Lionel Autoracks and Motor City Express ...Now with flashing ETD

Good Day Bill,

Are you searching for the two pack or the single auto rack?

Regards,

Frank

Frank either way is fine with me.

Hi Bill,

Check with TrainWorld. They have a sale on till tomorrow.

Good Luck,

Frank

http://www.trainworldonline.co...to-Rack-2-Pack-6-395

SNOWED IN SALE!

Offer Starts: Saturday, January 26, 2013 Offer Ends:   Monday, January 28, 2013

$100.00 to $199.99          Save $10.00 OFF

$200.00 to $299.99          Save $20.00 OFF

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$500.00 And UP          Save $50.00 OFF

*** You Must Mention ***   Code Word: SNOWEDIN

Enter Code Word "SNOWEDIN" in the "Additional Order Information" Box, On Check Out Page 4 at the bottom of the page, If the discount is applicable, it will be applied by TrainWorld when the order is processed on our end.

Frank I called them Friday and they said they were out of stock. I called the sister store and they said same thing. Thanks for trying.

Bill,

Have you called and checked with Charles Ro?  Their website still has all racks available for sale.  It's worth a shot.

BTW, Wings - B'Hawks tonight.  Don't get your hopes up.   GO HAWKS!! 

After studying the bridge and placing a car on the track I was able to very slowly take out the bottom cross girder through the whole bridge and now can run the cars through. And while doing that I ran the car down my grade and found out I have to take out a few trees the car overhang on the curve touched them. Now that I have some I am surprised Lionel said 0-54 curve. My smallest curve is 0-80 and there was a bit of overhang on it. ....Paul

I finally got one on friday, still waiting for 6 more. My yard is O54, and while it does go through the curve, I really cant say it would make any sense at all to run a train of these through an O54 curve. Its very apparent that the car drags through the curve, even as you push it through, and it overhangs such a comical amount that its beyond laughable. O72 is fine. A good bit of overhang, but it runs smoothly.

Good Day,

I was thinking about the Lionel 2013 catalog this morning. I bet we’ll see Auto Racks with new road names!

Regards,

Swafford

Swafford, I sure hope so- these are fantastic cars. I would like to get several more to make up a cool auto rack train. When is the new catalog due?

Jeff that would be nice. I am still trying to find somemore of the GT cars and I am having trouble finding them. So if they show up in the catalpg then that would say to me that they are going to do another run.

Popsrr did you try Just Trains for the cars and once again thanks for the suggestions on the my bridge the auto racks are rolling through the bridge..........Paul

If anyone is looking for a bnsf two pack I know a few places that have it in stock.

If there is another run, I hope they make the BNSF in yellow with the "swoosh" logo.

I like the swoosh BNSF too. 

I also hope they do some cars in red in the next wave.  I would like a red Santa Fe.

I Had a buddy find a GT two pack in Chicago, and he got it there yesterday, last GT two pack they had in stock.  The GT is the best looking of all the autoracks in my opinion!  But maybe that is me and we see alot of them here in the MOTOR CITY!

I hear rumors of another run of all these two packs, but if they do, I would want to see another set of road numbers.  That way I would buy the next UP two pack also...

Hope Lionel is listening! 

Canadian Pacific or CP Rail would be a natural in red too. 

David

I saw a CP one thismorning.  It was all yellow and had a red square with CANADIAN PACIFIC on it.  So I have never seen an all red CP.  Sounds great!  Hopefully I will some day.  I see CP engines parked here in the CSX yard every other day.

The Soo Line would also be another natural Red car in the Autoracks. I also like the idea of CP Rail. BUTTTTTT HOPE THE GT WOULD BE IN YET ANOTHER RUN!!!!!!

I don't think many dealers got these in very large quantities -- probably because the number of layouts that can handle these is extremely limited.  But perhaps a growing number of new layouts being built in dedicated basements is changing this dynamic. 

I've noticed several websites are now showing their remaining inventory for items -- just not sure if it's always accurate.  According to the Nicholas Smith website, they only had 3 each of the auto-carrier two-packs when they first arrived.  That's not very many in the scheme of things.  Perhaps Lionel just didn't produce these in large quantities.

David

Buddy of mine picked up the Canadian National racks from Charles Ro at the Amherst show.  Pretty nice looking cars but both had broken end doors   HAs anybody else had problems with them?  Seems to be a pretty flimsy hinge system

 My first two were good. I haven't opened the rest yet. I almost broke a door trying to close it. Make sure you do it in the right order too. I forgot about the door with that little latch closes last.

 I don't think I'll play with the doors much. They do seem fragile.

I can picture a scene where a few sidings have ramps up to the open doors   Other than that I don't know why they bothered with opening end doors as probably 95% of them will never be opened more than once

Maybe they were trying to give us easy access to fix their non-functional ETD.

Ben I hope to have a few cars with doors open at my Auto Plant. I need to see when Lionel is going to make the cars and WHAT ARE THEY GOING TO MAKE. I have tried some of my old K-Line cars and trucks and they did fit. But I don't think I will be opening and closing them a lot. I hope Lionel Makes a Ramp Truck like you see at the loading areas here in Michigan. Sort of like the Aielines have on the ramps to load cargo in and out of the planes.

There was a guy at the Amherst show in Mass. last week that had a number of those ramps in HO made in Brass   He told me he would make them in O but I unfortunately can't find his card.

 Now Charlie that is funny!!!

Ben hope he is known to others on the OGR. That might be a pretty nice item to go along with the Racks. Thanks for posting that.. Bill

Mr. Brown just showed up here. I have not noticed any bad doors on mine so far.

I did just notice that the Lionel lables on these Autorack boxes that came today says 8/17/12. I seems to me that it was about Christmas or a little after when I saw my firsy one. So I am not sure where those lables were put on the shiping cartons but if in China that if Lionel was to do another run say in Feb after the pre orders are out to the people who bought them it might June/July before we might see another round being offered. Bill

Can't say with any authority, 'cause I just don't know.  But I'd be inclined to think Lionel ran the two-packs without any serious dealer pre-orders on them per se.  If you recall, the set was catalog'd in 2012 vol 1 and the two-packs didn't show up in a catalog until 2012 vol 2.  Yet everything arrived pretty much at the same time.

I'm always puzzled by some of the dates we see on the outer shipping cartons.  Sometimes it's MONTHS earlier than we actually see the products here in the States.  Other times it's very close.  And it's only Lionel's supplier who may really know the why's and wherefore's of how long these pallets of finished product sit around -- perhaps waiting to fill up an entire container or whatever the minimum shipping unit happens to be. 

David

I think the dealers have info saying Feb more cars. They were saying that a shipment was tied up in customes on the west coast. That probably is a second wave for the dealers. But I think it maybe the Pre order items. The deakers seem to have some single cartons and 2 packs now. I have heard many dealers say to me that they did not get the quanity that they had on order.

This is a shot from a video i took at the UP yard in Kirby TX last week. I think there was one of every autorack scheme ever made there...well, not really, but a lot.  There was a couple unusual white ones and of course my favorite, Conrail.

joe

Maybe we can see this a little better.

Good Day,

To me the Auto Rack trains are colorful. Lots of railroad color schemes to choose from for your model railroad empire.

Regards,

Swafford  

Hey Bill,

This video is for you!

Regards,

Frank

Frank thanks. Looks like the CN had 92 Autoracks in tow. Looks really  nice. Thanks again Frank.

Adding some CP auto racks would be fantastic.  Now the real question is who is going to be the first to weather their auto racks and also add some graffiti.  They are almost too beautiful to deface.

I know by now a lot of members know of the Miniatur Wunderland in Humberg, Germany. And since this forum is on auto carriers, what would it take for one of our  O gauge manufactures to make a highway system for O gauge trains? As I watched this one video there are vehicles that leave and also move onto this train of flat cars. This is in the America section of their display.

At 39:00 minutes a train of flat cars backs into a dock and then a truck that was on a flat car pulls off of the train and goes onto the highway. A few seconds later another truck pulls onto the dock, onto the cars and parks on a flat car. All of this in 30 seconds and then at a few seconds after 40:00 minutes if you watch the extreme lower left corner of the video you can see that the train starts leaving with the truck still on a flat car.

Wouldn't it really be great to have a system where we could load up or unload our carriers with autos. And their system for their cars and trucks is all operated by a thin wire under their roads and flat cars. This would be neat to load up or unload these nice auto carriers we have. 

Thanks for the CP pictures.  I think an all red flat and super structure would look the best (with the silver screens).  So I'm game for some red ones.

As for the missing autoracks.  I heard that another batch is being made now to cover the dealers that were short of orders.  But it is Chinese new year, so it may take some time to get them.

I would get the racks you can now.  I know many folks that have large layouts and they like the autorack cars and are assembling big trains.  This is the market for these cars.  The 'big layout guys', and there are more and more of us out there, and believe me, many out there who aspire to a big layout one day!  So cars like this are great for large layouts and all the modular clubs that are forming...  I think there is a big demand for these beautiful cars!

I also want to try my hand at some graffiti!  Just need an extra two pack, to try it!

Now we need to see some graffitti autoracks!  Saw one the other day where the dude must have had a scaffolding!  The entire side of car was covered in letters, flatcar to roofline!

 Well I'm not the first. I finally got my new Atlas scale trucks in and mounted to my first auto car ready to run on my layout. Checking clearances and determining coupler size.

Joe the trailer looks to be pretty good size. Did the cars do well on your layout?