My front-end view for this first Friday of 2025 is New Haven Railroad EMD FL9 #2043. The model was made by Sunset/3rdRail in 2013 and is the only O gauge model of an FL9 that has been built to date.
During the Metro-North era, FL9s in the McGinnis red-black-white livery hauled commuter cars like those behind my model as pictured on my 12’-by-8’ layout.
MELGAR
For the 1st Front End Friday of the New Year, we have my new Legacy Conrail trio that Santa brought me…..
Have a great and safe weekend, everyone!
Peter
Happy FEF!
Happy New Year!
Fresh out of the RSJ&B shops......
Bob
@mike g.- feel free to beg, borrow, and steal any ideas you like Mike.
@Putnam Division- You must have been a very good boy this year Peter. Very nice! Enjoy! Although I do recall that the man with the beard is a member of your club so......
Bob
The first FEF of the year & the first snow too. I had to get the plow out to clear the way. Looks like more is on the way Sun & Mon.
Have a great day!
Here’s my Lionel LEGACY Grand Trunk Western Light Mikado no. 4070 after getting some cosmetic upgrades on the front.
I changed out the big class light housings for the ones Lionel used on 765/1225, and added a brake hose and extra railing on the pilot.
The changes are subtle, but very effective.
Before:
After:
Here is my end of the front kind for this fine Friday! Ma & Pa Doodlebug heading east.
@RSJB18 posted:@Putnam Division- You must have been a very good boy this year Peter. Very nice! Enjoy! Although I do recall that the man with the beard is a member of your club so......
Bob
Yes, I was……….…….and, it does have its advantages…..
Peter. 
Happy 2025 inaugural FeF! Here’s the front end of an R1 on the main subway line -
Well its 2025 and I thought I would start off with a somewhat humble offering this Friday. This is a simple Marx type 400 plastic boiler 0-4-0 , Marx's classic steam loco of which he made 100's and offered them in virtually every set he built. However there is something a little bit unique to this train. She is trailing an "Allstate" slope back tender. Allstate is the brand name for Sear's and they were a large customer of Marx, especially at Christmas. Allstate trains appeared in the Sears Christmas catalog for years beginning in the early 50's and lasting till the early 70's.
Even more unique, this loco is pulling a consist of Marx Allstate tank cars...3 dome, 2 dome, and 1 dome!
As the round up today, this consist is trailing a Marx Allstate bay window caboose
So anyway, here is the Marx Allstate Tank Train...right to the end!
Happy New Year and Best Wishes
Do
Two PA's off duty at the "Charles Street Yard..."
F.E.F. Boston & Maine ALCO S2 #1264. 
Happy Friday! North Western decided reactive 400 passenger train after received new Lionel Legacy E6 AA.
Patrick
Hello, FEFers, I hope the season was good to you.
I am getting ready to post some history and pictures of the Freedom Train (the 1947 train, not the 1976 American Freedom Train). Here are some front end photos of the PA-1 that pulled the train through every state (at the time), the only known locomotive to have accomplished that.
Received 18" of snow on FEF so here we have MTH Alaska snowplow with Lionel Alaska GP-7 God Speed All!
@coach joe posted:
EMD made 60 FL9s. All were purchased new by the New Haven Railroad - 30 in 1956 and 30 in 1960. Some went to Metro-North and the MTA after the New Haven was merged into Penn Central but, as far as I know, the Long Island Rail Road never owned one. There was at least one New Haven Alco FA that ran on the LIRR after being converted to a cab-control unit.
MELGAR
I give myself an F for being so late to FEF. Actually a couple of F’s. F-19 to be exact.
Good evening, this is the front end view of a new MTH Pennsy I 1s in charge of a coal drag on this cold winter day.
@MELGAR, thanks for the response and clarification Mel. From the info you included in your first post I thought the timing of the FL9 was prior to MTA gobbling up all things transportation in the Metro New York area but wasn't certain. I thought there may be a possibility if the FL9 was MTA era the MTA may have bought the FL9 for both Metro-North and LIRR.
@MELGAR posted:EMD made 60 FL9s. All were purchased new by the New Haven Railroad - 30 in 1956 and 30 in 1960. Some went to Metro-North and the MTA after the New Haven was merged into Penn Central but, as far as I know, the Long Island Rail Road never owned one. There was at least one New Haven Alco FA that ran on the LIRR after being converted to a cab-control unit.
MELGAR
@coach joe posted:@MELGAR, thanks for the response and clarification Mel. From the info you included in your first post I thought the timing of the FL9 was prior to MTA gobbling up all things transportation in the Metro New York area but wasn't certain. I thought there may be a possibility if the FL9 was MTA era the MTA may have bought the FL9 for both Metro-North and LIRR.
Mel and Joe- according to the LIRR Archive, Trainsarefun.com, the LIRR had a few FL9's in service. Looks like they had 3 that indeed did originate on the New Haven.
(scroll down near the bottom of the page)
Bob
@RSJB18, Bob thanks for the link. I've got a K-Line LIRR "F Unit" in that silver, blue and red paint scheme like the FL9 pictured,. It's got B-B truck arrangement instead of the B-A1A arrangement of the FL9 so I was thinking of hunting for an appropriate three axle truck to make it a FL9. However it's numbered 624 which is more in-line but not actually a number for the F7/F9 HEP engines. So I guess it will just stay a F-Unit. Whew one less project!
@coach joe posted:@RSJB18, Bob thanks for the link. I've got a K-Line LIRR "F Unit" in that silver, blue and red paint scheme like the FL9 pictured,. It's got B-B truck arrangement instead of the B-A1A arrangement of the FL9 so I was thinking of hunting for an appropriate three axle truck to make it a FL9. However it's numbered 624 which is more in-line but not actually a number for the F7/F9 HEP engines. So I guess it will just stay a F-Unit. Whew one less project!
Well, if you don’t want another project, as Mel pointed out, the LIRR had some FA cab cars. Lionel did a couple back in 2019 - two were in the blue/white/red scheme and two in an MTA scheme of gray/blue/yellow. I picked up one of the MTA versions to go with a C-420 in similar livery.
@Apples55, keep those voices to yourself will ya. I remember when you posted those a while back I commented on them because I hadn't seen that livery and thought it may have come from METCA. For now I think I'm good with the F Unit pulling the 4 car passenger train and will save my money for a freight engine to haul the 5 or 6 NLOE club specials I've got.
New York Central Alco RS-3 #8344 is heading up a train of Connecticut cars on my 10X5 layout for this front-end Friday, January 10, 2025.
MELGAR
A pair of SW1 Front Ends waiting for their next assignment.
Have a great day!
Happy FEF!
New York Central S2 and it's successor railroad, Penn Central BEEP.
Bob
Happy FEF!
Here is a set of front ends for today.
Gene
Happy weekend to all!
Safe travels in this latest storm!
Peter
Well in the aftermath of WWII the European and Asian economies were smashed and in attempts to recover the countries searched to products to export that they could make with limited industrialization as their industrial base recovered and hence earn "hard" currency. In many , UK, Germany, & Japan in particular, the economic planners set up the manufacture of lithographed tin toys as one of their recovery products. These could be made quickly, were popular exports, and took modest industrial facilities. Brimtoy, in the UK, was a pre-war manufacturer of toy trains and went back into production in the early post war period. In those days, it was hard to acquire the toys IN the UK as they were reserved (by Gov't decree) for export. The one below, is somewhat later than that very early period as it carries the "new" British Rail livery - the RR's were nationalized by the UK in 1948 - and the tender carries the famous "Lion and Wheel" logo of that period. So likely this variation dates to the early 1950's.
It is clockwork and made almost entirely of lithographed sheet metal. The cars try to emulate the "blood and custard" color scheme of the BR coaches of that period. She came to me from an auction and was complete with her full set box that included, interestingly enough, an oval of track that included a gated road crossing!
Here is the set as she appeared in her box. The short piece of track is to make up the straight line distance taken up by the road crossing on the opposite side of the oval (very good planning) and the box also contains her "key".
Best Wishes, Don
The CN Mountain steamer approaches the South Main Street crossing...
From an earlier Christmas layout
- walt
My end of the front kind for this fine Friday! A Shay locomotive rounds the bend and a 1952 Seagrave open cab pumper stands outside the engine bay at Patsburg Fire Dept.
Front End of my new Rock Island doodlebug!
Happy Friday! Generation of diesel engines!
Happy Front End Friday all! This week I'm running some 1930s clockwork tinplate. Here are the front ends of my two Hafner M10000 sets.
Here's the new-to-me red Hafner M10k running on the layout. No electricity required!
Great photos, everyone and happy FeF! Here’s an R62 leaving the station -
Happy FEF everyone. I haven’t made the trip up to the train room today. I was undecorating my tree; and thought, here’s a front end. 
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