Beginning about 5 or 6 years ago, I remember even inexpensive Lionel locomotives such as the $100 0-6-0 Docksider and $225 2-8-4 mini Berkshire coming with an engineer and fireman in the cab. That was not the norm before then.

Now I'm not obsessed with scale or engines that have every little detail on them. In fact, I think that some expensive scale engines have too much fragile detail on them that breaks off too easily. We see those threads on this forum every now and then. Sometimes less detail with a lower price, is better than too much fragile detail with a higher price. I, for one, want quality locos that run without easily breaking, and are not museum pieces that wind up sitting on a shelf because they are too fragile.

However, what I would like to see is the various manufacturers offer a few passengers in each passenger car of their moderately priced passenger cars. How many real trains actually don't have a few passengers in them most of the time? Answer, not many. I am not advocating they be included in the passenger cars of budget priced starter sets (many of them come with passenger silohouettes in the windows), and some of the expensive scale sized cars already have them. But I don't see why they are not offered in the 4 pack of $220-250 passenger car sets typical of the 13 inch Lionel or 16 1/2 inch MTH Railking sets. I for one would pay a little more, $10-15, for moderately priced passenger sets that came with a few passengers in each of the cars. We should also remember that typically one of the four cars in the sets is a baggage car, so we are really talking about adding passengers to 3 cars. At the manfufacturing level, I think the cost(s) to do this would be minimal.

I know some of you buy RMT's "beeple" or other premade passengers and glue them to the seats of your passenger cars. However, some of us don't have the time or interest to want to do that.

What I would like to know is if you think if there is a market for the manufacturers to offer medium priced passenger cars that already come with the passengers in them from the factory. I for one think there would be. As I said above, beginning in the last few years, even low priced locos now come with a fireman and engineer in the cab. Adding a few passengers to the passenger cars should be the next logical step.

What do you think?

Thanks for reading in advance.

Erol

I agree Erol, we now see the higher end cars with passengers in them. It's just a matter of time until we see them in the other levels. hopefully soon.

I'm with you Erol. I don't like these silloettes (sorry about the spelling), they spoil a nice set. The opaque window like on the Harry Potter cars are not much better. A moulded interior with some passengers would be cheap to make and add considerably to a car's look.

I agree. The silloute thing is way old school, let move ahead and make that the real inexpensive stuff and populate the passenger cars!

Stuff above the starter set level should have crew in engines and passengers in passenger cars.

Agreed. The first thing I do is add passengers if they don't have them included.

I would not pay the extra $10-$15 for passengers.

quote:

I would not pay the extra $10-$15 for passengers

I agree with Erol on this and I would definitely pay for having some people already added in to the passenger cars. I add them myself and I can tell you that the cost buying them aftermarket is substantially higher then 10 -15 dollars. Heck for some of the older RailKing engines I have that didn't come with cab figures I added them and Arttista figures are like 6 bucks each.

I would guess that painted figures are labor intensive ($$$) and thats why you dont see them.

But it would cost pennies to include a tree of un-painted figures, so that those who want them could invest their time in painting them and installing them.

I don't believe painted passengers or engineer figures would be prohibitive for train manufacturers considering they do them in quanities. Chinese painting is cheap, but watch out for the lead.

I believe the transition to LED lighting is more important to me than people. I run, like many new O gauge train operators, at 14-15VAC which makes the present incondecent lighting too bright. I would want the manufacturers to move to change lighting before adding people. Window shades would be a nice touch with off-white instead of clear or brilliant white for plastic strips.

IMHO.

Tex

quote:

I for one would pay a little more, $10-15, for moderately priced passenger sets that came with a few passengers in each of the cars.

I would go for that, as well--perhaps even a bit more if they were decently done figures and if there was more than a handful in each car.

As for crew figures, I don't think I have more than a very few locomotives that don't have those figures included, ranging from the Lionel Dockside up through the MTH Premier versions and most everything in between.

Locolawyer is right. Mid-range passenger cars should have passengers in them.
Unfortunately, while the price of such cars has increased, no passengers have been added to the cars. Manufacturers are missing an opportunity to differentiate their product with passenger figures and thereby increase sales.

Tony
Up on "The D & H Bridge Line"

Erol,

As you know I'm a post war guy and passenger cars don't have people in them unless its their silhouettes but I have to agree with you. A few more dollars for some seats with people in them is a good idea.

Mike

I agree that it would be nice to have passengers included in the mid-point passenger cars and above. But if that means poorly painted figures in horrid hues of gloss paint, I'd rather just have empty cars.

Jim

I agree and very much so. I'd be more than happy to pay the extra.
As for the silhouette strips....that's another beast. The early Williams (Samshonga) sets had passenger strips in color. I find these sets attractive.

I agree there should be passengers in all cars. I just bought a MTH Florida East coast set "New old stock" and the first thing I did was add passengers to it along with a LED red light for the rear roof and ordered a lit drum head for the rear. All this came to roughly $33 dollars so I can't imagine a few passengers adding that much to the cost but people have to be paid to install them.

Erol, you are right on. I don't believe it is a big deal to provide passengers in ALL price points today. If more of us speak up, the manufacturers will react favorably.

So, after this whole thread. Will AtlasO in their new passenger cars have scale passengers? I see no mention of them in any literature put out by AtlasO.

Let's raise a fuss with Atlas to include passengers. I'll wait for their Union Pacific passenger sets.

I would have gladly paid extra for the passengers. Even after help from this forum it was still a pain to get the cars apart to add passengers myself.

--Greg

Late SP and PC.....WHY?

Actually, has anybody seen a pass train at a station. I know trains these days have coated windows, but even with "heritage" cars, could you REALLY see the passengers in them?

quote:

Originally posted by ezmike:
Erol,

As you know I'm a post war guy and passenger cars don't have people in them unless its their silhouettes....Mike

Congratulations, Mike. You win the spelling bee for the word "silhouettes."

Re: the passenger figures, yes, prices on passenger cars have gone up - like everything else. I think it is totally unrealistic to expect that a manufacturer could put adequate numbers of decently painted passenger figures in their lower priced cars for $10-$15. The labor alone would be significant - I don't think a machine is used to glue passenger figures in different seats, and in standing positions. The cost would be justifiably much more than $10-$15. $10-$15 is nothing.

I put figures in my Lionel Pennsy Baby Madisons (the newer ones with interiors). It was easy, and fun, and of course greatly improved the look of the cars. What was the cost of the figures and glue (never mind labor)? Well, it was a bunch more than $15.00. Check prices of small packages of figures from the manufacturers. They're not cheap.

quote:

I believe the transition to LED lighting is more important to me than people. I run, like many new O gauge train operators, at 14-15VAC which makes the present incondecent lighting too bright. I would want the manufacturers to move to change lighting before adding people. Window shades would be a nice touch with off-white instead of clear or brilliant white for plastic strips.
tex

I agree about the lighting update. bulbs for the most part should be out for O guage trains. LED's should be in! I personally made it a point to transition much of my layout to LED's and not have to worry about replacement bulbs again.

quote:

I don't believe painted passengers or engineer figures would be prohibitive for train manufacturers considering they do them in quanities. Chinese painting is cheap, but watch out for the lead.

IMHO.

Tex

This is also corect. K-line did it with thier 16" aluminum cars as well as 18" and 21"sets. Why can't other mfgs- esp todays huge price increases? YEs the people became ambiguous over time but it's better than nothing inside.

I would pay the extra fifteen bucks a car for four or five passengers in each. In fact a conductor standing in one of the cars would be cool also.

quote:

The cost would be justifiably much more than $10-$15. $10-$15 is nothing.

You may well be right about that.

quote:

Originally posted by Allan Miller:

quote:

The cost would be justifiably much more than $10-$15. $10-$15 is nothing.

You may well be right about that.

I have to disagree guys. Sure if we went out and bought the people they could run about six dollars each, but that's for top of the line product at over the counter prices at our LHS. The manufactures would use a plastic product to better match the cars interiors and they would be buying them in the hundreds or thousands from the factory because the same people could be used in diffrent products. They may have to change the color of their outfits but that should not up the cost that much. I would guess they could bring it in at around two dollars a figure and that includes installation. Six figures a car falls in around two to three bucks a person, or ten to fifteen a car.
I would not be surprised if the local hobby shop only paid half or a little more of what they retail them for.

I have not been impressed by the quality or the number of figures I have seen in more costly passenger cars. I hand paint MTH figures (pk. of 120 for $29.), and use about 25-35 per semi-scale car. I also like to detail the dining car tables, and have standing figures as well (porters, waiters, etc.).

I see both sides. If sold without passengers, than buyers can leave them empty or fill them with whatever quantity of people of any style they want.

If sold WITH passengers, folks would complain about too many, too few, wrong groupings, wrong clothes, wrong era. Remember too the bruhaha about two years ago about the race of the engineer and/or fireman in certain locomotives? Many interiors, such as Lionel semi-scale heavyweights (Madisons) don't take well to passengers with legs - probably ok for us to lop off legs, but would you buy a passenger car with legless people?

Might run into issues too of passengers not matching because they were made at different times. Suppliers may change completely, or maybe changes in paints.

I think the best solution for most of us is do our own populating.

Paul

Well, I look at it this way.
If the mnfrs put figures in what are now "mid" priced cars, that would push the prices up. So they would no longer be "mid" priced, they would now be "high" priced.

To quote my favorite Vorlon - "Yes."

Guys, go to eBay some time and search "O scale figures". Cheap, painted O-compatible plastic figures can be had for $0.04 to $0.30 each in quantity. High-quality, highly-detailed figures are not necessary for car interiors. Very few people will stick their noses close enough to a passenger car to see the figures clearly, and all we really need are figures that have enough of a variety of paint jobs and have enough of a human-shape to give the impression that the cars are populated by a variety of people. When the cars are moving, there is even less of a chance of noticing much detail regarding the figures, but the important impression that there are passengers in the cars will be there.

And seriously, on an assembly line, how long would it take to glue some figures in place? On a cost-per-car basis, you should be able to have some pretty heavily-populated passenger cars for not much more than an extra $5 or so per car. I'd happily pay and extra $5 or $10 for populated cars.

Andy

It's great to have passengers like the MTH premier cars because it is very time consuming to paint and glue in individual figures. I also think a car would increase considerably in price unless the passengers were unpainted and molded in as part of the seats. I put about 20 MTH passengers that I painted in a RK vista dome and it does look good and increases weight too. You used to be able to get a bag of 100 figures from MTH. They were considerably smaller than scale so they fit properly in a Railking car.

Here may be an opportunity for someone to buy a Rapid Prototyping machine, scan passenger figures and reproduce them in plastic and let the painting to the modeler. (Probably a trademark issue though)

Its funny but K-Line was way ahead of this curve.

5 or so years ago they were putting passengers in their 15 inch Madisons. I have a Lackawana set with same...

Absolutely! I'll pay the extra money. I suspect the reason this is not done is because of line differentiation, but I would pay extra for a peopled version. Also, the extra "wow" factor make actually increase overall sales.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Andy Hummell:
To quote my favorite Vorlon - "Yes."

Guys, go to eBay some time and search "O scale figures". Cheap, painted O-compatible plastic figures can be had for $0.04 to $0.30


Hi Andy, I agree with all you said in your post and your pricing is far closer to reality then what I quoted. I just wonted to show how even at an extreme estimate ten to fifteen dollars is very doable.
In fact what people don't understand about the cost factor in producing our toys is that the price of each little do-dad they hang on it has little to do with it's retail tag.
R&D and implementation of assembly are the big cost factors. Doors that open are not expensive because of the cost of the hindges and springs. It's the design and assembly of same that can drive cost through the roof.
If there was no scale people out in the market place then the cost of producing them for a project like the one we are speaking of would be out of the question. But with all the product there is to chose from and the low cost of labor in China there is no reason why they can't lode our passenger cars with a dozen people and still bring to us at only a ten percent increase in cost.

I'm on board with Erol on this one, the cars with detailed interiors, seats instead of silouettes, should come with passangers.

However, the cost is a different matter. K-line before being swallowed up by the other mfg, did include passangers in their cars. Cost to the manufacturer can't be that much at product, however, I understand where they would loose big bucks on the retail end, where, for instance,MTH (don't scream, i'm an MTH guy) soaks us at $29.99 for a dozen figures. The other after market sources are even worse, and Beeple, while more reasonable in cost, are just a smidge too large to fit without partial amputations.

So long story short, come on manufacturers, reward the devoted customers a little, put a crowbar in the wallet, and toss us a few passangers at reasonable cost.

NO.

First, the bundling of passenger cars into sets means that many of us are already paying more than we should be in order to acquire the cars that we want/need. Adding passengers to each car will only give manufacturers an excuse to raise the price further.

The second problem concerns era. Certain open platform passenger cars that were common in the 19th century remained in use well into the 20th century. Victorians in tophats just aren't going to look appropriate in a Depression era setting. Likewise heavyweights managed to survive in service into the 1960s so those 1930-1940 era figures may not seem appropriate in a train being hauled by a GP-7.

I like and enjoy sets with passengers as much as anyone, but those that come with only a small sprinkling of plastic figures, less than half dozen, are not worth it to me. I would as soon have nice silhouettes as nearly empty cars.

Full scale cars are definitely improved by having lots of passengers in the seats and standing in the aisles, but I don't need all my sets to have them, especially if they add much cost to already expensive items. After a time or two around the layout, do you really notice them? To me, having beautiful correct paint, correct windows, correct "stance" and other exterior details are more important overall to my satisfaction.

I did not enjoy populating my cars with the figures myself. It is too hard to find figures that fit decently in the seats of molded interiors of this manufacturer or that manufacturer and I doubt I will do that again.

After spending $25 on 5 people to begin poulating my Santa Fe El Capitan set, a fellow club member tipped me to Golden Gate Hobbies in California. They offer a pack of about 40 O scale figures for around $30. These aren't highly detailed people, but I've discovered that once you have them seated in a passenger car, the lack of detail cannot be noticed. In fact, no one has even noticed that I've had to remove the legs from the knee down in order to fit the figures into the seats.

So, for 40 bucks, I was able to come up with enough passengers to make 5 cars look "normal". If one of the manufacturers can keep the price of a populated car consistent with current pricing plus say about $8-10 for the passengers, sure, I'd consider it a good value.

quote:

Originally posted by Andy Hummell:
Guys, go to eBay some time and search "O scale figures". Cheap, painted O-compatible plastic figures can be had for $0.04 to $0.30 each in quantity. Andy

Unfortunately, almost all of the figures for sale are standing figures. Very few are sitting figures. You'd have to slice the standing figures in half, but that would take some time, make a less secure surface for gluing to seats, and affect appearance (cutting off from the knee down is acceptable, but maybe not cutting from the abdomen down with no legs showing at all).

I bought a two pack of K-line by Lionel Heavy Weight US Army Passanger Cars a few years ago and they had soldiers inside each car. If memory serves me right the list was $125 for two, $250 for four. I got them on early buy so I think I paid about $100 for two. I run them during our holiday show at the BDSME in Bethlehem Pa. I get a lot of compliments on them. Real good buy too.

JohnB

quote:

Originally posted by breezinup:

quote:

Originally posted by Andy Hummell:
Guys, go to eBay some time and search "O scale figures". Cheap, painted O-compatible plastic figures can be had for $0.04 to $0.30 each in quantity. Andy

Unfortunately, almost all of the figures for sale are standing figures. Very few are sitting figures. You'd have to slice the standing figures in half, but that would take some time, make a less secure surface for gluing to seats, and affect appearance.

I wasn't saying that those exact figures should be used. My point was that plastic figures can be made for very little cost and populating a passenger car wouldn't cost very much if you didn't insist on details that no one would ever see.

Andy

Here is a link to the K-line catalog that carried the US Army 15" Heavyweights, you can page forward or back to see other cars offered that year:

http://www.lionel.com/Products...064174F26&PageID=992

JohnB

I'm in the minority on this, but I'd rather do it myself. That way the cars are random.

I thought RK had a pack of sitting people who were "smaller" for pass cars.

Although I think it would be great to see cheaper passenger cars with people (and I definitely would buy them if the price was right), I do like silhouettes. My favorite part is when people ask me why my passengers are only silhouettes, I tell them that the passengers had to pull down the window shades because of the ugly giants outside their windows!

I have a set of Santa Fe El Captain cars. I think LIONEL should of "Molded in the passengers in them! " Evan if all we had to do was paint them! that should cost .50 cents extra to do! .. Hopefully Lionel reads are concerns..DANiel