J3A Hudson in Lionel 2019 Catalog

What is slightly shorter? 1/4 inch? That could be due to different drawbar or coupler lengths.

Pete

Thanks Pete.

If your looking to purchase the 1939 set and don't want the cars, please let me know.

brucefclark posted:

Is this a true scale engine?  Length is slightly shorter then MTH Hudson with the same type of tender.  Thanks Bruce

It would be desirable for one to compare dimensions with actual builder's line drawings, not necessarily another manufacturer's model. For example, one could compare dimensions with those on pages 333-335 of Thoroughbreds. Then, you could answer your question. 

Happy measuring.

Bob

Also just going by claimed overall length has not been consistent.  When i get an engine, many times its longer than claimed length...

Super O Bob posted:

Also just going by claimed overall length has not been consistent.  When i get an engine, many times its longer than claimed length...

The engine, or engine & tender coupled together?

In order to make the tighter radius curves of 054, there is a little more space between the engine and tender. There should be significantly less space in the new model than there was in the 2002 models due to improvement in the wireless tether.

Does anyone know if the die-cast mold of this model was used before, and if so, how does it compare to the Vison Line Hudsons and any other scale Hudsons Lionel or MTH have made in their scale lines? FWIW: I was disappointed when I saw the Vision Line hudsons...die-casting didn't seem crisp.

Paul Kallus posted:

Does anyone know if the die-cast mold of this model was used before, and if so, how does it compare to the Vison Line Hudsons and any other scale Hudsons Lionel or MTH have made in their scale lines? 

 The VL hudson was made from antiquated tooling, lacks significant detail and has gross errors like rectangular valve guides, no rivet detail on the steam chest, and no builders plates just to name a few. The tender is also very "muddy" especially the trucks.

I can't comment regarding comparison to the MTH model other than the fact the MTH models is a slightly different earlier prototype J1e hudson.

Lionel originally offered the J3a with TMCC back in 2001. IMO, while there are small errors like the headlight style. This is as good as it gets for Lionel as far as " Lionel" hudsons are concerned.

The Legacy J3a is from Lionels 6-28072 hudson. Heres a photo forum member PC5980 posted on an old thread:

Here it is after he swapped for the optional  boxpok drivers .(This is what the new Legacy pacemaker set locomotive will/should look like albiet ,possibly a black smokebox if the catalog illustrations hold true.)

The "other" J3a Lionel offered back in 2002, from the 50th anniversary Hudson set, is basically the same model, factory boxpok drivers and lacks the front class lights.  No class lights is considered more accurate for a mainline NYC hudson.

Hot Water posted:

Super O Bob posted:

Also just going by claimed overall length has not been consistent.  When i get an engine, many times its longer than claimed length...

The engine, or engine & tender coupled together?

Overall as in yes, coupled and even with open coupler.  I think the catalog length is just an APPROXIMATE!  Lol

RickO posted:

Paul Kallus posted:

Does anyone know if the die-cast mold of this model was used before, and if so, how does it compare to the Vison Line Hudsons and any other scale Hudsons Lionel or MTH have made in their scale lines? 

 The VL hudson was made from antiquated tooling, lacks significant detail and has gross errors like rectangular valve guides, no rivet detail on the steam chest, and no builders plates just to name a few. The tender is also very "muddy" especially the trucks.

I can't comment regarding comparison to the MTH model other than the fact the MTH models is a slightly different earlier prototype J1e hudson.

Lionel originally offered the J3a with TMCC back in 2001. IMO, while there are small errors like the headlight style. This is as good as it gets for Lionel as far as " Lionel" hudsons are concerned.

The Legacy J3a is from Lionels 6-28072 hudson. Heres a photo forum member PC5980 posted on an old thread:

Here it is after he swapped for the optional  boxpok drivers .(This is what the new Legacy pacemaker set locomotive will/should look like albiet ,possibly a black smokebox if the catalog illustrations hold true.)

 

 

The "other" J3a Lionel offered back in 2002, from the 50th anniversary Hudson set, is basically the same model, factory boxpok drivers and lacks the front class lights.  No class lights is considered more accurate for a mainline NYC hudson.

 

 

Back more then a decade ago ( 2004) when the J3 class lights were raging here on OGR I asked Al Staffer at a York meet whether or not the J3's had them.   He said some did and some didn't.   He also said later on the headlight was changed on the J3's to a double bulb type.   Photo's of double headlights must be quite rare because I've never seen one pictured that way..   

joe 

Super O Bob posted:

Hot Water posted:

Super O Bob posted:

Also just going by claimed overall length has not been consistent.  When i get an engine, many times its longer than claimed length...

The engine, or engine & tender coupled together?

Overall as in yes, coupled and even with open coupler.  I think the catalog length is just an APPROXIMATE!  Lol

Best thing is to have sombody measure the overall length of the actual MTH and actual Lionel, before assuming one is different in size.  Some of the guys have the older issue of these, maybe they can measure.

I saw that 25inches listed.  I am guessing thats not with the PT tender...

Sometimes the listed length in catalog is just not accurate...

Gentlemen, for your viewing pleasure, lionel J3A, and MTH J1E......the only real length difference I see would be the area on the tender where the auger would live....the MTH is slightly longer....so the length battle is sided to MTH.......Pat

Have at it boys!

harmonyards posted:

Gentlemen, for your viewing pleasure, lionel J3A, and MTH J1E......the only real length difference I see would be the area on the tender where the auger would live....the MTH is slightly longer....so the length battle is sided to MTH.......Pat

Very nice but, aside from that, has anybody bothered to compare either locomotive model to the actual prototype drawings?

Rick and everyone, that older Lionel J3a is very nice looking. If Lionel can close the gap a bit between tender and cab it'd have a lot going...perhaps use the kinematic drawbar that my S-3 has, but I don't see that feature listed, nor a swinging bell?

Fwiw...  i measured my Ese with PT tender.  Overall length was 27 and 3/8 inch long over the closed rear tender coupler.

harmonyards posted:

Gentlemen, for your viewing pleasure, lionel J3A, and MTH J1E......the only real length difference I see would be the area on the tender where the auger would live....the MTH is slightly longer....so the length battle is sided to MTH.......Pat

Thanks for posting!  Nice engines...

is this one going to be the model ricko posted in the last photo? just updated with legacy correct. if so I want one.

JC642 posted:

"Back more then a decade ago ( 2004) when the J3 class lights were raging here on OGR I asked Al Staufer at a York meet whether or not the J3's had them.   He said some did and some didn't."

Joe

As we posted before, and as was confirmed by the expert, the Lionel model of the J3a is correct either with or without classification lights. I personally like the new J3a as cataloged with the classification lights and Lionel should stay true to the catalog depiction, and their own listing of Legacy Steam features in the 2019 Vol. I catalog.

Lionelzwl2012 posted:

is this one going to be the model ricko posted in the last photo? just updated with legacy correct. if so I want one.

No,not the last photo. One legacy model will be similar to the first photo, and the set loco will look like the second.

The last photo has no classification lights. The legacy models WILL ALL have classification lights.

The class lights should be higher on the boiler front and further apart as depicted in "Throughbreds." The way it is illustrate it in the catalog is unacceptable for such an expensive engine and for this reason alone I will not be ordering. By the way, I don't ever recall seeing a NYC Hudson with a boiler that is not completely black.   

Your correct about the class lights. As far as the smokebox, heres the exception rather than the rule:

Most of the time in old photos and videos, the J1 series Hudson’s almost always looked all black, but the j3 series almost always had the noticeable graphite gray color on the smokebox.

It has to be scale as it is in that section(at least you would hope that's the case). I did hear this past Friday talking to Tony at my LTS that the VL Hudson used of course the old die for the engine, but he said that the tender was the K-Line one. He said if you have the K-Line Hudson and the VL Hudson, they match(except the built by Lionel on the side of the boiler). I don't own either, but that gets my curiosity going.

I do believe on one of the other Hudson topics, someone RICKO, Norton or someone else said that the K-Line Hudson was probably one of the most decent Hudson models made. It would be nice to see accuracy and quality in these upcoming ones but we already know there are some short comings on accuracy. Hopefully there are no issues.

I'd love to have one with all of the bells and whistles, but I think I'll upgrade my 38041 J3 with some Gunrunnerjohn boards and call it a day.  I'm more of a PRR guy anyway, but I do love the Hudson.

Will at least this body style be correct as it appears in this catalog?

Thank you

So, Ostensibly the VL chassis should mate up to...say... the commodore vanderbilt from the late 90's?

Rob English posted:

So, Ostensibly the VL chassis should mate up to...say... the commodore vanderbilt from the late 90's?

Its not a drop in Rob. The chassis is actually different as are the mounting points. The cylinders would have to be shaved just like they are on CV chassis and the rear of the VL frame is quite different because of the DC motor. 

I considered this when I redid my CV.

Pete

K Line Hudson, came without TMCC, I have upgraded with ERR Commander and RS.In comparison, the Lionel Hudsons I have come nowhere close, although they are "scale" sized and are good engines in my roster.   The MTH Millennium Hudson also has great detail.But, the K Line is still the best I have seen in this class of model Hudsons.

Jesse   TCA

A more worthy comparison would be the K-Line model shown above vs. Lionel's 6-28072 (and/or its class lights-less brother in the anniversary set) which is shown a few responses up. Those other models are detail-stripped 773s.

Skip, check out those markers, I mean class lights on the K-Line above. They seem to be mounted correctly. There's a 3rd Rail J1d (nice!) on eBay with similarly-mounted class lights for comparison. 

Although not an 'expert' by any measure, we participated in several Hudson threads over the years here that seemed to arrive at a consensus that the K-Line model was likely the most accurate with the Lionel No.6-28072 posted at the intro of this thread by RickO as a close second along with one of the MTH models (I forget). The K-Line seemed to have the 'finest' detailing by a slight margin. I've had several and my current one has PS2 and MTH Smoke installed by JDS and is a keeper.

Boys, boys, Lionel is bringing back the J3. K-Line only made a J1 in unstreamline.

Three J3s, Williams, 3rd Rail, Lionel. Note lack of Class lights, the way they were meant to be.

Pete

Norton posted:

Boys, boys, Lionel is bringing back the J3. K-Line only made a J1 in unstreamline.

Three J3s, Williams, 3rd Rail, Lionel. Note lack of Class lights, the way they were meant to be.

Pete

Now there are some great front ends. About the K-Lines, I only knew Hudson not the type. Tony didn't explain which it was, and I'm sure he would know what it was. He was merely stating that they used the tender from their Hudson for the VL one. I don't even know if that would match up to any of the J3's as I don't know if the tenders changed like sometimes they do.

I do enjoy the fact that I will be getting a new Hudson that I don't own the type of. I have J1's, CV's, ESE'S &CCI. So this will be a most welcome edition(even with the class lights). I only hope that we will see some other Hudson's not produced by Lionel in the near future like some of the other streamlined NYC engines and other railroads. Hopefully their won't be any clown colors(as noted on the UP Challenger) coming out of the woodwork.

Most notably, I would of course love to see a Dreyfus Hudson as well as the Mercury.

MTH has done the streamlined Dreyfuss in Premier scale several times and 3rd Rail has done the Mercury and the 20th Century Dreyfuss.  I have a Williams Crown Edition brass 20th Century Dreyfuss that is screaming for 1938 style 21" passenger cars.  I would like Lionel to produce them, but not unless they built and modeled correctly.

JR Junction Train & Hobby posted:

MTH has done the streamlined Dreyfuss in Premier scale several times and 3rd Rail has done the Mercury and the 20th Century Dreyfuss.  I have a Williams Crown Edition brass 20th Century Dreyfuss that is screaming for 1938 style 21" passenger cars.  I would like Lionel to produce them, but not unless they built and modeled correctly.

Phil, You know GGD has done 1938 20th Century cars, no? They have figures, no thumbtacks, and are aluminum. Given Lionel's latest pricing the GGDs would likely be no more and maybe even less.

Pete

Norton posted:

Phil, You know GGD has done 1938 20th Century cars, no? They have figures, no thumbtacks, and are aluminum. Given Lionel's latest pricing the GGDs would likely be no more and maybe even less.

Pete

Yes I know but finding a set of GGD 1938 deco seems difficult at best.  Have you seen any available recently?  As with many other GGD items I'd like today, I was asleep at the switch when they were originally offered.

Try the wanted to buy section. Thats how I got my 1940 cars. There are some 1948 cars out there now but $$$$.

Pete