Are these K-line Army Heavyweight Cars hard to find?

Don.......I always have an eye out for military cars.......these particular cars certainly have held their value.  They don't come up often. $75/car is roughly list. It will be interesting to see where they end up.

Peter

I don't know if I would call them rare, but they are a bit hard to find.  I don't have a set of these cars, but likely would pick them up if I found them at York or elsewhere at a decent price and in LN or better condition (I don't do eBay).

One last note that I forgot and that is that I have these listed in my database as a value of $50 a car and I believe that I purchased them for under that cost at the time.

 

Paul

Thanks guys. Paul they seemed a little high to me but most of the K-line heavyweights are pulling higher prices these days. I have the old catalog they were listed in but never knew if they really went into production. They are very tempting because no one else made them. Don

As an alternative, there is also the Weaver Troop cars.

 

They are scale sized, but only 13" and will run on O-42 curves.

 

 

Jim

I wanted a set of these cars to run with my Red Cross heavyweights as they are the same tooling.  These were some of the best semi-scale heavyweights made.

 

I'm pretty sure these came out about the same time K-Line went bankrupt.  This maybe why they are so hard to find.  I wasn't sure they were made either until I came across some at a dealer.  He had marked up the two pack to $249.95.  The original catalog MSRP on the two pack he had was $124.95.

 

I keep watching for a more reasonably priced set.  I'm in no hurry.

 

Fred

K-Line by Lionel released a similar set.  They were item numbers 6-21224 and 6-21321.  I have both of those plus the four pack and two pack from K-Line.  I thought the K-Line by Lionel versions would be different as the steam engine being released at the time was identical to the K-Line version but with a different cab number.  It turns out that was only partially true.  All but one car were identical to their earlier K-Line counterparts.  The one different car in the K-Line by Lionel set was a Pullman troop sleeper with a new car number that replaced the Pullman observation car in the K-Line set.

To me, you can't go wrong with ANY of the K-Line Heavyweight cars, as they are well made and nicely detailed. I would agree that you see this particular car set less often than others. 

 

The Heavyweights have a great back-story as the tooling and manufacturing costs were split between 16 distributors/retailers (K-Line included) back in 1989.  The $6,000 "buy-in" was divided over several years and these partners were then given a 1 year exclusive on selling the Heavyweights. In the first several years some of these dealers had exclusive sets made for them such as The Lackawanna for the Train Station in NJ, and a Texas and Pacific set for Collectible Trains in Dallas.

 

Details on The Heavyweights can be found om pages 63 to 65 of the K-Line Collectors Guide.

 

Ken

The later K-Line heavyweights with passengers bringing premium prices. They are at least the equal in terms of detail of current MTH and Lionel offerings. I saw two of these sets at October York. One set at private seller and Eastern Depot had a set.

 

Pete

There's a 4 car set at nicholas smith trains. It's still in a shipping box...$229.99

I saw it an hour ago.