A non-model railroader sent me the following photo and asked for some help in valuing the engine. There is no box and no second unit. It is really hard to tell from the photo, but I think it does have the nose louvers that mark the engine as a pre-MPC product. However, it has pickup rollers only on the lead truck, which suggests that it is a MPC era single-motored unit. I have seen conflicting information online; did the 1976 F3 have single or dual motors? If there are indeed louvers on the shell (or other spotting features I do not know about), am I looking at a 2383 mounted on an MPC chassis? The only other clue is that the friend says the locomotive is 50+ years old, which places it anywhere from the end of the postwar era through the MPC years.
There are no MPC-era Santa Fe F3s currently on the Bay, so I am not sure what a good valuation is, but I cannot imagine it is more than $170.
