Any special value in club branded MPC era diesels?

It's yours, so do what you want. I think it's pretty interesting and a little trip to "how things were in the hobby" back then. To me it's a little history. I prefer history to value. Again, it's yours, so do what you want with it to enjoy your hobby.

I have a bunch of cars and such from the late 1990s visits to York, dated stuff, treasured reminders of my initiation to York and the excitement of finding the broader world of 3 rail collecting and running. They take a lot of space on exhibition shelving. I should get over it...   LOL

Times have changed, and at this point most of these club branded MPC era diesels don't have any significant value over the plain ones. If you had some special relationship with the LCCA, it might be meaningful, otherwise you can paint them without any worry that a Mona Lisa has been defaced.

These kinds if items are kind of like souvenirs.  The "value" is often just sentimental or personal.  Rare does not equal valuable if fewer people want the item than the number available.  I would feel no remorse at re-painting an item that is readily available elsewhere.  And you can also feel good in the knowledge that you might just increase the value of the surviving examples for some collector 100 years from now.

Andy

FWIW, I had about 20 of the TCA and York boxcars all painted for PRR.  To give you an idea of their residual value, I bought them all for $10/ea, not exactly a king's ransom for MTH Premier cars, many that had never been out of the box!  I didn't feel bad at all having them painted, and I can assure you they're worth more now than before the paint job!

If you have to ask what the "value" of a club or organization branded car is, it's probably not worth it.  I've never seen any of these cars sell for what people paid for them.

Here's my TCA and York cars with value added.   They were participating in a test run of my C&O Yellowbelly with it's new Pittman motor before the electronics went in.

Back in 80's and 90's when I went to York, I would stay away from locomotives and cars with club names on them.

Jim,

Why?

Mike

Mike,

Most of my customers didn't want them. So I didn't buy them.

That's a good answer.  I'll accept that.

(I was interested in finding out whether you knew something in those early days that the rest of us didn't, like whether club sponsored items would still have collector value after 25 or 50 years.)

It looks like it was simpler than that -- as a small business owner you have to listen to your customers first.

Mike

Where there any other MPC era locomotives done for clubs?

That Rock Island GP20 seems to be about the only one I can think of

@EMD posted:

Where there any other MPC era locomotives done for clubs?

Yes.  I've got one of these, as well...  This is the one I am leaning towards getting repainted...

@Mellow Hudson Mike posted:

(I was interested in finding out whether you knew something in those early days that the rest of us didn't, like whether club sponsored items would still have collector value after 25 or 50 years.)

The club cars I got painted were mostly from the 90's, and they sure hadn't gone up in value in the 25 years or so since production!

@Grampstrains posted:

The Rock Gp20 was offered to LCCA members for $55.00 in 1980.  It's value today is anyone's guess.

Trainz.com has them anywhere from $50 to $125.  Flea-Bay has one at $225!  Ugh!

I have the GP-20, plus some "The Rock" rolling stock as well.  I was debating doing the other GP7, plus caboose, but I don't know if I have it in me.  Most of my roads are East Coast (NH, EL, VGN, D&H, LIRR, Amtrak, PRR) with one exception (TP&W).  Do I really want yet another family of gear? 

Club items don't seem to have much value. A few do, but not many. If I want to repaint, I'm usually looking for something black that has no visual appeal.

Jeff, Thanks for the reply!

While realism and 3 rail traditional trains are pretty much mutually exclusive, my line in the sand is club car offerings, unless the club blurb on the car is vey subtle. See below

If you look in the upper right corner, you can barely see the MTHRRC marking. So small, I don’t understand why it was released as a club car. Maybe club members had petitioned MTH to produce something with subdued club lettering.

@Mark V. Spadaro posted:

While realism and 3 rail traditional trains are pretty much mutually exclusive, my line in the sand is club car offerings, unless the club blurb on the car is vey subtle. See below

If you look in the upper right corner, you can barely see the MTHRRC marking. So small, I don’t understand why it was released as a club car. Maybe club members had petitioned MTH to produce something with subdued club lettering.

If I were looking for that caboose, I could have probably lived with that.

It seems that the market has spoken on whether those diesels are worth very much.

But I have to say, I do like that Rock Island GP. What makes it nice (to me) is that it is a unique item, not regular production. Just begging to be MU-ed with the regular issue ROCK GP20. And the club notations are not too loud and bold. The ones which I find hard to like are the catalogued products which someone overstamped, like Homey B's Burlington Northern.

@nickaix posted:

It seems that the market has spoken on whether those diesels are worth very much.

I am loving that they are so dirt cheap. It means that I can consider doing an Operation Lifesaver "coverup tattoo" over the club markings or even having it repainted as a GMTX rental engine and have less than zero guilt pangs.

As a GATX shareholder, I wish they would license their art more often. It would be great PR (and maybe a perk if they do an official run available to investors).

@brr posted:

It's yours, so do what you want.

He knows that. That's not what he asked.

I took it as: he is trying to avoid damaging something that someone, anyone might find of above-average value, so as to not pass up on some meaningful economic benefit by selling it rather than using it as only a model for project-fodder.

Many of us have a rule of thumb (I dislike that phrase, but there it is): if it is declared a collectible by the manufacturer, it is not.

=======

Not that one shouldn't buy it if one likes it. Personally, I don't have any interest in all these "commemorative" RR pieces being put out "honoring" everything under the sun. I had no idea that this concept would be such a cash cow to the toy train outfits (they are indeed only toys when decorated in these odd ways). But, if it helps with their stayin' alive in order to produce the truly good stuff, I won't be mad about it. I won't buy it, though.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

If I were looking for that caboose, I could have probably lived with that.

Especially being just a few tiny odd letters and numbers. Could pass for some kind of registration ID.

Certain club car offerings still hold considerable value but most don’t. Generally items from the 80s, 90s, and early 2000s are prime candidates for repaint. The cars were over produced and very few were appealing by today’s standards. It was the heyday of train clubs and members bought cars regardless of whether or not they were appealing.
The club items I would avoid repainting are from the very early days. For instance the cars done for TCA and TTOS in the 60s. It was the beginning of these clubs and these items were late postwar Lionel. The clubs were small and did not have a lot of purchasing power so they had Lionel redecorate existing product. They aren’t the best looking cars but there is a lot of collector interest and they bring significant prices. There also aren’t many out there so it would be a real shame to destroy them.

@Homey B posted:

Howdy!  My first post!  Woo hoo!

  I just don't want to find out on my death bed that I've basically painted a moustache on the Mona Lisa.

Opinions?

Realistically, if you find out on your deathbed that you've painted a mustache on a Mona Lisa, is it really going to matter anyway?

@ConrailFan posted:

If you find out on your deathbed that you've painted a mustache on a Mona Lisa, is it really going to matter anyway?

If my heirs find out that I destroyed a rare gem, I might get planted (at high velocity) just off the side of the NJ Turnpike.  Or buried under a dog run, so I constantly get piddled on. Never forget that both Blackbeard and Oliver Cromwell were executed after they had already died.

Nah - I'd rather ask first!

I bought an MTH PRR coil car 20-98400 which was a club car. I never noticed the small icon....until I did. Now I can't 'unsee' it and notice it every time I run the car.