Marx Block 5 Light block signal question

Regarding the above signal, all the ones I have seen have clear bulbs in the sockets.  So you would have three vertical and 3 across.  You might want to email Robert Grossman and see what he knows about the shape of the globes...

 

Marty

Dale, the mushroom bulbs are available from Grossman's, the best source for Marx.

 

http://www.trainpartsformarx.com/shoppingcart.htm

 

scroll down to the lightbulb section, what you want are the #166 14V "Button Shaped Bulb, for early block signals", in clear, red, green, or amber.

 

Thank you guys for the information and help. Saw these pair a York and never knew they existed. Kind of like them. Marx made some pretty cool stuff. I am a toy train guy at heart. If you see my post on the first page in the electrical Forum ,I converted the towers to LED lighting. But I will go with bulbs in these for originality. .

 

 

Dale H

Interesting that Marx made those, a new one to me. I thought the original "position light" signals used only white lamps, but when I Google images for this I find colored light versions. 

 

No doubt about it, Marx made some very, very cool stuff.  They were selling trains and accessories for something like one tenth of what the big guys were asking, so they had to really develop the ingenuity.... as a result the Marx accessories have a lot of character.

 

I think the whole clear-bulb 5-light position-light thing was just too much to try to explain to non-train-buffs.   Prototypical, yes, but Marx was all about toys, and colored lights just looked better and were easier for the kids to make sense out of.  Read the copy on that page I posted:  the top one, with the two light red-and-green, makes sense.  The bottom attempt at explaining the position light... huh?....LOL

 

I believe these 1404's came from Marx fitted with two red, two green, and one center amber mushroom bulb.  That way the center amber could be lit with either the red or green and still make some kind of sense.  The alternative is to retrofit them with all clear like the Lionel signal bridges and be more prototypical.

 

B&O color position light signals do indeed have colored lenses- green, amber and red. PRR used amber in all but interlocking signals, which had two red lenses for the "stop" indication. Some former PRR signals on the Northeast Corridor, along with former N&W ones on NS, have been converted to CPL's.