I hesitate to put my oar in at this point, as this discussion seems to have gone past the point of useful information, but I suggest you not bait dave on that question, as he is a former O scale modeler. And I am currently primarily an O scale modeler--with an entire wall of blue boxes in the train room--and I have to tell you that all Atlas cars are designed primarily to accept three-rail trucks and clunky couplers, with two-rail trucks and couplers purely as an after- thought for the much smaller scale market And most of us aren't very satisfied with their two-rail trucks and couplers. Even the former Intermountain cars, which were produced for fastidious scale modelers had underframes revised when Atlas bought their dies (although with the added benefit of cast metal for weight). And some of the details have been modified to be more robust for the three-rail market. Serious O scale modelers are not HAPPY with the compromises, but we appreciate the choice is between having acceptable equipment at affordable prices (still not all that cheap) or expensive and limited-production brass, scratch-building or doing without.
As I say, I have a whole wall of Atlas blue boxes. And more than fifty SHS freight cars (I know, as I just went through them, culling the AF-compatible couplers for Don Thompson); neither are not contest-quality, but they look close enough to prototype to satisfy me for operating a model railroad. I have plenty of other O scale models with more detail, either brass or scratch-built or from kits with added-detail and expect to have some in S scale (probably not brass, though), but not many. Without SHS locomotives I very much doubt I would have bought ANY S scale to start. As for lots of scale extra detail on the underframe, a frequent complaint among O scale modelers about the original Intermountain kits was that in actual operation delicate parts tended to get lost in handling. Mind you, that was in O scale, and I/M cars didn't even have full brake rigging to the trucks, nor chains, nor every fiddly bit of prototype detail. Except for P/48 or contest models even serious scale modelers live with compromises and I can't recall seeing or hearing of anyone who routinely adds brake rigging from the lever clevises to the trucks; I am not talking about rodding to the BOLSTER (I do that) but actually to the trucks, which then have their own clevises and levers (San Juan offers that for both their standard and narrow gage trucks, perhaps a few high-quality brass suppliers such as Keystone). This discussion seems like a very large red herring... Jace Kahn General Manager Ceres & Canisteo RR Co./Champlain County Traction Co. > FYI... Atlas O builds ALL of their O offerings in two forms... 2-rail or > 3-rail... and for a reason... they know what I know. > > As for SHS...although their offerings are the best RTR in the market in S, > there is a lot that can be done to their models to improve them to a better > scale appearance... like the addition of brake gear and piping on and around > the trucks which would surely not mesh well with AF wheels... then there is > the addition of an air-hose to the side of the draft gear box which would > also cause an issue. > > > John Degnan > [email protected] > > SHS and Atlas O routinely build them? .........dave [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: [email protected] [email protected] <*> 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/
