Wish Menards would make Black Single Dome tank cars

That sounds like a great idea! I second this.

Yes, if there is ever a car that call for long consists, it's these.  And selling these by the lot, like Menard's does with other cars, would be a huge winner.  I agree that you do not need lettering either, making them even cheaper to make.  The ones I see on the long trains bound for the Bakken fields in North Dakota right now have no lettering.

Great idea, I'd love a bunch of cheap tank cars.

I like the one posted above but plain is ok too.  Could always paint over the lettering.  Good idea.

I am mostly interested in regional and defunct oil companies, but strings of GATX and

UTLX black single dome tankers (I am guessing the ones in current use, such as to Bakken, are not the old cars as depicted above in "Sinclair" livery) are legit for anywhere (in times past).

What I always have been looking for too.  I grew up in the 40s and 50s and there were lots of them.

.....

Dennis

I agree too, Don!  I would buy some!

Mark told me he is working on a tank car and it will come down the line in a little time, I had asked for a black single doom 8000 gal tank car from them a few month back.

I'm in for a few.

Sinclair had the biggest fleet of tank cars in the country at one time. It would be an excellent choice. I'd buy a dozen of the black ones with white lettering. 

Bob

Watch for future Menards advertising.They are listening and seeing what we are buying from them.

A string of Sinclair or Gulf black tankers would be very cool.

    Bill T.

If they're listening I hope they make them with Kadee mounting pads.

Question...when did the safety platforms around the dome become the norm?  I've seen cars without anything, with a simple board(s) on either side to stand on, and the platform with rail.

I don't recall ever seeing anything but black tankcars in my area when I was growing up.

While they're at it, how about a Tankar Gas Station like this one that was here in town:

I made one in HO years ago:

31.9/gallon!!!  Of course I was only making $1.73/hr back then too.

Great idea!

Great idea!  I am in for at least one set of 8 tank cars!

I would definitely be in for a string or two of the black Sinclair tank cars.....Paul

This car is a special run that Atlas made for The Public Delivery Track.  Very nice scale tank cars and still available, but at $70/car, a large string of them would hurt the wallet.  Here is your opportunity Menard's . . .

Prototype photo

Bob

Count me in also. Black Sinclair or Gulf.

These recent mentions of Menard's is the first I've heard of them supplying O-gauge parts.  Anyone know if products will be carried in all stores, and will it only be at Christmas or year round?  (Not that it really matters, since their Christmas stuff seems to be posted 6 months of the year anyway!)

I belieave I had sugested this earlyer this year.

If they would start out with Sinclair, to get some of there tooling $$'s back and do an undecorated [black] car, singles and bached and get alot of their tooling $$'s back then they could play the delivery field like they have with their box cars.

Try Menards on line.

I'd go for 10 of these in Sinclair livery. Saw these in Wellsville NY when we'd go to watch The Wellsville Braves farm club baseball team! Class D...I think?

At any rate....Mr. Menards Man......please consider a run of these tankers!

I like to see a plain black Union tank car (UTLX) not union gas. I would buy a couple dozen in a heartbeat, I also buy Sinclair, Gulf, Sunoco, Shell, Atlantic, and yes I like my black tank cars!

Pure had them too.

I'd be happy with, Gulf, Texaco, esso. I'm surprised MTH has never made single dome gulf

rat

scottydl,

As Doug mentioned, all of our O gauge offerings are on our website. Just search "train stuff." I can confirm that there will be train cars and buildings in our stores this Christmas. However, I cannot tell you with complete certainty what items will be available in our stores. If you live near a store, you can always have these items shipped to the store for free!

-Mark the Menards Train Guy

Bob, I'm with you. I have one Atlas Sinclair tank car. That's what got me thinking how great it would be to have a long string of them. Only one problem. $70 each. Don

Thanks Mark, I checked out the site.  I didn't see any track bundles listed there, so hopefully that will become something that the store can offer in the future (that's primarily what I'm shopping for at the moment).

I would suspect that Menards isn't going to be able to produce a car with the current levels of scale fidelity everyone expects today and at a fraction of everyone else's retail.

So far Menards has been able to take advantage of existing tooling and dies... which helps account for the low cost to consumers. Folks have given some grace to Menards for things like "Built by Menards" and stickers for car numbers... they may be sequential, but still inaccurate - all in exchange for a price point that currently no one can match for a brand new piece of rolling stock. If Lionel, MTH or Atlas did that to lower the price, whoa! I can't imagine the critical comments.

I would also suspect the availability of duplicate or available scale tooling and dies is scarce. Of all the flat cars Menards has made, only one is "scale" and that one appears to be on a detail level of the older Lionel Standard O types of cars AND NOT detail levels of current O scale offerings.

This isn't to say Menards cannot do it. But given the high cost of tooling, IF Menards was considering this, I would strongly suspect they'd take a middle of the road approach: Something that would appeal to semi-scale operators. And the less research and precise engineering, the less cost for the tooling and dies.

More than likely though, they'd probably have to gain access to some sort of tooling or purchase the plain molded cars and have them custom decorated... which could possibly be the explanation for the one single scale flat car(?). You'd think they would have offered more of these, right? Or maybe they haven't sold as well as the other type of traditional flat car Menards offers.

Either way, interesting how Mark remained silent on the whole tank car topic. Smart! Which is the way Menards has been operating: To not discuss products until they are available. The only thing Mark has specifically made mention of here, that I know of, is that Menards is currently planning on introducing O gauge tubular track.

I think we should be thankful for the products Menards has offered. And if they can figure out how to expand at the same price points, I'm sure they will. But I highly suspect we won't see any products from costly, newly engineered and made tooling... and definitely not at their current rolling stock price points.

There has to be an old O gauge tank car injection mold sitting unused somewhere.

Andrew

Don't know who owns the K-line single dome tank car molds but if they could get them just paint them black. It would be easy to add some grab rails, scale ladder and a few other details. You'd have a nice looking car. Don

Never bought from Menards. Can you mail order from them or do have to buy from a store. We don't have any Menards on the islands. don

The K-Line single dome tank car is being marketed by RMT. Whether RMT actually now owns the dies or not is anyone's guess. Unless things have changed, when Kader (Sanda Kan) had their big shake down and dropped dozens of companies, Aristo Craft was one of the companies not dropped. At the time, RMT was affiliated with Aristo Craft. So one could guess that unless Kader sold all the molds to RMT, that Kader is still making the products for RMT.

There have been some modifications made to some of the prior K-Line molds by RMT, such as with the Bang S-4 and the RDC Buddy. Whether those alterations were made to the original molds or to duplicate molds, I have no idea.

It's been said that Menards is having their trains made by Golden Wheel Die Cast, though I personally can find no verification. Still, it's highly unlikely that dies, molds, tooling from Kader would be allowed to be used by another company that is in competition with them for a contractor that is undercutting them in price.

On a side note, Bachmann has said they have nothing to do with the making of the Menards box car. I'd take a stab and be willing to bet that however Golden Wheel got duplicate or unused tooling to that car, Bachmann is sorry about it now... sales of the WBB box car have probably taken a nose dive. And I'm not implying anything was done wrong. Obviously if there was something wrong, Bachmann would have likely taken some sort of action on the matter.

They will ship to you, Don, even to paradise. Here's a link to their "Train Stuff" page:

https://www.menards.com/main/c-14331.htm

Since Golden Wheel Die Cast is manufacturing Menards rolling stock I would guess that for the tankers to be manufactured they would have to be in possession of the tooling. Mark has stated that down the line there will be other types of rolling stock.

   Bill T

I would guess that the expense for Menards to fund their NASCAR racing teams would dwarf what Lionel, MTH and Atlas spends on tooling.

    Bill T.

I just hope when the tank cars are made the dome cap or the end caps come off so I can add weight.

.....

Dennis

That is the correct one I think most of us would like to see it in whatever marking given, The one I can remember was the Peter supply version they did that looked the closest with the proper dome. I have not found one since then done that way.

I'm in!  Especially if they're weighted properly.

     Hoppy