Marx Train pictures

Thank you Don for the kind comments. The tender was not restored it was just cleaned up.  

Well Marx fans, its been almost a month since anyone has posted to this thread...so come on' lets have um!!  Today I thought I would post my new #59 6" Marx UP cattle car.  I had posted this on "Box Car Sunday" a short while ago but I thought that as Marx fans you would like to see it as well.   I just received this about 2 weeks ago and although the basic car (as a 6" 4 wheel) is quite common, this one has several unusual features:  1. It is an 8 wheeled car which makes it pre-war.  Marx started to add trucks to his 6" car line in order to compete with Lionel and American Flyer in 1936 and continued to offer them up until production stopped due to WWII in 1942.  They did not return after the war.   2. It has what some collectors call "one way" couplers.  These were Marx's first attempt at automatic couplers but they required that the car be positioned such that the leading car and the following car in the train had the opposite type coupler.  Obviously this made for more complex operations and in fact these couplers were complex mechanically and expensive to make and were discontinued.  3. Finally and perhaps the most significant, from my perspective, this is a SLOTTED car. Almost all #59 cattle cars have the slots between the slats represented by a white lithographed line to simulate the opening.  This car is actually slotted with horizontal spaces between the side planks.  Marx made only a very few of these cars before switching to the lithographed format  which was likely much cheaper to make.

Here is the side view, note the open slots between the side slats.

Here is an end view, showing the "receiver" end of the one way coupler and a somewhat better view of the slots.

Here is the opposite end, showing the "post" end of the one way coupler.  Note it is only on this end that the Marx logo appears.

Best wishes everyone

Don

Picked up these 6” inch cars recently  to add to the small collection I have of these cars.

@dandeo50-great looking cars and they are fun to collect. Good hunting!!

Don

Hello fellow Marxers, it has been awhile since I posted but have enjoyed all your postings.

Today I would like to share two of the largest tin litho engines ever made. Here are the Marx Santa Fe #21 and the Unique Arts Rock Island.

Here's a little video and them moving some Marx freight.

Keep on Marxing, and thanks to everyone for sharing their great trains.

Dean

@PW53inVa - Hey Dean, welcome back!!  Great video of the #21 and the Unique Arts RI .  I love my 21 but that Unique Arts RI has continued to elude me (at a price I can afford) so its nice to see one in action.  Hope you are doing OK and enjoying your summer.

Best Wishes

Don

Dean

Thank you for posting the video of your Marx and Unique Art Trains. Nice layout.

LOVE 21's!

I've been intrigued with them from the first time I discovered their existence in what... early 1990s? (A fellow MR friend that happened to also be involved in 3-rail had some that I saw.)

Those Rock Island's are nice, too, but 21's capture my imagination without fail.

Andre

Don - Thanks. Glad you liked the video and summer has been good. The RIs have very nice litho but are really big. Hope you are doing well and enjoy seeing and reading your posts. Take Care

Dandeo50  - Thank you for your kind words.

Andre/laming - The Rock Islands are nice but the Marx 21 is a better runner. I had to make a little adapter to get the RIs to connect to the Marx tab/slot freight cars.  I think I read somewhere when Unique Arts came out with the big Rock Islands Marx brought the Santa Fe 21s out to keep market share. So maybe we should thank Unique Arts for the 21s.

Dean

L-I-B!  (Well I'll Be!)

Learn something new everyday: I didn't know that Unique Arts was contemporary with the Marx 21 era. At first glance, I thought it was a recent (last few decades) retro-release of some type. You know, like "New Marx".

Andre

@PW53inVa, Dean, first, I must admit I’m not a collector of Marx trains, however I’ve always been inspired about and by the colorful lithography, beautiful color schemes used by Louis Marx to set his products apart from Joshua Lionel Cowens Lionel and  AC Gilbert’s, American Flyer, even Ives, and I compliment you on your video and showing us trains from the past. I grew up with several friends in Dennison Texas with Lionel, American Flyer, and Marx, trains, and we all enjoyed each others trains, all Fun. (My friends with American Flyer always pointed out the third rail, but we still had fun.) I like your layout and your beautiful trains. My friend @Don McErlean, Don has many beautiful Marx trains and many other tinplate products, along with many Lionel trains. Anyone growing up in the late 1940’s, and 1950’s  has to admit, (These Electric Trains) is why we love the hobby of model railroading today. Thanks for sharing your video and pictures with us here on the OGR Forum. Happy Railroading Everyone

I had a set of the Unique Art Rockets. Very nice in person. They really did a bang up job. But they are not the best runners. I wound up selling mine as storage was becoming an issue as they are quite large. I still have a set of the 21 Santa Fe diesels. They are good runners. Marx knew how to make a runner!

You may not know the story of the Unique Art trains.  It turns out that Louis Marx and Sammy Bergman were very close friends.  Sammy ran Unique Art toys and Marx both sold toys for him and purchased Unique Art toys for resale.  It was said they even made parts for each other and exchanged tools and dies.  Marx was completely surprised when in 1948 Unique Art suddenly introduced a line of 0 gauge trains to compete directly with Marx.  As testament to Marx's unquenchable competitive spirit, Marx decided that he would field a line to compete by 1949.  In what amounts to record time, Marx created his 7" line to compete directly with UA trains and had them ready for the 1949 season.  It turned out that UA really didn't amount to much competition, they only produced a very limited line of trains and never really competed with Marx very much.  I don't know what happened to the friendship between the two principals.  Marx's 7 " line remained quite limited and was only available till 1958.

Don

Many are aware of the red end 3/16 scale boxcars, but for those that aren’t, it’s the whole frame that is red, even inside.

Steve

@Steve "Papa" Eastman- Thanks for posting, although I had heard about these cars I had not in fact ever seen one before.  A rarity for sure.  @CHOO-CHOO MIKE- Neat scene and beautiful scenery.  Of course that pre-war M10000 is really terrific!!  Being from Texas, we also applaud the cows and cowboys! .

Best Wishes

Don

This is a good running unit with tab couplers. The longer it runs the faster it goes. These pictures were taken before I got replacement horns for them.

@boomer0622- Hey mate !  welcome aboard...those are some really neat F-3's and they do run well.  Glad you also got the matching 7" caboose and I can see a NYC Pacemaker box car as well.  Looks like a great set.  Thanks for posting.  From looking at the background it looks like it was Christmas, is that a Holiday layout or do you keep it running longer?

Best Wishes, and thanks for joining the Marx post

Don

Hi Don,  thanks for the “welcome aboard “.
This video is showing a B&O with 3 red tenders and the straight track it goes on back & forth, controlled by hand on the transformer. Otherwise it’s bump & crash !  I don’t have any passenger car with tab couplers.

This video is it traveling back up the line.  Slow because iPad in one hand and transformer in the other.

Doug

I know this a common set but it was complete and a very good price. As usual tested the engine ran and smoked like a champ. So happy I found this set.

Here is my Marx 5590 crane car with Lionel couplings.   Some NYC 5590s come with search lights on top.  My search light is on my wrecking caboose car.

Charlie

@boomer0622- WOW that is one long straight away.  The B&O F-3's are handsome for sure, some of my favorites.  By the way, the Marx 6" passenger cars, in red, are the same size as those tenders and came with t/s couplers in most cases.  They are often available at very low prices as they are quite common.  They would work well with your set up.

Here are a couple with a Marx clockwork CV also in red.

Best wishes and keep posting your Marx, I for one really enjoy it!  Keep hunting!

Don

Well Marx fans, its been some time since we had a new posting and if fact the last one was by me in response to a great video by @boomer0622 and a neat crane car by @Choo Choo Charlie.  Today I thought I would share my "Tail End Tuesday" post with you all on the Marx thread as it is, of course, a Marx car.

In the lightweight or 4-wheel plastic line, the KCS red / white stamped caboose is rather scarce as judged by its listed collector value in the Greenberg Marx Trains pocket price guide.  I luckily happened across this one on E-bay and won a rather aggressive auction battle (for a little Marx car anyway) to bring it home.  So here is the KCS red/white stamped 4-wheel caboose from 1958.

Best Wishes

Don

Working on getting my H0 Hudson’s serviced. So far 3 smokers and 1 non smoker are done.

Steve

Those smoke pretty good for little ol' HO!

EDIT: Are those tender drive or what?  The Marx HO 4-6-4's I'm seeing on eBay seem to be tender drive?

Andre

@laming posted:

Those smoke pretty good for little ol' HO!

EDIT: Are those tender drive or what?  The Marx HO 4-6-4's I'm seeing on eBay seem to be tender drive?

Andre

The tender provides pick up on one rail, no motor. Here is a photo of the chassis.

Thanks!

Those trucks under the tender makes it look as if it's tender powered, but your video indicated it wasn't.

I note that both smoking and non-smoking were made.

Darn sight cheaper than the going prices for a 333 smoker in 3-rail!

Andre

Picked this up at a train show for a great deal and freshened it up. I can't believe how well it runs and smokes! I thought it'd be cool to do a "resto mod" project and add sounds to it, but I'll save that for another day. Having grown up with mostly MTH Railking trains, I didn't think I'd be getting into the Marx stuff, but this was too cool to pass up haha

@JS814 posted:

Picked this up at a train show for a great deal and freshened it up. I can't believe how well it runs and smokes! I thought it'd be cool to do a "resto mod" project and add sounds to it, but I'll save that for another day. Having grown up with mostly MTH Railking trains, I didn't think I'd be getting into the Marx stuff, but this was too cool to pass up haha

They used the basic H0 Hudson smoke units in those.

Project this week has been bringing a bunch of Marx H0 Hudson’s back to life.

Another Marx H0 TET. Jade green NYC bay window caboose. This color caboose is almost always seen as Western Pacific.

Dagnabit it, Steve!

Your Marx HO stuff tries its best to fling a fever on me to get me some!!

Andre

One of the toughest Marx clockwork 933 variations to find. Battery headlight.

Steve

@Steve "Papa" Eastman- Great find Steve, really unique.

Don

1962 Marx Allstate 9622 Rock Island freight set. I recently found this in an antique store for the bargain price of $68. It was almost complete, even had the road bed track and 8 extra straight roadbed track sections. The Erie flat car was missing the Sears truck and trailer, but Steve Eastman came to the rescue and sold me one! Thank you Steve!

@milnyc posted:

1962 Marx Allstate 9622 Rock Island freight set. I recently found this in an antique store for the bargain price of $68. It was almost complete, even had the road bed track and 8 extra straight roadbed track sections. The Erie flat car was missing the Sears truck and trailer, but Steve Eastman came to the rescue and sold me one! Thank you Steve!

Glad to help.

nice score

Short video of my Seaboard ABA pulling 12 cars.

Steve

Marx S3 custom painted for Bessemer and Lake Erie (bought that way on Ebay).  Rear truck has a Lionel coupler

Marx Rock Island E units in action.  I modified these engines with a Lionel coupler on the B unit and a lock out switch on the Marx reverse unit.