I'll freely admit Lionel has done virtually nothing for S Scale and not much for the Flyer line since 1979. O gauge is their bread and butter and Flyer was the red-haired stepchild. Flyer simply became repaints of old ideas.
It wasn't until 2003 when the Mikado was introduced that things began to look up. It was the first "fresh thought" and the Lionel reps at the NASG convention in Milwaukee I talked to were quizzing us about making the Flyer line more "scale friendly" in the way of locomotives and rolling stock. Then several management changes happened since and it was back to square one until a year or two ago with the Challengers and U33C. Granted, only the U33C has the capability to be equipped with scale wheels, but it is now so available. Same for the upcoming SD70ACe's. I woundn't be surprised to see DCC capability coming. It's a little nebulous how the cylindrical hoppers will be equipped, so stay tuned. But, in the 2012 Flyer catalog over half the items are new or newer scale tooling totally unrelated to old Gilbert tooling. And, the last time I looked, SD70ACe's are fairly contemporary, more than likely of interest to the younger folk. And neither company has indicated that their SD70ACe's are going to be the oONLY modern piece of equipment they produce. I expect we'll see announments for GE AC4400CW's within a year. With MTH, the proof will be both when their first SHS-based product AND new product emerges. However, MTH has 2-rail availbility for a good part of their Premire O line(with fixed pilots on diesels!) and appears to be doing fairly well in the HO market, so there's reason to be optimistic. The one thing Lionel and MTH have that no other S manufacturer has in the outside world is name recognition. That will help to increase visibility and get S into the stores, which is where this stuff really needs to be. I really don't expect to see Lionel or MTH saturation-bomb S Gaugers or Scalers with hundreds of new products in these first years of new production. But, both companies have things in their respective O lines that I wouldn't mind having in S. It's early days yet. It's going to take probably 5 years or so to see how well this shakes out. If more people are drawn to S, be it Scale, HiRail or Flyer, it's all good. I welcome them all. Rich G(ajnak) --- In [email protected], "John Degnan" <Scaler164@...> wrote: > > I agree with Earl... but let's keep one thing in mind - Lionel has had the > AF/Gilbert line for... how long, now? And still S scale remains in the back > or at the bottom of the hobby when it comes to popularity. What does this > tell us? What does it tell you? What it tells me, when you consider that > Lionel has not (until recently) had ANY interest in catering to the SCALE > modeler, is that the product they have been offering, a product designed in > the early 20th century, is not of interest to the new generation, therefore S > scale has not grown in popularity. Now, as narrow as you may think my > thinking is... and maybe it is, I grant you... the fact that the largest > group supporting S scale is well over 60 (or is it 70?) years of age proves > my point. > > So... I'm betting that IF MTH continues Don and company's commitment to > quality and simple AF-to-scale convertability, and increases the production > of existing models AND adds new models to the SHS line (both modern stuff and > older, never-done-in-S-before models), we will most likely see a rise in > popularity of S scale. Otherwise, as Lionel's continued production of > AF-like stuff has shown, it will remain stagnate. So, an ancient product > being produced a new, big name manufacturer is NOT going to make a > difference... the quality of the PRODUCT is where the difference has to be > made... or, in this case with MTH with the SHS line, the product has to at > LEAST retain the already-existing quality AND CONVERTABILITY to continue to > thrive. It MUST remain convertable to scale, or it will not help the scale > grow. > > My local model railroad club, the Coastal Rail Buffs, has quite a few younger > modelers under 20 years of age... the vast majority of which are 'realistic' > modelers, and the vast majority are 'modern' modelers.... CSX, NS, etc. > Every one of them install Kadee couplers on their models and replace the > plastic wheels with metal ones, etc... and a few even use Sergent Engineering > couplers. None of them, to my knowledge, even own any of the cheaper stuff > that is available from Bachmann, LifeLike and Model Power or any older stuff > from Tyco or AHM, etc. One little guy, Dillon, has nothing but Genesis and > Proto 2000 models... and quite a few of them... more than me, in fact. These > youngsters are a sign of the times and an indicator (to the manufacturers) of > what is wanted by the majority of the newcomers into the hobby. > > But I digress... and hang up my horse flogger for the day. > > > John Degnan > Scaler164@... > Scaler187@... > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: tennsgauge@... > To: [email protected] > Sent: Friday, July 13, 2012 01:07 PM > Subject: Re: {S-Scale List} New Lionel + New MTH = Muddy Waters > > > > > > Regardless of what one thinks about it, it is going to be extremely > interesting. I am rather fascinated by what is going on even though I am not > a likely candidate for buying much new stuff, especially the modern stuff. > Sure would like E6s or E7s from MTH or AM. > ------------------------------------ Yahoo! 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