take an engineer to interpret them, someone that MR didn't have on their staff. It took years before they'd admit the mistake though and by then there was a ton of stuff already made. Raleigh in Maine where it's a bit nippy... At 09:26 AM 12/8/2005, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >The most glaring example of callous disregard for prototypical appearance of >"scale" models in my memory is Athern's EMD truck sideframes, which for >decades had a flat rather than arched shape. Throughout the seventies (my >formative >years in model railroading) I was continually frustrated by this error. I >echo >the plea to our manufacturers to check their facts before investing all those >thousands of dollars in molds. > >Fred T. > > >[Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > >To REPLY to the list, use REPLY ALL; to reply to the sender, use >REPLY. For those of you on DIGEST mode, all REPLY messages go to the list >(remember to edit the SUBJECT of your message). > >To use our CALENDAR or LINKS, change message settings, view shared files >or photos, view the list archives, GO >TO http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/ > >Yahoo! Groups Links > > > > To REPLY to the list, use REPLY ALL; to reply to the sender, use REPLY. For those of you on DIGEST mode, all REPLY messages go to the list (remember to edit the SUBJECT of your message). To use our CALENDAR or LINKS, change message settings, view shared files or photos, view the list archives, GO TO http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
