Lionel Conventional UP F-3s - with pix

They look good Chris, thanks for the pix!

Were these cataloged? I don't remember anything at all about these. Is the 2362 road number supposed to make this a postwar or archive type of unit? These do look nice, and it's nice to see that Lionel got rid of that MPC-era lower rib around the sides of the shell. How do they run? Do these have magnetraction, or traction tires? Are there Pullmore motors in there?

Sam

Sam, you are way behind the power curve here.  They were catalogued in Lionel's last catalog, 2013 Book 2.

All your questions can be answered there.

I have wanted a set of these for some time now. I am currently painting a set of them for myself. I don't know why Lionel never gets the paint scheme right for these? The roof is painted incorrectly as is the nose in front of the windshields. I guess they are emulating the 2023 alcos? The set Lionel brought out in the late 80's was painted way wrong too. 

Your set is very nice, its good to see them being made again. I was hoping Williams would make them but they likely won't. They have the F7'S which don't look right.

Here is what an F3 shoud look like-

Since this may be the end of the Conventional Classics type locos for a while, I jumped on the Labor Day sale from Charlie Ro and bought a set for $249.95+$9 shipping. The original $400 price was too much to get my interest but the sale price made it hard to resist. I had to scrounge a bit to get the matching B Unit but did find one elsewhere since Charlie Ro did not have the B Unit.

If anyone is interested, I believe he still has the AA UP set in stock at the sale price.

Ken

Does anyone know how these compare to the 1983 UP set? I have that one and have always liked it very much. It has conventional electronic horn from that era and they had a lot of trouble with units not color matching. My B-unit color is off from the A-units, for instance.

Dave,

I don't have a 1983 set so I can't say how they compare but the current set has perfectly matching paint on A-B-A units and the horn and bell are excellent state-of-the-art Railsounds. Of course you can't "quil" the horn on this one since it's conventional. It also has the standard all electronic DCRU reversing unit so there is no buzzing sound. Not sure what they used in 1983 but I suspect the reversing unit was electronic back then too.

Ken

The earlier UP F-3 engines (they were from 1984, not '83) had a slightly different paint job, mainly in that the grey roof paint extended over the sides and about halfway down the grills. There is also red pinstriping next to the grey paint, along its entire length and over the cab. The other main cosmetic differences I can see are that the '84 version doesn't have the add-on ladders below the cab, and the number boards appear smaller. These engines would have had the older 3-position E-units.

Re: the color variation of the "84 UPs (the aluminum cars had the problem as well), I was told back then that yellow was the hardest color to match (given the paint processes back then), and it was extremely difficult to match that color in different paint batches. Of course, the different engines and cars were not made at the same time but over weeks of production.

I bought a 84 set from Tom a friend of Mike Moore at the Dupage Show about 20 odd years ago. Tom had 2 sets cars and engines he put together to make a color matching set. That is the set I bought from him and he kind of acted like he really didn't want to let it go.

Ken

Sounds like you really like them

Saw the Charles Ro price---thought it was great

Vacation with my wife this week---let's see how much I come home with

Also---York is right around the corner

Also---New Lionel catalog this week

What to do---can't have it all

Joe S

Well, I like my '84 version just fine (small paint dissimilarity notwithstanding) but would have jumped at the new ones if I didn't already have them.

btw, I believe that the '84 set may have gotten caught up in Lionel's ill-fated move of production to Mexico. That unfortunate  phase of Lionel's history gets scant attention when we talk about the company these  days.

I'm surprised Lionel didn't use the prototypical looking anti-glare green paint in front of the windshield on these new UP conventional F3s, like on the 1984 issues.