A/F 2014

The Berkshire picture shows a NYC type tender on 4 wheel passenger trucks like the O gauge traditional sized engine.  If new tooling is being made, perhaps Lionel can make a real deal NKP/C&O/Pere Marquette/Virginian tender riding on 6 wheel Buckeye trucks to make the engine more accurate (pretty please)??? 

That's because it's the same artwork from last years catalog.  We'll have to wait and see when a pilot model shows up.  The Berks are allegedly being designed for upgrading later to scale details. 

 

Quick impressions:

The 57' mechanical reefers and new cylindrical hoppers are listed with scale wheels/Flyer couplers.  Let's hope Lionel's found a gauge for the wheels.

 

Looks like Heritage has run it's course.  No completion of the UP series, no new fantasy heritage cars and relisting of the NS stuff.

 

Finally, ES44's in regular roadnames.

 

The waffle sided boxcars appear to be odd ducks.  A 50' car schrunched down to traditional size.

 

Still no price info for the NKP and C&O Berkshire sets.(At least on the website.)

 

Repalcement wheel part numbers for the ES44's, Mechanical Reefers and Cylindrical Hoppers are listed in the product features (finally!)

 

Rusty

 

 

The cylindrical hoppers and the mechanical reefers have list prices of $80. If we want to run them on the track most people in S gauge use, the trucks have to be replaced for $25 more. That's $105 per car, plus labor. Something's amiss. 

The Waffle-side boxcars shown in the catalog are the Traditional O Gauge Waffle-side Boxcars that simply have S Gauge Trucks. Compare the photos of the Waffle box cars on the Lionel product locator.

 

The Lionel waffle-side boxcars are the about same length and height as the American Models S Scale Plug-Door 50' Box Car, but slightly wider.

 

Andrew

I noticed that the Southern Pacific Docksider set is re-cataloged with the same number (6-49634). However, while the 2013 catalog indicates that the power supply included is the CW-80, the 2014 version indicated that the power supply is now the 30W Powermax. I have had one of these sets on order for quite a while, though the "current" delivery date is now listed as May of this year. This down grade might be enough for me to call and cancel my order.

O.K.....the 6-49865 Grade Crossing with Flashers and Gates IS shown in the 2014 Track and Power Catalog. However it is NOT Shown in the 2014 American Flyer catalog pages 42-45. An earlier thread started by me told of Lionel "cancelling" this accessory.

By the thread's conclusion I had come to believe that maybe the accessory was to be produced after all since it is shown in the Track and Power catalog.

Somebody got some "splainen" to do!

 

 

Mark

The Flyer waffle is being listed as 8-3/8" long, the same as the traditional Flyer 40' boxcar.  (It's not like Lionel's ever had a typo or cut and paste error...)

 

Rusty

Looks like if you have been holding your breath for the production of the SD70ACe in the MKT Heritage scheme (like I have) you are now officially dead.

 

Mark

Yup. I got a reply from Lionel:

Craig,

I do apologize for the inconvenience, there was a change in the plans for production, and this item will be coming with the 30W Powermax - and not the CW80 as previously advertised.

Thank you,
Meghan
Lionel Customer Service.

 EDIT: I just called Trainworld and cancelled the order. As usual, the Trainworld personnel were cordial and helpful. With any luck, perhaps there will be enough cancellations of some of the downgraded products that we'll see "blowout" bargains in a few months. We'll see ...

The D&H Alco PAs sure are pretty and just what I wanted to see...but $649? That's $180 more that the Texas Special for just a paint job? Am I missing something? My 2 D&H U-boats cost me about that much but they are both complete locos with motors and smoke. Geez...

Well, I'm not dead.  I blew onto a mirror and still fogged it up.  The Katy unit would have been nice to have, but my world doesn't revolve around it.

 

Although, I'm a bit suprised the UP series wasn't completed.  I strongly suspect that overall, the Heritage (both UP and NS) stuff turned out to be a lead balloon in S.

 

Rusty

Rusty and banjo

 

i too want to see the Katy and WP units for the SD70s.  I hope the lack of the units is just Lionel not wanting to do another run of these engines for just two paint schemes at this time. I did not see any NEW sd70 offerings in this catalog.  

 

Ben. 

I was hoping my gut instinct was wrong about this catalog, but it wasn't. One new freight car that will retail for about $100 with the Hi-Rail replacement trucks and a whole lot of repaints and re-cataloged items.

 

So at minimum we are 2 years from having any new tooled scale steam or diesels in hand. I had left the door open ever so slightly with hopes that I would be pleasantly surprised by this catalog, but unfortunately it was exactly what I expected. Maybe I'll revisit it again next year? I like the CP ES-44s, but that's not enough to build an entire railroad around. Perhaps it will continue to slowly get better, but after 3 years of trying it is still really difficult for new people to get started in S scale.

Comparing the O Gauge and S Gauge Waffle-Side Boxcars on-line shows that they reused the O Gauge car in S Gauge. Look at the trucks in a side by side comparison. The O Gauge trucks look huge on the Waffle-Side Boxcar and on the S Gauge car the trucks look in proportion.

 

The graphics on the C&NW waffle-side boxcar are exactly the same. The roof color is brown on the S Gauge car.

 

They are being frugal in reusing the boxcar.

 

Andrew

Banjo

 

My guess at the lack of the crossing in the 2014 AF catalog is that it is not planned for 2014 production. If you look at the T&P catalog that has the crossing it is listed as a 2014-2015 catalog.  There is also some mention of a change or addition to the design of the piece in the T&P catalog.  

 

Ben

There's no holiday offerings for Flyer, either! The D&H locos are an answer to prayer from me as they've been a favorite of mine for decades. I've ridden behind them many times and shot hundreds of feet of 8 and Super 8 film of The Laurentian for years. I trust passenger cars will be available later?

From what I've seen, recycled O27 seldom goes over well with the Flyer folks.

 

Rusty

Timothy,

The D&H Alcos really need the passenger cars to go with them.  Same with the SP set for that matter. I would get the SP set if I knew that Lionel was going to run the cars to go with them. I know that the set has been done already and they are out there, but Lionel can not expect someone to search for items offered over the past 20 years to make a set to go with their new legacy Alcos right?  A new hobbyist to S will not be willing to do that. At least make the standard Lionel/flyer 3 pack of cars would be a start. 

Ben

I couldn't do that as I was still holding my breath...

Mark

Ben I hope you are right. Lionel really makes it a guessing/waiting game.

I waited 2 years to receive the Texas Special PA's. The consolation was that when built they exceeded the original catalog listing as they were delivered with Legacy operation as opposed to TMCC. I too noticed the mention of the additional activation track sections for the crossing. The original cataloging of this item made no mention of how it actually worked. Lionel has retained the same catalog # so if you now have one on order I guess maybe the order will someday be filled.

Thanks for the input.

Mark

Well, I didn't have any great expectations and I wasn't disappointed.  A little surprised, perhaps, like the NKP and C&O Berk sets are now a 2015 preview.  My guess is they don't want to dilute Polar Express purchases.

 

Anyways, here's what my "predictions" were way back in January:

 

January 10, 2014 11:34 AM

---

Well, seeing the catalog's about a month away, I'm going to list what I THINK (generically) we're going to see in the next catalog, with my precentage of confidence.

 

Pricing information for the Berkshire sets: 95%

New operating car for traditional Flyer: 60%

New fantasy paint on traditional Flyer freight cars: 70%

New "standard" roadnames on traditional Flyer freight cars: 50%

New traditional GP/SD: 50%

New Traditional PA set: 50%

Conclusion of the UP Heritage SD70 locomotives: 65%

New SD70's in "standard" roadnames/numbers: 55%

New ES44's in "standard" roadnames: 55%

New Legacy steam locomotive: 10%

Rerelease of the Pacific or Mikado w/Legacy: 5%

New "scale" freight car (60' box car and/or caboose): 45%

Fantasy NS and UP heritage paint for above: 99%

New "standard" roadnames on the cylindrical hopper: 35%

 

Rusty

Well, my coveted WP 2-8-2 with Legacy (6-48081) is listed in the first post here, but does not appear in the catalog. Lionel is playing with my mind.

Unfortunately, the ES44AC's dies were cut with the NS heritage bruhaha in mind, and most of the new roadnames prototypes have headlights down in the short hood, not up between the number-boards. When I spend $500+ on a model, sorry, inaccurate headlight placement, that's a deal breaker.

Maybe I should be grateful, Lionel saved me a couple grand, as I would have leapt on the BNSF, and CP units.

I hope this isn't catalog photo-manip carelessness, as I will not order these unless I know they're right.

Nice reefer. We'll see if it teeters on the bolsters as we see production samples.

 

 

Well I am somewhat disappointed and yet somewhat happy,Will not be spending a lot of money, buying a few things. prices continue to rise year over year which to me is a bad sign it will limit new people coming into the hobby and will have a downward spirial on the brand.

what would be nice is that they mfg. all of the items that we have been waiting for in some cases years, I believe we can build a Nuclear aircraft carrier faster then they can build a smoking caboose, this say's a lot about commitment to the brand.

Don't get me wrong I am happy that we get what we get and we have made a lot of ground in the last 5 years but we have a long way to go.

I was hoping that MTH would come out with their Catalogue soon so I could spend my dollars wisely if anyone know when that will happen would like to know!

Can someone tell me what is the drive drain used in the Baldwins, I was always disappointed in the old flyer baldwins, I like the ability to have very slow speed in these switchers, I was very impressed in the new  Alco's slow speed performance.

 

Jonathan

 

You sum it up very well,I'm afraid. And, just like you, (I think),I find myself leaning toward heading back into my first preference,2 rail O scale. Heck, there is so much more available, and the prices are at least comparable,if not less expensive.

 

I haven't given up yet,but I'm getting mighty close...

 

Mark in Oregon

Mark,

 

I try not to post on here if I don't have anything positive to say. I'm sure others don't like to read the complaints. But from a relative newbie's perspective Lionel has absolutely missed the mark. How many years will go bye before they actually deliver a turnout? I mean honestly... 2 years ago I bought cases of straights and curves thinking they would soon follow with turnouts of 20 and 27 radius. Won't make that mistake again.

 

I will always leave the door open a bit in case things get better as I still really like 1/64 scale. However, I've gone back to 2 rail and On30 modeling. I'm not going to sit around and wait years at a time. I want to be building now. I recently purchased a pair of Bachmann On30 4-6-0 engines with DCC/Sound installed for $170 each. These are fantastic engines that are very detailed and all die-cast metal. They also run fantastically well. They are about the same size as an S scale engine so I like the size. What is the equivalent model in S? There isn't anything close for the price.

 

There are so many models that Lionel could be making, and if they actually had a track system that would allow people to build layouts I think they could really grow S. Perhaps it will grow, but it won't be anywhere near the pace that the other scales are growing at. There are at least 3 different companies making an ES-44 in HO this year.... I just can't sit around and wait for another year hoping and praying that they will catalog at least one new engine next year. I'm taking an approach of "what can I do right now". If S ever gets to the point that I can build what I want with it then great, but it isn't there yet.

Andrew,

 

In looking at the waffle-sided box cars I noticed that the length of the S Gauge car is listed as about 2 inches shorter than its O27 counterpart.  If you look at the S Gauge mint cars, they have the same length listed as the new waffle cars.  I recall in the American Flyer podcast on notch6 from York last year (fall) that Matt A. from Lionel discussed how the new tolling for the mint car would allow for Lionel to do "other things" with it.  I just assumed aquarium car, maybe he meant this as well.  As far as the picture in the catalog, I'm sure it is like all newly listed L/AF offerings, o gauge picture in the catalog with photo shopped S trucks and track.  I hope it is not retrofitted and re-purposed O27, that would be two steps back!  

 

Ben 

 

 

There's another thing I find puzzling. 

 

Outside of the fact the NKP and C&O Berkshire sets are now a "2015 preview," (can 2016 be far behind???) the catalog illustration for the C&O set has changed.  The passenger cars in the set now appear as S clones of the O27 "baby Madison" cars, complete with 4-wheel trucks.  The previous catalog used the same cars as in the Polar Express illustration.

 

Rusty

As someone who has been in S since the 1950's I gotta say, I am somewhat dismayed by the grumbling. 

 

This is the biggest selection of cars and locomotives that Lionel has ever cataloged for a given year since they started making American Flyer. 

 

Now I don't really see a lot of stuff that I want to buy (except for the railsounds boxcars) but if somebody wants to buy it, it will expand the market and encourage Lionel to make more stuff of all sorts including, presumably, stuff I want to buy.  Historically this is about as good as it is likely to get for a while, and for those of us who remember the dark days of the 1970's when the only way to get new rolling stock was to repaint and decal basket case Flyer, scratch build, convert O 27  or ON3 cars or put Ace trucks with coupler adaptors on Craftsman kits (that were essentially a box of sticks with 5 or 6 castings), we are okay with it.

 

Little Tommy

One thing I thought was a little short sighted was the Southern Pacific AA Legacy engines.  They would have been better off selling just the A unit or a A-B Unit with the option of a powered B unit.  This way those who have the set would have bought it to get Legacy and a powered B unit.  They could have then offered the Dummy A for separate sale. 

 

By selling an A - A set, previous owners will now having a second Dummy A unit which is worthless.  At least with a Second Dummy or Powered B, previous purchasers could have always used a second B unit if they already had one.

 

For the D & H the A-A did make sense as those engines never existed.

 

If they are going to reissue more Legacy Alco's such as the Northern Pacific, I really would suggest a powered B Unit as that set is getting close to not having enough power to pull all the cars they produced for it.  A powered B unit would be very helpful.

 

--Rocco--

 

--Rocco--

Well, it looks like about half is re-cataloged from 2013, and some from 2012.  That unsold merchandise is likely responsible for the limited new product selection.

 

Plus, I can see the point made by others about a $80.00 car needing to be reworked to either look or run right.  This has been beaten to beyond death on cylindrical hopper threads, so I won't rehash it. 

 

My only new comment is how quickly Lionel responded today on the 3-rail side to someone sniffling about the color of a Penn Central E8, while it's been crickets from Lionel over here for the past 2 months regarding the roller bearing truck issues. 

 

S today is not the same as it was in the 50's.  Heck, it's not even the same as it was in the 80's.  The character of the market has changed.  Today's folks have different expectations than those in the past.

 

Although, I'm willing to bet that in the 50's, if it was in the catalog, it was on the store shelf, not two years (or more) down the road.

 

Personally, I try to preach patience and understanding, garnered from my quarter century in S, but that's starting to wear thin, if not worn out.  I know folks here are tired of hearing it from me. 

 

I'm willing to tolerate the shortcomings(for now,) but I have the advantage of being in the right place, right time over the years.  Others wanting to enter S as a newbie don't have that advantage.  There are other options to them and they will likely take them.

 

Oddly enough, I WANT Lionel to succeed in making S products stand above others in both variety and quality.  But, they're not making it easy.

 

Rusty

 

 

Exactly Rusty. That was the point I was trying to make. My complaints must be put into perspective as someone new trying to get into S over the last 3 years. For those that have been around it is likely a different story. When I look at all the other options I have in O, HO, or N scale it becomes extremely difficult to continue to wait to see where this is going. Despite how much I like the size of S.

 

I too really want them to succeed.

Just think how hard it is for us "old guys" to try to "sell" S (Flyer, HiRail or Scale) to the public.  It was even difficult in the late 80's and 90's when things were relatively good. 

 

Even then you couldn't just tell folks to mosey on down to their friendly LHS and view the selection that was available.

 

We just lost Andre Ming to the siren song of HO and barely hung on to another fella on the S Scale Yahoo board. 

 

It's going to be another tough year...

 

Rusty

As proof of "you never know what you are going to get from Lionel until you see the finished product" note that in this latest catalog some of the "Mint" cars have their ladder on the right side of the car side and some of them have their ladder on the left side.  Of course there is no correct side since the car really has no known prototype and, for the folks who want such a car on their layout, it probably doesn't matter, but one does wonder how carefully the material is "proofread" before it is sent out. 

 

I suspect that I will have to wait and see what the Berkshires really look like before I buy one, although, since I really would like a Boston and Albany Berkshire, I wouldn't mind if it came with a NYC style tender.

 

Little Tommy

Perfectly said,both Rusty and Jonathan

 

Mark in Oregon

Lionel catalog artwork (and text) has been subject to interpretation for the last several years.  There's a whole thread about it on the 3-rail side.

 

For what it's worth, here's a couple of samples of the mint cars taken last November.

 

Rusty

I think most of you have unreal expectations of Lionel when it comes to Flyer.  You all know that what goes in the catalog is bait to see what we will buy. If not enough people order it to cover costs it won't be produced.

 

My guess is they are not producing a new engine either Diesel or scale type steam because it takes too long to recover their development costs. The steam engines have been at 1 grand and the disels half about that.

 

The Berk coming out is cheaper and comes complete because it is made to appeal to parents and their youngsters not people like us.  There is to be a better appinted Berk later but it will not have a new casting for the shell.

 

Anyway, it would be impossible for Lionel to meet everybody's desires for engines, road names, and rolling stock.  Look at MTH as another example.  They are just issuing old S Halper stuff.  And they didn't pay much for the company.  It has been about 18 months and still no s gauge MTH locomotives have been delivered.

 

S is a small market and we are lucky to have what we get.

Well stated. I for one are in a way glad for the respite as I can re-focus on the old Gilbert.

 

It's probably more due to the fact that most of the Y3's, NS Heritage, UP Heritage and a couple of U33C's are still in the warehouse.

 

I noticed "limited availability"(not build to order) on the new roadname ES44's.  I read that as "we're using up the remaining parts supply."

 

It's also interesting the NKP and C&O Berkshire sets have been pushed back another year while the Polar Express hasn't.

 

Rusty