What is your favorite Aquarium Car?

have 3 ,Beatles -Yellow Submarine (favorite).the lobster car ,which I repainted and decaled an older car, bought the film on the lionel parts site.The wizard of oz. I also added leds ,same type that I  used in passenger cars.

rich b

I have the fondest memories of traveling to SeaWorld San Antonio (The last place anyone would see a water-themed resort, deep in the heart of Texas, but im not gonna question it), so the Lionel #26853 SeaWorld Aquarium Car speaks to me on a personal level. The entertainment, roller coasters I never rode, smelly flamingos, the halloween event, it all takes me back to a more innocent time of my life

hello guys and gals

I have the railking version of the aquarium car # 30-79280 and bought it new in Dec 2010 and it is 9 years old and still runs trouble free.  I just ran it today for 10 mins still no problems.  This is my first aquarium car !  I like the blue marlins !!! It is a GREAT operating car.

Tiffany 

I have three MTH aquarium cars.  I've always thought the fully filled windows, louvered glass, and operating mechanism make the MTH versions best.

Lobster car

Tuna car

I like the Blue Marlin car a lot, but, I don't have one.

Jerry

  The backlighted "big L" is one of the nicest uses of on stock branding Lionel did imo. The light placement highlights it and still manages to provide a moody, murky ambiance. That gives this style points out of the gate.

State O Maine-ish & lobsters is the closer, pass the butter tanker eh?

I like my homemade Aquarium car although I now have a Lionel made one.  This shorter car just works well with my O27 layout.

The homemade aquarium Car was made by cutting out the windows in Lionel Scout type 8 inch box car.  A Lionel Aquarium car sea background was purchased at a train show but one can be made from parchment paper.   Plastic fish were cut out of clear plastic from old toy boxes and colored with Sharpies.  The fish were suspended from the roof with 4 lb fish reel clear leader line and glued to the fish and roof with glass clear cement.  This allows the fish to wiggle and move with the train motion.  Lights were added to the roof and a pickup made.

The light pick ups were made from brass shim stock and added to a non operating Lionel coupler truck.  A piece of tin can was added to improve durability of brass shim stock.

Charlie

Hi, I AMA 

Long time fan of the aquarium cars since my mom got me one for Christmas in the 60's.  I have one of the original Vibromotor versions and one of the newer Lionel motor driven versions. 

I am looking at getting at an MTH one but they all say you need a special track section to get the car to operate. Will they work on Lionel tubular trace with an UCS control track?

thanks,

Kevin

I have owned several aquarium cars over the years, but got rid of them all because high maintenance and erratic motions. Then my wife won this Lionel 3435 Traveling Aquarium, Gil Finn'sTrout ranch built in 1996 as a door prize at a train show. It actually runs very good.

Kevin, No issue on your mth question. They have a roller for the middle rail and operate when the track is powered.

My favorite is the "Alien Transport" car, which is rather macabre for me, as I like aliens. "Gort! Klaatu barada nikto!"

The LOTS National Aquarium Car.

Been to the National Aquarium in Baltimore several times. It's a favorite museum for my daughter. Found the aquarium car at a Greenberg show in Edison NJ.

The NLOE (Nassau Lionel Operating Engineers) did a club aquarium car that was for Petland, a local Long Island pet store chain.

Sadly I can't figure out how to link to a local picture.

The MTH Aquarium cars are especially nice because they come w/ 3 LED's for interior illumination. They are equipped with an on/off switch and are motorized. The don't require any special track activation device to make them work.  I swapped all my gear driven Lionel cars with motorized units so they all operate while being staged near the aquarium waiting to be unloaded. I also installed LED 12v cool white strips and removed all bulbs. They are easily wired to the motor board which supplys DC power to the motor. They look great & operate with little heat for hours. I also plan to install Cool White LED's in the Aquarium itself.  There are 5 command cars w/ sound. 4 whale sound cars & 1 shark car.

I only own one aquarium car (which automatically makes it my favorite), which is this one which I created as the NLOE 2011 club car.

John

Tom,

Extremely cool.  One of these days, I'll do the same.

Couldn't agree more about the MTH aquarium cars.

Jerry

Jeff T posted:

As a Chicagoan it has to be the Shedd Aquarium car the CLRRC did in 1998. Try to find one! 

This is probably my favorite as well, just because of trips taken to Chicago and remembering many visits to the Shedd when the kids were younger. This was originally a gear-driven car, but I converted it to motor-driven using another Lionel aquarium car and swapping shells. Incidentally, for some time now the Lionel cars have had dual overhead lights.

tr18 posted:

I only own one aquarium car (which automatically makes it my favorite), which is this one which I created as the NLOE 2011 club car.

John

 

Those did come out really nice.... hard to believe those were almost 8 years ago!

I've got a few Aquarium cars, but I struggle to pick a favorite.  The 16681 Gold colored one is pretty nice looking, as well as lots of the custom ones shown in posts above.  The one from maybe 7-8 years ago with a train going around instead of fish was nice, but of course it really shouldn't count as an aquarium, really just using the aquarium car mechanism.

Unfortunately the ones that were less than anticipated stick in my mind more.... the one from 1997 (8?) with the "3d" phrase applied to it was sort of a turkey in my mind.  It was something interesting to try, but the actual design hardly counts as a true Aquarium car since nothing moves (though I suppose the intent was for the stickers with holographic tech  to trick our eyes into seeing some sort of "motion" as it went by.)  Also, the latest Disney one where they advertised with both a motor and light and it arrived with neither wasn't too great, though the graphics were OK.

Sorry.  Didn't mean to derail the thread too much.

-Dave

BwanaBob posted:

The NLOE (Nassau Lionel Operating Engineers) did a club aquarium car that was for Petland, a local Long Island pet store chain.

Sadly I can't figure out how to link to a local picture.

 

Local?  This site needs a copy of the picture file or must link, or allow an embedding.  If already on this site, just copy paste link address (r.click/long press pic).

Try the desktop view setting on a device's browser or a new browser if things don't work.

   Stored on another site, copy/paste page url address from at the top. (it will change to a link when you post).

On a host site (Ytube, flicker, whatever), you want to copy the share/ embed and open the filmstrip above, and select the embed tab, then past it there. Embedding is when the picture/video stays there, plays here. (won't work from home unless you never shutoff or disconnect...so you upload a copy to ogrf, like this......)

Local on your drive, start up a cursor in text box to post here, as you do there's an attachment tool that shows in the lower right, in blue, with a paperclip icon. Use it, find the photo, wait for loading to tell you you're successful, choose more? check off insert large which appears after sucess. Hit "finish", finish up reply, post. 

Ya gotta dip your toe in water sooner or later; worst case scenario, you delete a failed attemt and try again

I don't follow your instructions.  The picture I had was on my PC, not on an external site.  When I tried to add a picture it did not give me a file explorer to "find" my picture.  Or is that not an option?

BwanaBob posted:

I don't follow your instructions.  The picture I had was on my PC, not on an external site.  When I tried to add a picture it did not give me a file explorer to "find" my picture.  Or is that not an option?

Click the text outlined in red in this pic when you are composing a message. 

It should open a standard file management window asking you for the file you want to upload with your post.

-Dave

You have to type or at least set the cursor in the composing box for the tool to show up.