Chuck

I read elsewhere that Ro Jr. says no more shows except for that one. And no more of the USAT streamliner cars to be produced.

Yes nice!

Yep I agree as ingenious!!

Nice blue cars! I always liked the red, white and blue potato boxcars too!

Boy, I can't really remember what all I did with that. I sold that and didn't keep any notes sorry.

Maybe try a rc car speed controller but then would need a remote control. That's all that I have to offer but other than that you're making headway!

Looking good!

I think it looks like a winner!

And 3985 will come back to life in the next few years! RRHMA recently posted pictures on their FB site on the work going on at the massive ex-Rock Island Silvis, IL. shops. Challenger #3985 boiler flues and tubes removed.... Peering into the boiler from the smokebox....that boiler barrel is nice and clean!

I see RLD has listed new replacement Aristo 3-axle drives from Bachmann which is good news as I imagine that there's a big demand for them. https://www.rldhobbies.com/art-29355.aspx I contacted Al Kramer of San-Val fame and asked if he would be selling them and he said yes...for a bit cheaper than the $135 than the RLD listed price.

That is great news! And they cut the rail sections down from 10' long truck only freight to 5' UPS able shipping. I always wondered why H&R never did that?

Haha!! The blower train...that is awesome! You pretty much have it all covered!

I agree with Rayman and the micro-arcing and maybe binding with natural dust in the air. I remember years ago reading about some restaurant that had an overhead g scale train running around that used an open grid construction. They eventually had to enclose the bottom of it as black carbon dust was drifting down on the patrons etc. I've had large buildups of carbon in track joints and switch frogs also when using brass track. Piko makes a small track cleaning engine which is nothing more than what Rayman made. That is small pieces of a scotchbrite pad mounted on a car truck gliding along the railhead. The o gauge 3-rail world has the same problem esp. when using tinplated steel track. Turn the lights out and those things spark like crazy! I used to run trains over a piece of paper towel lying across the track slightly dampened with naptha to get the black crud off the wheels. I think that o gauge using ac power seems to exuberate the problem.

Cool! I mean HOT...Very hot!

A bit disappointing as was advertised years ago that those were gonna have die-cast metal truck housings with all metal gears. All they did was take 15 years to copy USA Trains truck design with plastic gears along with piano wire axle wipers....sad....

blid, That's okay as all I've seen listed is the Maxi line and thought was a bit toyish. Sorry to hear about your eye problems as mine aren't the best these days.

Marklin Maxi line is 1:32. Kinda clunky looking F Units I believe are all metal and screwed together on the outside. I've seen some of their steamers that look a bit like lithographed tinplate. Here's from ebay... The listing...Marklin F Unit

Looks very promising! Maybe the belt started slipping?

That boiler looks like it's supply plenty of steam! How many volts is that producing?

Very nice!

Just amazing!

Interesting list of exhibitors! But once again no Charles Ro Supply/ USA Trains attending. Something is changing at that place as no Saturday hours and no more show displays. Sad as see Bachmann, MTH , Lionel etc. being there.

Very interesting progress and very cool concept!

Received the MTH Christmas Tree Flatcar and all is fine!

Sounds like she's spooling up pretty good!