Why I Oughta...

The annual tradition of the Christmas Train is back ahead of Christmas this December.  The KotBT was fumpferhing around with his Lionel O-Gauge train and his new (thanks to his Papa) ZW transformer.  This year might be the year of sorting - what we want to keep (and what works) and what we can get rid-of and likely re-sell via Facebook Marketplace and/or Craigslist.  As expected, he's not that drawn to boxcars, but is mostly interested in the operating cars and rolling stock.

It has been a number of years since I lasted added a post about a new (to me) Lionel train car to the blog, but today I'm sharing a car that I've had for a couple of years (I think), but since I just cleaned out a closet, I found it.  It is: 6-39391:  U.S. ARMY MADE IN USA FLATCAR.  The listing on Lionel says that it was from the 2016 catalog - which means that I likely received it in 2017.  The listing says that there's one of these for each of the branches of the military - this one is for the US Army.  It has a separate 'load' from the flatcar that you can see in the box below. I mentioned in January that we *did* set up our Christmas train this year , but we didn't run this car.  It will go into the tubs and maybe get a shot at the layout next Christmas.  

The boy had a proper Christmas train setup this year with the basement being done.  (or mostly done)  You can see his setup (a large oval) with a steam O-gauge locomotive running with some rolling stock behind it.  The tubs in the corner contain a few more pieces of track and cars that we didn't get to this year, but it still is a Christmas tradition.  My Dad set up a Christmas train with me.  And I'm setting up a Christmas train with the KotBTs.   Here's last year's post - 2020 Christmas train .   In our new house, this marks four years - 2017, 2018, 2020 and 2021 (now).   There's a very short period of time these days for a boy to be interested in these model trains.  With our train being O Gauge (larger than the most popular - these days at least - HO), I think that also limits the potential in these trains.  HO (smaller) can pack A LOT more into a layout with the same footprint and the hobby is more well-formed for adu...

This is a car that runs on the Mantleburg line.  Built in 1999 by Lionel, it doesn't have a box and is very heavy.  The yellow and blue look sharp on the tracks. 

Just yesterday, I posted about with the kid's Christmas Train (the Mantleburg Line) set up in the basement, we're using more of our cars that we've picked up in the past few years while the trains were in storage.  The operating barrel car that I shared yesterday was, as I noted, in a weird color gold and brown box from Lionel .  In that post, I showed the components of the operating car - including the barrels, the car and just the simple tray to 'collect' the barrels once they're pushed out of the car.  We run FasTrack from Lionel, so *that* setup is easy to use.  Meaning...you don't need to modify any of the track/trackside in any way.   The little tray just sits next to a segment of operating FasTrack and the car simply "works".  Nice and easy - especially for us with the kids at the controls.  Today's post is about a different operating car:  The 3356 Santa Fe Operating Horse Car and Corral.  Lionel part 6-19895.  The ...

With our Christmas Train (The Mantleburg Line) set up down in the basement for the first time in a few years, I've been able to go a little deeper into the archives of Lionel O Gauge cars and accessories than before.  One of the cars that I picked up over the years is this Operating Barrel Car.  It is in this weird gold and brown Lionel box listed as "Limited Edition Series".  This is the only car that is in *this* style of box. It runs on the Union Pacific line and is Lionel #6-9290. Inside the box is the car.  Along with six barrels and the little tray that the barrels land in when you operate the car. In the most ideal situation, you wouldn't use that little tray, but instead have a barrel loader accessory (which we don't have!).  To give you a sense for how it would work together, here's a video showing the operating car (that we have!) along with the loader. We're going to get this car up and running on the Mantleburg line tonight, so...

Just yesterday, I posted a couple of photos of a boxcar that I picked up over the years at the annual Christmas Train Show in Wheaton.  It was from Hamm's Beer .  Today is another beer-related boxcar: one from Miller High Life.  It features the classic tagline: "The Champagne of Beers" and was made two years earlier than the Hamm's one - in 1973.  Similarly to the Hamm's car, this Lionel O Gauge 6-9852 billboard reefer car comes in the 1970's era Lionel Trains box and has the printed label on the side.   This Miller High Life one also has an orange price sticker that the price scratched out but says "Sporting Goods".  Not sure if that was the name of the store or the section of the store.  Either way....kinda strange.  I have a draw to vintage beer-related Lionel stuff.  In addition to these two (The Hamm's one and *this* Miller High Life one), I also run a Schlitz boxcar that I'll have to capture in a photo and post.  I ...

We were setting up the kids Christmas Train (the Mantleburg Line) in the basement and I came across a some rolling stock that I've picked up the past few years, but have not been run on the line due to the lack of operations.  Mostly because of our up-ended Christmas (moving between Elmhurst and Naperville) the past few years, the Mantleburg Line hasn't run, but this year, we picked up the foam boards from my parents house and I set up the train with the kids. There were a couple of beer-related boxcars that are still packaged up in plastic that I think I bought at the annual Christmas Train Show out in Wheaton one of the previous Winters. This one is from Hamm's and is called a "Billboard Reefer".  Lionel 6-9862. If you look closely at the photo at the top of this post, you'll see that it has a 1975 built date and is in this box that is of that era.  Those of you who know Lionel Trains Corporate history may know that in 1975, Lionel Trains were owne...

I picked up this pair of flat cars with Chicago and Northwestern trailers a while back at the train show, but it has not made it out of the box yet.  I'm a sucker for Chicago and Northwestern (or North Western) train cars.  My oldest sister worked at the C&NW before it was gobbled up by the Union Pacific.  If you look closely around town, you'll still see signs for this line on bridges, buildings , stations and what-have-you. Maybe this is the year we get the full Mantleburg line out and running on a table?

Yesterday, I posted about an operating chicken-sounds boxcar which is the first of a few of my potential pre-orders from the 2018 Lionel O-Gauge catalog.  Today, I'm sharing the second item that I am eyeing in this year's catalog:  the Moe & Joe Lumber Flatcar.  Note...in the image above from the catalog the red "NEW!", which the chicken-sweeping car from yesterday didn't have . Trainworld has this one up on their pre-order site for $20 less than the listed price above and includes this description: "Moe & Joe figures unload boards at the touch of a button".  The Trainworld image and description also includes the unloading bin, which is absent in the image above from the catalog. I poked around YouTube and came across this same car, but the description says that the last time it was made was 2004.  So, this will be the first one in 14 years?  Watching the video (I've embedded it below), I'm surprised that Moe & Joe unload jus...

The folks over at Lionel Trains have recently released their 2018 catalog or 'Big Book' as they call it.  You can find it here in this magazine-style viewer.   Or you can download it as a pdf here .  I've been thumbing through it and like a kid with the old Sears Catalog, I've been circling the items that I'm interested in and will likely pre-order.  The catalog is split between O-Scale and O-Gauge. O-Scale is Lionel's premium product.  And it isn't meant for kids.  The locomotives and cars come with high-end features, are more realistic - meaning they are true 1:48 scale, all have built-in bluetooth/other power controls and cost quite a bit more.  We're talking about $700 to $900 for a locomotive. O-Gauge is where we play.  They now call it 'traditional O-Gauge'.  The pieces are smaller than O-Scale (not by much) but still run on the same 3 rail track that Lionel is famous for.  This is also where they seem to have more fun with t...

Photo via Facebook.  Original here .   Via the Frankfort Station comes this news that there's a Lionel O Gauge Hobby Shop called Choo Choo Works that has sprung up in Frankfort.  That's cool and all.  But it is in the location of a place that was a big part of my childhood:  the (as I called it) Laundrymat.  More photos here on Facebook via this guy and this guy who I believe are involved/own in the shop (and the custom car shop next door). This is a weird collision of concepts and places that brings a HUGE smile to my face.  My Dad is smiling too, I bet. 

When the 2017 Lionel catalog came out early in the year, like most years, I ended up pre-ordering a few items from TrainWorld that I knew would trickle in throughout the year.  That's what most often happens - starting around Halloween, the cars start to arrive.  But, just like last year, a car that has Christmas theme'ing arrived in January...post-Christmas. Here's the post from last February showing the Buddy the Elf boxcars that arrived late .  This year's late arrival is the car you can see above:  a Tell-Tale Reindeer Christmas Car. If you look closely, you'll see that this is part of the "North Pole Central Lines" and is marked with "Reindeer Transport Express" on the sides along with some drawings of Christmas symbols like teddy bears, drums and a brass instrument. So, you're probably wondering...what is a "Tell Tale" car?  Welp, it is a car with an animal inside that kind of 'ducks'.  In this case, it is a r...

I was packing up my train stuff for the year (btw....we finally got around to putting out our Christmas Train, yeah!) and I came across this Plasticville Pharmacy and Hardware Store that I picked up at the 2017 Christmas Train Show in Wheaton.  This is a piece that we bought for $1 and goes along with the other items that I've already posted here including the Plasticville Town Hall , the Schlitz beer billboard , the American Flyer Lackawanna girder bridge and Lionel flag pole .  According to the fine folks at Tandem Associates - who have chronicled Plasticville - this piece you see above is the 1853 Tan Version.  From their site, we find out when this was released : Bachmann introduced the No. 1853 in 1974 in a Bicentennial box, they had redesigned the front wall that was now TAN in color. As you can see in the version I bought, there are two big open windows up front.  Turns out, those are for little cardboard inserts.  Again....Tandem comes to...

More buildings and accessories are springing up on the Mantleburg line.  In addition to the American Flyer bridge that I posted about yesterday and the Plasticville Town Hall that we bought at the Christmas Train Show out in Wheaton, we also bought this Lionel Flag pole that features both the American flag and a Lionel flag standing at attention.  As you can see on the box, they are showing a red Lionel pennant under the American Flag, but when we opened it up, it was flying a blue Lionel pennant.  Just poking around on the web, it seems that's common?  Here's a listing showing the exact setup with red on the box and blue inside .  Seems like the new Mantleburg Town Hall could use a flagpole outside, right?  Wonder if we can make up a little "Village of Mantleburg" flag and run it right under the Lionel flag?  Of course, we'd follow Roman Mars lead and be good vexillologists and come up with a quality flag with no words on it, right? 

I picked up this Lackawanna girder bridge at the same Christmas train show that I bought the Plasticville Town Hall building earlier this month and we are going to add it to the Mantleburg line this week.  This isn't a Lionel part, but rather this is made by American Flyer .  I think this might be the first American Flyer part that we've acquired.  It was just $5, but looking at the various listings on Ebay and Etsy , they're mostly listed for between $40 and $50.  So...thinking we scored a deal. The sticker itself is cool, right?  Shows it was made by The A.C. Gilbert Company in New Haven, Connecticut, USA.  Who knew...but...The Gilbert Company invented the erector set !  They owned American Flyer from 1938 to 1966 , but I can't quite figure out when they put out this bridge.  From the sounds of it, I would guess it happened sometime after the 1946 post-war startup and like the mid-1950's when things slowed down before their founder die...

Last week, I posted a photo of the Schlitz Lionel O Gauge billboard that I scored at the Christmas Train Show out in Wheaton and hinted that we bought a few more things.  Today, you see one of those:  Plasticville Hall.  The version that I bought was fully assembled as you see it here and decorated by someone with some garland and a wreath over the front door.  It is all doll'd up for Christmas time.  And that's part of the appeal here for me:  we only set up the Mantleburg Line as our traditional Christmas train.  We have enough cars and rolling stock for Mantleburg, but we don't have that many accessories or buildings or structures, so that's what I've been focusing on at the show.  I've come across some of these Plasticville structures and they never appealed to me.  But for some reason (I'm pretty sure it is the garland and wreath!?!?), this one called out to me.  Five dollars later, it was coming home with us.  Turns out,...

Over the weekend, we went out to Wheaton to attend the Great Midwest Train Show with my Dad for our annual visit.  We go every December to look through the tables and I get a big shot of nostalgia as I recall the trips to the train show that I took with my Dad when I was just a little one.  We always come home with some nice loot from the vendors and this year is no different.  Above you can see a Lionel billboard with a Schlitz Beer card inside of it with the 1974 date on the bottom.  Just $1, too, which makes it all the more sweeter.  We scored a few other items that I'll post here on the blog this week, but this billboard is my favorite item. We haven't had time to set up the Mantleburg line this year (shameful, I know), but when we do, this will go perfectly trackside next to some of the other accessories.  I also posted about some animated billboards that I picked up earlier this year here on the blog , but I don't remember if I bought one for ...

The folks at TrainWorld just shipped a few of my 2017 Christmas Catalog pre-orders including this one:  the 2017 Santa and Snowman Tag Boxcar.  The box is not a normal O Gauge train box from Lionel, but a two piece top/bottom orange box.  The front of it only reveals the blue boxcar.  But once you open it up? You see this: That's the boxcar with the platform on top, Santa, Frosty and the 'bridge' that you put up for the boxcar to pass under. Here's the side of the box with all the product details.  I haven't set up our track yet, nor can I find this year's model being run on YouTube, but I *did* find this older version that gives you a sense for how it works.  Kinda cute, right?

Yesterday, I posted a photo of an operating log dump car that I picked up for a Christmas present this year and mentioned that I scored a few operating accessories for the boys.  Above, you see one of those accessories in the Old St. Nick Operating Billboard.  This is the first time I've bought an operating billboard from Lionel but I know the basics:  there are two scenes that alternate in between by the rotating of the slats on the billboard.  The official product listing on Lionel.com show the two scenes and you can see them on the back of the box below.  For each of the boys that I've bought one of these for, I've been buying them boxcars/operating cars and/or track pieces/bridges/switches every year since they were born, so I figure they have enough rolling stock.  To keep their attention, they need operating accessories, right? And, like me, they only haul out their layout for the holidays and keep a holiday train so the St. Nick piece seems ...