Lionel's New Strasburg Wood Coaches The 1990's and 2000's

Dave NYC Hudson PRR K4,

Thanks for sorting the Strasburg cars out.  I had the same questions.

I have all the 2000s ones except #70 & #96.  Not going to purchase duplicate cars just to get those 2 at the prices being charged.

I'll stick the the 7 I have - Lime Valley Baggage, 60, 72, 59, 58, 62, 88.

Jim

I asked Ryan about the observation cars this morning, and they are the same car with different paint schemes as well. I like both though. Paradise reminds me of the old Ringling Brothers car with it's vibrant colors.

Personally, I hope we see a Hello Dolly open air passenger car in the future for the set. I’d rather have that than the redo heavyweight observation car.

I'd go for the Hello Dolly open air car.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), Nicolas Smith did a custom run of #96 the "William McFarlan" and #72 Mill Creek was offered as an add-on car by MTH. That limited my options for the passenger cars down to just one of the two packs.

Lionel hinted during their show that open-air cars could be coming sometime in the future. I too would spring for a Hello Dolly as soon as it is offered.

Definintely would be interested in the open airs in the modern paint scheme (2000's). Not sure if I would like those as a 1 or 2 pack.

Currently, I have the MTH 3-pack plus the NS Exclusive Marion car.

Considering getting the 2-pack that has the combine in this catalog, but not as the prices that it is being offered at. I'm actually pretty happy they did away with that baggage car that MTH offered.

The big question: how will the paint stack up against MTH paint?

Well, open air cars I don't think anyone has done, and that means new tooling needed. See how long that takes if they do decide to do those. Guessing that may be as well for other offerings we have not yet seen.

@Dave NYC Hudson PRR K4 posted:

Well, open air cars I don't think anyone has done, and that means new tooling needed. See how long that takes if they do decide to do those. Guessing that may be as well for other offerings we have not yet seen.

They could reuse most of the tooling from the current cars (Frame, roof, trucks, majority of the detail parts etc.)

Would just need a new body/ modify the current body. This quickens the turn around time.

@Prr7688 posted:

They could reuse most of the tooling from the current cars (Frame, roof, trucks, majority of the detail parts etc.)

Would just need a new body/ modify the current body. This quickens the turn around time.

Don't know. Ryan said that they went with what they could make. He also said he didn't want to make anything else using the toolings and painting it to one of the cars(like the Marian or other cars) that doesn't look like that. It would be interesting if they could use the toolings to do the open air cars, but I don't know if that would work for those.

I didn’t know there was one offered with the Cherry Crest name on it. Obviously, named after the Cherry Crest Adventure farm down the road. My fiancé and I love taking the kids there. We are planning to go again this year. I might have to order that one right after I cut off my arm and leg and sell them so I can pay for it!

Did any of the MTH cars have the Cherry Crest name? Although I doubt I will ever see those MTH cars on the secondary market. I do have one MTH Strasburg passenger car and I am concerned about the paint color matching.

@Hudson J1e posted:

I didn’t know there was one offered with the Cherry Crest name on it. Obviously, named after the Cherry Crest Adventure farm down the road. My fiancé and I love taking the kids there. We are planning to go again this year. I might have to order that one right after I cut off my arm and leg and sell them so I can pay for it!

Did any of the MTH cars have the Cherry Crest name? Although I doubt I will ever see those MTH cars on the secondary market. I do have one MTH Strasburg passenger car and I am concerned about the paint color matching.

I don't know Phil, but I would suspect that it is a possibility since the tooling is the same. No idea where to look.

Glad I bought the boxes with MTH on them. At $200 per I'm happy with what I have.          j

Do you guys think these cars will still have the Kadee coupler pads as the MTH versions did? And will the MTH 2 rail trucks fit these cars? There is always a possibility that Lionel will change stuff right? Just wondering.

I imagine that the folks to ask is Lionel, I doubt anyone here actually knows what Lionel may or may not do to change the cars.  My guess, and it's just that, is they'll be pretty close to what MTH offered.

@Hudson J1e posted:

Do you guys think these cars will still have the Kadee coupler pads as the MTH versions did? And will the MTH 2 rail trucks fit these cars? There is always a possibility that Lionel will change stuff right? Just wondering.

Don't know. I looked at the catalog for these and the later ones in the catalog, no mention on either. Also popped on YouTube to review what they said about them on the Ryan & Dave show, no mention. I would suggest email Ryan or Dave to see if they can answer this. Either that or tag them here to see what they say if they reply.

@Hudson J1e posted:

I didn’t know there was one offered with the Cherry Crest name on it. Obviously, named after the Cherry Crest Adventure farm down the road. My fiancé and I love taking the kids there. We are planning to go again this year. I might have to order that one right after I cut off my arm and leg and sell them so I can pay for it!

Did any of the MTH cars have the Cherry Crest name? Although I doubt I will ever see those MTH cars on the secondary market. I do have one MTH Strasburg passenger car and I am concerned about the paint color matching.

Passenger car 70 is named "Cherry Crest" in real life and on the mth model.

I would love to see open air cars, and also some accurate tooling of the first class and dinning car window configuration. I don't know what it involves, but that would make a very accurate Strasburg train, and would be pretty cool

Thanks for the information.

@Conrail6358, @Dave Olson  hey Ryan, could you or Dave please answer the question on if these cars will have the Kadee couplers pads that @Hudson J1e asked above? I know that the catalog doesn't list them, and that you and Dave didn't mention them during the catalog review. I am guessing this could be a "We're looking into it" or "stay tuned" if it's not possible to answer at this time.

I know that it doesn't matter to me, but gotta cover all the bases, right? I'm sorry I didn't get a chance this week to pop this on sooner, just been busy Dave this week. Hopefully we'll hear sometime soon.

FWIW, the recent MTH Strasburg Woodside passenger cars have Kadee mounting pads.

Furthermore, I don’t think Lionel would have any reason to alter the mold to eliminate Kadee mounts and know that Lionel’s 21” cars come with Kadee mounts so this is not new territory for them.

Pete

Why does Lionel not list things like car names and Kadee pads? I would think these would be selling points.

@GVDobler posted:

Why does Lionel not list things like car names and Kadee pads? I would think these would be selling points.

I thought about that too. Near as I can figure, maybe they haven't looked at them thoroughly, but you would think that would have already been known before and or during them purchasing them. So, no idea why they wouldn't list it.

@Dave NYC Hudson PRR K4 posted:

2227030 looks to be #62 Gobblers Knob and #59 Grasshopper Level(1990's)

2227040 looks to be #72 Mill Creek and #70 Cherry Crest(1990's).

2227050 looks to be #62 Gobblers Knob and #59 Grasshopper Level again, different art(2000's)?

2227060 looks to be #72 Mill Creek and #70 Cherry Crest again(2000's)

2227170 looks to be #60 Eshelman Run(was this renamed to Donald E. L. Hallock) and #96 William McFarlan(1990's).

2227180 looks to be #60 Donald E. L. Hallock and #96 William McFarlan(2000's).

If you want to order all the cars you can, just figured I would point this out to anyone who didn't know that is going to get the cars.

I am confused. I decided I was going to take a chance and order one set of these cars. I assume I am reading your post correctly Dave and that what you mean by (1990's) and (2000's) is that these are the correct paint schemes for those eras. I want the Cherry Crest car from the 2000's so I went to the website of Charles Ro (since he has the best price) and I searched for #2227060. What comes up is a picture of 2 cars but one car says "Mill Creek" and the other car says "Grasshopper Level" not "Cherry Crest". I don't understand this and after the last pre-order fiasco I had with my MTH steam engine (it was my mistake) I want to be perfectly, 100%, positive I am ordering exactly what I want. These two cars do have the correct paint scheme as the prototype cars have today which is what I want. Dave, I see that you wrote "looks to be" in your description what did you mean by that? And any idea why Charles Ro has a different car than what you wrote above? Just to explain I am not criticizing in any way but just trying to understand what is what.

I just tried Mr.Muffins Trains to see if it was the same and it was the same thing there. I have to assume that the "Cherry Crest" car is not being produced in the 2000's paint scheme so it looks I will not be ordering a set of cars. Hopefully someday Lionel will do the "Cherry Crest" car in the 2000's paint scheme. Although I do like the "Mill Creek" car so I will think it over. Maybe I will still order. It's a tough decision.

Dave, how were you able to get in touch in with Ryan? I would like to ask about the coupler pads.

Don't most Lionel cars come with Kadee mounting holes anyway?  (minus the milk cars)  You would figure/Hope Lionel would keep the tooling as is.

@Hudson J1e posted:

I am confused. I decided I was going to take a chance and order one set of these cars. I assume I am reading your post correctly Dave and that what you mean by (1990's) and (2000's) is that these are the correct paint schemes for those eras. I want the Cherry Crest car from the 2000's so I went to the website of Charles Ro (since he has the best price) and I searched for #2227060. What comes up is a picture of 2 cars but one car says "Mill Creek" and the other car says "Grasshopper Level" not "Cherry Crest". I don't understand this and after the last pre-order fiasco I had with my MTH steam engine (it was my mistake) I want to be perfectly, 100%, positive I am ordering exactly what I want. These two cars do have the correct paint scheme as the prototype cars have today which is what I want. Dave, I see that you wrote "looks to be" in your description what did you mean by that? And any idea why Charles Ro has a different car than what you wrote above? Just to explain I am not criticizing in any way but just trying to understand what is what.

I just tried Mr.Muffins Trains to see if it was the same and it was the same thing there. I have to assume that the "Cherry Crest" car is not being produced in the 2000's paint scheme so it looks I will not be ordering a set of cars. Hopefully someday Lionel will do the "Cherry Crest" car in the 2000's paint scheme. Although I do like the "Mill Creek" car so I will think it over. Maybe I will still order. It's a tough decision.

Dave, how were you able to get in touch in with Ryan? I would like to ask about the coupler pads.

Just emailed you with his email address Phil. I believe that the picture on the website is wrong, which I did point out to him. Guess they didn't fix it. Either way, contact him on that.

@Conrail6358 and @Dave Olson, could you comment on here about the questions that have been asked?

Having missed out on the MTH sets, I was thinking of getting the 1990's scheme.  I presume it includes these sets:

I have to decide if I should spend that kind of money, or just keep hunting for an MTH set.

Thank you Dave. I emailed Ryan asking him 3 questions. I asked about the Kadee couplers, the 2 rail trucks, and the discrepancy with the pictures. I will report back here any information that I receive.

@Frank Mulligan posted:

Having missed out on the MTH sets, I was thinking of getting the 1990's scheme.  I presume it includes these sets:

2227030 looks to be #62 Gobblers Knob and #59 Grasshopper Level(1990's)

2227040 looks to be #72 Mill Creek and #70 Cherry Crest(1990's).

2227170 looks to be #60 Eshelman Run(was this renamed to Donald E. L. Hallock) and #96 William McFarlan(1990's).

I have to decide if I should spend that kind of money, or just keep hunting for an MTH set.

Well Frank, whatever you decide should be good, as long as you can find what you are looking for. The stuff you listed is from my post above, which should be the correct names. When I emailed Ryan all that while ago, I had the Strasburg roster PDF in front of me. That was why my questions about the names raised my eyebrows. I hadn't taken into account that they were the same exact cars with just a name change on one I think, but the design art changing. That was what I wanted Ryan to clear up for me.

I really do wish he or Dave would chime in here as I have tagged them twice. Yeah, I understand work can be busy, but this should be something that I would think they would reply to. I don't like pestering them if I don't have to, as I know they are busy answering other people's questions and concerns. I do know that if I have emailed either of them, they usually respond in a day or two(sometimes less), but really depends on what they have ahead of them.

Good luck in your MTH search.

Hey guys, I just heard back from Ryan literally about 10 minutes ago. I will post what I said to him and his responses in italic.

#2) Again since they are MTH tooling will they accept the MTH 2 rail trucks that were designed for these cars when MTH sold them?

Phil, Yes, these will have the Kadee pads and we haven’t made any changes to the trucks so the MTH 2 rail replacements should work just fine.

Cherry Crest is the correct roadname and I just confirmed that on the production art. Thank you,

Ryan

Sorry about the large type. That happened when I copied the email over to here. I tried to get it smaller but I could not figure out how to do it. I got a lot to do today so I can't spend all day on this. Anyway, I will be placing my order tomorrow morning. I am very happy that Dave was correct in regards to the "Cherry Crest" car. That car is a must have since I highly doubt I will ever see the MTH cars up for sale. Thanks for starting this thread Dave or I would not have known about this.

@Hudson J1e posted:

Hey guys, I just heard back from Ryan literally about 10 minutes ago. I will post what I said to him and his responses in italic.

Dear Ryan,

Hi, how are you doing? I am considering purchasing a set of the Lionel Strasburg Passenger cars Part number 2227060 but I have a few questions: #1) Since they are MTH Tooling will they still have the Kadee coupler mounting pad?

#2) Again since they are MTH tooling will they accept the MTH 2 rail trucks that were designed for these cars when MTH sold them?

Phil, Yes, these will have the Kadee pads and we haven’t made any changes to the trucks so the MTH 2 rail replacements should work just fine.

#3) On the part #2227060 the catalog says "car #70 & #72". Car #70 is the "Cherry Crest" car and car #72 is the "Mill Creek". The question is in all the pictures on several websites that are selling these cars the picture shows "Mill Creek" and "Grasshopper Level". Can you confirm that it is indeed the "Cherry Quest" car that will come in this set? Thank you very much.

Cherry Crest is the correct roadname and I just confirmed that on the production art. Thank you,

Ryan

Sorry about the large type. That happened when I copied the email over to here. I tried to get it smaller but I could not figure out how to do it. I got a lot to do today so I can't spend all day on this. Anyway, I will be placing my order tomorrow morning. I am very happy that Dave was correct in regards to the "Cherry Crest" car. That car is a must have since I highly doubt I will ever see the MTH cars up for sale. Thanks for starting this thread Dave or I would not have known about this.

Well, that's great Phil. Good straight forward questions and good answers. Still, don't know why they didn't have that part about the Kadee's in the catalog. I would have thought that would have been something that they should have listed since it is another selling point to buyers. Having optional selling features is always a plus. I know how engines can have a bunch of stuff that people don't care for, but when it comes to rolling stock, options or other features are usually a plus(unless it's thumbtack uncouplers).

Totally agree Dave. Thanks again for your help.

No problem Phil. Hope that these don't take to long to get done, would really be nice seeing these come down the rails on a layout near you, lol.

@Dave NYC Hudson PRR K4 posted:

I happen to take a bit of time last night studying the coaches very thoroughly and even contacted Ryan to get some more information on these particular set of coaches. I know that when I look at a new catalog I tend to try and see as much as I can, usually I look for build dates on cars because of what year I want to model in, but these I wanted to see the coach numbers.

I did a bunch of small research both on Lionel Dot Com, the catalog(online), and Strasburg's roster to see what cars were in fact being made. Well, the coaches are the same, that is I mean the 1990's and 2000's are the same set of coaches. Ryan confirmed this to me last night, as I didn't know that ahead of time, maybe some already knew, I don't know, just trying to put that out there in case someone doesn't want to order the same thing twice, so to speak.

Below is the list of product numbers, number of the cars, and names of the cars. You will note that the only difference other than the artwork change on the side of the cars(if you can see it clear enough), is that car #60 got it's name changed. All the rest of the cars are the same cars.

2227030 looks to be #62 Gobblers Knob and #59 Grasshopper Level(1990's)

2227040 looks to be #72 Mill Creek and #70 Cherry Crest(1990's).

2227050 looks to be #62 Gobblers Knob and #59 Grasshopper Level again, different art(2000's)?

2227060 looks to be #72 Mill Creek and #70 Cherry Crest again(2000's)

2227170 looks to be #60 Eshelman Run(was this renamed to Donald E. L. Hallock) and #96 William McFarlan(1990's).

2227180 looks to be #60 Donald E. L. Hallock and #96 William McFarlan(2000's).

If you want to order all the cars you can, just figured I would point this out to anyone who didn't know that is going to get the cars.

@Dave NYC Hundson PRR K4

Hi Dave      I guess I am a little late responding to your thread, but I just stumbled across it this morning. I wanted to ask you about these Strasburg cars since you seem very knowledgeable about them. I am extremely interested in the 2227050, 2227060, and 2227180 (the 2000's style car sets). I pre-ordered them last week.

I see that they appear in the 2021 Lionel Volume II Catalog, of which I do have a copy. While these are a 2021 Volume II Catalog option, I have not seen any of them yet in the stores. Have you? On all of the major train venders' websites, we can only pre-order them. Even though these are technically 2021 items, have they not come out yet? I have paged through the entire 2022 Catalog, and they do not appear in it. On the pre-order webpages, it says they are expected this summer - in June or July.

Can I assume that Lionel is just delayed in producing them? I am trying to understand what is going on. I felt better once I was able to preorder them. I know a lot of people will pre-order them and there will be more than enough orders to warrant their production, but when the 2022 Catalog came out and I didn't see them I got concerned.

Thanks, Robert

Robert, not speaking for Dave, but I can tell you that these cars did not come out yet. I did place an order for a two pack of them with a major dealer. I would have received a notice that they were in and to pay for them if they had reached the store by now. I don't know the Lionel shipping schedule but usually an item is not automatically due out before the next catalog comes out. The manufacturer in Asia may have other companies items or other items from Lionel to run first before they get to these cars so there really is no way to predict exactly when they will ship to the US and then to dealers. I would try to look up the Lionel shipping schedule if they have one. I don't worry about it. I figure they will get here when they get here but since you placed a pre-order then you should be guaranteed to get what you ordered.

@Hudson J1e posted:

Robert, not speaking for Dave, but I can tell you that these cars did not come out yet. I did place an order for a two pack of them with a major dealer. I would have received a notice that they were in and to pay for them if they had reached the store by now. I don't know the Lionel shipping schedule but usually an item is not automatically due out before the next catalog comes out. The manufacturer in Asia may have other companies items or other items from Lionel to run first before they get to these cars so there really is no way to predict exactly when they will ship to the US and then to dealers. I would try to look up the Lionel shipping schedule if they have one. I don't worry about it. I figure they will get here when they get here but since you placed a pre-order then you should be guaranteed to get what you ordered.

Phil - I was thinking the same thing. In my mind, the fact that they have not come out yet is great news because that means they will be coming out in the near future. (I say this because typically, once something has already come out and been sold, it becomes very difficult to find anymore if they discontinue it unless someone decides to part with it on eBay.) Good deal. I look forward to their arrival then. Thanks for responding. Helps me to realize that I was not mistaken.

I have the 1990's cars on pre-order also.  According to the shipping schedule on Lionel.Com, they are due in April 2022.

@DILLI posted:

@Dave NYC Hundson PRR K4

Hi Dave      I guess I am a little late responding to your thread, but I just stumbled across it this morning. I wanted to ask you about these Strasburg cars since you seem very knowledgeable about them. I am extremely interested in the 2227050, 2227060, and 2227180 (the 2000's style car sets). I pre-ordered them last week.

I see that they appear in the 2021 Lionel Volume II Catalog, of which I do have a copy. While these are a 2021 Volume II Catalog option, I have not seen any of them yet in the stores. Have you? On all of the major train venders' websites, we can only pre-order them. Even though these are technically 2021 items, have they not come out yet? I have paged through the entire 2022 Catalog, and they do not appear in it. On the pre-order webpages, it says they are expected this summer - in June or July.

Can I assume that Lionel is just delayed in producing them? I am trying to understand what is going on. I felt better once I was able to preorder them. I know a lot of people will pre-order them and there will be more than enough orders to warrant their production, but when the 2022 Catalog came out and I didn't see them I got concerned.

Thanks, Robert

Yeah, they have not come in yet. My buddy Jimmy(who is not a train guy but knows I'm a train but) was asking me about this yesterday(that is how ordering works). I told him that usually the way it works is the catalog comes out, and the orders are collected about a month and a half later. It takes about 7-10 months for production depending on what all else is going on. I'd expect that it is possible that we should see some things from that catalog around July/August. Not sure where these cars will fall into, but typically some stuff comes in at the mid part of June.

Just an FYI, it is my understanding that presently when an item is listed in a Lionel catalog the first two digits of the item number indicates when it is planned for manufacture.  So, even though the cars were first listed in a 2021 catalog, the 22xxxxx item number means they should be available sometime in 2022.