Particularly, I was wondering if the weaver observation cars come with marker lamps and a lit drumhead? Unfortunately their website doesn't show much.

Are weaver cars good in general? The first passenger car I bought last month was a Lionel 18" aluminum fleet of modernism scheme. How does weaver in general compare to lionel scale passenger cars?

These are the cars, I am thinking of ordering.

I have a few of the older sets with window strips. The newer ones have seats and interior details. They are as good as anyones except for maybe K-Lines which I think made the best passenger cars. I found most other brands similar in appearance and design.

The old cars had 4 light bulbs mounted on the floor. I installed overhead LED lighting to replace them.

Dale H

The weaver cars are 20 inch long.
I have several and they run well.
I run them with my K-Line and GGD scale passenger cars.

all i know is that the new Weavers are pretty heavy

I have the 20" N&W cars. They are great!!

...keep the rails polished...

quote:

Originally posted by Lucas Liska:
all i know is that the new Weavers are pretty heavy

Yep, and the Golden Gate Depot extruded aluminum cars are even heavier!

There is a review of these cars, and specifically the PRR set, in a recent issue of either OGR or CTT, I am not sure which. What I remember from the review is that they are good cars, the biggest flaw is that the color around the window band, which on the prototype is a dark maroon, is nearly black on the Weaver car. I'd suggest you try to locate a copy of the review, sorry I can't remember exactly where but it's within the last 3-4 months.

I would also refer to the OGR review as a starting point although I've never seen a bad review in the magazine.

Editorial aside, I think Weaver makes a decent car and are very close to scale length. The older cars with the silhouettes are effectively the same extrusion that was offered by Williams in their 20" line, but with a few extra additions. The latest release are good generic cars.

For the price though, I'd vote for the various GGD sets. Accurate cars with very nice trucks for a competitive price and higher detail.

No slight to Weaver as I love their stuff, but in this case GGD gets the call.

I have the Weaver Norfolk and Western sets and like them a lot. They are much better that the Golden Gate Depot cars that have not been made and are not planned for production any time soon, if at all.

The GGD cars are barely out. I think I would wait and take a look. My studied opinion is that the new GGD aluminum cars are about twice as good as the K-Line 21" cars, for the same price. (I have a fleet of K-Lines, all converted to 2-rail.)

Advantages of GGD, near as I can tell so far - trucks that are an order of magnitude more realistic - almost flush windows - metal details, except for underbody - better door details than K-Line. Main disadvantage is that the diaphragms might be a bit stiff, but 3-railers will never know, because you cannot couple them tight enough for contact and still make it around O-72 curves. And they are somewhat heavy, but I like that.

20" long? I'm impressed. But will these weaver cars run on my O72 curves without any problems?

The lionel 18" aluminum car I got runs fine on O72, I'm very happy with it.

Also, will weight be a problem? How many weaver cars could pulled by the average lionel steam behemoth?

And concerning the people...the only thing I am not happy with in the Lionel fleet of modernism sound car are the figurines inside, they kinda remind me of finely crafted fischer price men and women, it comes off as a little tacky...to me, no offence to those who like them.

Do the Weaver figurines look more era appropriate? Can these figurines be removed if I wish?

Oh yeah, not sure if I missed this, but do the Weaver observation cars come with lit broadway limited drumhead and illuminated red marker lamps?

quote:

Originally posted by rjake4454:
Particularly, I was wondering if the weaver observation cars come with marker lamps and a lit drumhead? Unfortunately their website doesn't show much.

There are markers but they are not lit. There is no lighted drumhead. The Norfolk and Western set correctly omits the baggage car and it is replaced by a second sleeping car.

The GGD cars are nicer and worth owning, but some road names are not available. For the PRR cars, Weaver charges $600 MSRP for a five car set, GGD charges $600 MSRP a four car set. GGD is not offering an observation car for its PRR brown cars. Hope this helps.

An update on GGD's PRR streamlined cars is that the set originally planned has been cancelled.

What will be offered is an accurate model of the PRR 1948 Broadway Limited in two sets of 4 cars each.
Set A will include a 12 and 4 duplex, 4-4-2, and two 10 and 6 sleepers
Set B will have a twin unit kitchen-diner, lounge, and flat end observation

Cars will be painted tuscan with dulux (yellow) striping. No plans at this time for the Loewy "Fleet of Modernism" 2 tone tuscan that Weaver did as that would not be correct for the cars GGD is doing.

The sleeper configurations were also used on many other PRR trains in addition to The Broadway Limited.

Bob, Announcements due noted but where do one place the reservation? I think I saw set PRR Set A but I didn't see Set B under the reservation form.

Since the Pennsy did not have boat-tail observations in a PRR
lettering scheme (they were flat-tailed), wouldn't that be more
of a concern than a color discrepancy?

Lee

Pennsy started with mostly round end observations and the very first streamlined Broadway of 1938 had round end obs as did most PRR trains starting out. The blunt end observations came into play on the '48 Broadway and later trains to allow the obs to run front, back or mid train. Many of the older round end obs were rebuilt with blunt ends, but a few survived through the end of the PRR on some lesser secondary trains.

In that regard, the Weaver set is actually accurate to that paint scheme.

Unlit markers and no lighted drumhead? Yikes, I think I'll pass on weaver, I'll look for the lionel cars.

Thanks, you just saved me a ton of money. In my opinion, any O gauge observation car of that scale length and price should come with lit markers and drumhead.

I agree rjake4454...Weaver needs to update their streamline cars. The addition of interiors is nice, now they need to finish what they have started and make these cars great! Speaking of the streamliners, I would put the GGD cars in first place, K-line cars in second place with Weaver closely behind.

Alan

Weaver could also benefit greatly from new scale sized passenger trucks. GGD's GSC Type 41's are outstanding and K-Line's version is still a good look with a little additional details like break shoes or modification to the later disc brakes.

Can you guys do me a big favor and tell me what company makes this Norfolk and Western streamlined observation? Click on the video at 1:18

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...QMJo&feature=related

I really want passenger cars like that.

Looks like the MTH N&W passenger set to me.

Alan

Those are indeed MTH N&W Premier passenger cars. However, as nice as they are, the round end observation car is incorrect for N&W. The N&W did NOT have those molded-in marker lights nor the big red tail light on the top rear of the obs end.

Also, I'm pretty sure you will find that the most recent Weaver 20" N&W passenger cars are a LOT less expensive than the 18" Lionel N&W cars (which are coupled WAY too far apart).

Mike P.,
I just checked the GGD website and the 1948 Broadway is not on there yet. The 4 car PRR sleeper set in the ad is incorrect. Scott is leaving Wednesday for the Orient, but I will let Marcy know to update the website to accurately reflect the PRR offering.

Thanks for noticing.

quote:

Originally posted by Hot Water:
Those are indeed MTH N&W Premier passenger cars. However, as nice as they are, the round end observation car is incorrect for N&W. The N&W did NOT have those molded-in marker lights nor the big red tail light on the top rear of the obs end.

Also, I'm pretty sure you will find that the most recent Weaver 20" N&W passenger cars are a LOT less expensive than the 18" Lionel N&W cars (which are coupled WAY too far apart).

You are right about the MTH Premier cars,they look very nice, but not prototypical in that regard, thanks for pointing that out. Much appreciated.

I would like to ask you a question about the Lionel upscale passenger cars in general.

Basically, the plan is to collect the whole set of lionel aluminum prr trailblazer cars, decorated in Raymond Loewy's fleet of modernism paint scheme, as pictured in this video I found on this site:


http://www.glancytrains.com/railsounds/index.htm


Under steam engines movies, look up and click on the file named t1-runby.wmv

That right there is my dream set. But are the ones pictured in the video 15" or 18" ?

Now, last month, I bought my first one of these, the catch is, the store had the only one left in stock, which happened to be 18" and it was the Diner sounds car, so I bought it for a decent price of $200. I don't care so much for the station/dining announcements, but what is amazing is the clickety clack sound Lionel produces, it helps with the realism on the layout a lot.

But here's the thing, after watching that video again, those cars being pulled by that massive T1 duplex appear to be shorter than mine, leading me to believe that they are indeed the 15" version. But I have to admit, whatever they are, I like the look of them much better than the one I have. The windows look better, so does the lettering for Pennsylvania, more futura lettering style, really reminding you of Loewy's design. The problem with mine is the lettering seems too big and intrusive, and I am afraid they are so large, they actually would take the attention off the T1, in a sense, making it look smaller. Also, the people inside mine look really tacky, why couldn't lionel make the interiors look just a tad less silly? I noticed the same thing about the new K-Line fleet of modernism cars, they look amazing on the outside, but the fischer price looking figurines inside them kinda ruin it for me. What I was expecting to find inside were people sitting, wearing era appropriate clothes, like men dressed up in pin striped suits of the 40s, and women wearing retro clothing, etc. Not these silly little people, there was even a guy with goatee, tee shirt, and so on, looking like the fleet of modernism was taking him to starbucks present day. Its absurd.


I'm hoping the smaller 15' cars windows actually limit the vision inside. I would almost prefer no figures at all, but hey, what can I do?

Anyway, sorry for meandering, back to the point. Were the 15" cars designed for the lionmaster series or something? Because that T1 in the video was the scale version, and those cars looked fine, I didn't think they looked too small.

What did you think of the cars in the video? They looked era appropriate, perhaps not perfectly scale, but not very noticeable in my opinion.

per Bob Heil

quote:

An update on GGD's PRR streamlined cars is that the set originally planned has been cancelled.

What will be offered is an accurate model of the PRR 1948 Broadway Limited in two sets of 4 cars each.
Set A will include a 12 and 4 duplex, 4-4-2, and two 10 and 6 sleepers
Set B will have a twin unit kitchen-diner, lounge, and flat end observation

This makes a skinny B'Way. But, buy another Set A plus a pair of Mac Shops 21R kits and you're almost there. You're still shy a pair of 4-4-2 cars and you have an extra 10-6. 'Twould be nice if GGD offered the cars separately at some point.
Worst is not having the M70 that ran on the B'Way.

Rex
before you start being so critical of the fine effort being undertaken by GGD, a little more research may be in order.
On August 4th 1949 the Broadway Limited arrived at Penn Station in NYC with four [4] 10 roomette, 6 doublebed room cars - Lehigh Rapids, Little Miami Rapids, Tippecanoe Rapids, and Racoon Rapids.

The other sleeper cars in the consist were Imperal Peak, Imperal Ridge, Conewago Creek and two 21 roomette cars Zanesville Inn, Alliance Inn.

It would be difficult to say exactly what the consist of sleeper cars were on the Broadway on any given trip during the late fourties early fifties.

That's why I bought several packets of the CHAMP decals for the Pennsy postwar lightweights

Critical? Moi? Au contraire Except for the Budd 21R sleepers, GGD is making all the cars we need. Maybe the GGD can port over something from one of their other LtWt trains.
The B'Way consist I compared to came from Stegmaier's book and is appropriate for 1952. Joe Welsh's book shows the 1949 consist to be closer to GGD's sets, except for the 21R sleepers, if you buy two of Set A.
Regardless, when GGD posts the reservations on its website, I'm signing up.

quote:

Weaver needs to update their streamline cars.

They also need to make a different casting for the car ends.
How many of you have noticed that the ends of the Weaver cars actually have two diaphrams? One the end casting representing a full body diaphram and then the narrow rubber diaphram. While the end casting on them may be a decent representation of a full body diaphram, not every RR used full body diaphrams, the N&W was one.

In an attempt to stave off a disaster when the rerun of these cars were first announced, I sent Weaver a letter (even sent them some photos) asking them to make a different end casting for the cars. Alas, my pleas fell on deaf ears. Actually, they sent me a nastygram telling me to mind my own business. So, I did exactly that, I walked out the hobby shop door empty handed. There is still a set of Weaver N&W passenger cars setting on the hobby shop floor.

quote:

Originally posted by rex desilets:
I'm signing up.

good idea
me too

Rex and Charlie,

The reason for not including the Budd built 21 roomette Inn series cars in the 1948 Broadway train is that the currently selected builder plans to do smooth side cars only which obviously precludes the fluted Budd cars.

Since the project is in its start up phase it is possible that the 4 car sleeper packages may be offered as;
- two 10 and 6, 4-4-2, and 12 and 4 duplex

- two 4-4-2, 10 and 6, 12 and 4 duplex

Obviously there will be different car names in each set to permit buyers some flexibility, and most likely, there will be different choices in each set.

I do not know if Mac Shops still has the extrusion for the 21 roomettes. I purchased one from Haynes about 6 - 8 years ago, and he was almost out of that extrusion then.

With the Weaver and Atlas options for postal cars, even though they are not exactly correct for PRR, you will probably not see a GGD BM70.

It is anticipated that the same builder of the recently released 1938 20th Century train will be used for the Broadway Limited and Columbian.

Bob-Just bought a 21R from Mac Shops. No indication that the supply was especially limited.

quote:

Originally posted by rjake4454:
Unlit markers and no lighted drumhead? Yikes, I think I'll pass on weaver, I'll look for the lionel cars.

Thanks, you just saved me a ton of money. In my opinion, any O gauge observation car of that scale length and price should come with lit markers and drumhead.

Beware of the Lionel cars. Word is that Lionel glues the car windows on the outside of the cars!

quote:

Originally posted by rheil:
Rex and Charlie,

The reason for not including the Budd built 21 roomette Inn series cars in the 1948 Broadway train is that the currently selected builder plans to do smooth side cars only which obviously precludes the fluted Budd cars.

Since the project is in its start up phase it is possible that the 4 car sleeper packages may be offered as;
- two 10 and 6, 4-4-2, and 12 and 4 duplex

- two 4-4-2, 10 and 6, 12 and 4 duplex

Obviously there will be different car names in each set to permit buyers some flexibility, and most likely, there will be different choices in each set.

I do not know if Mac Shops still has the extrusion for the 21 roomettes. I purchased one from Haynes about 6 - 8 years ago, and he was almost out of that extrusion then.

With the Weaver and Atlas options for postal cars, even though they are not exactly correct for PRR, you will probably not see a GGD BM70.

It is anticipated that the same builder of the recently released 1938 20th Century train will be used for the Broadway Limited and Columbian.

Is the B&O set also offered in the A set/B set configuration?

ChessieMan,
The B&O's Columbian will be offered in two 4 car sets:

- a set with 4 coaches
- a set with combine, diner, dome, observation

Like the PRR train these sets will most likely be offered about 4 to 6 months apart to spread expenses for buyers (at least that is the current plan).

Rex,
Good to know about the Mac Shops 21 roomette. Might have to get another one.

rheil--

I was asking about the B&O sleeper car sets. I have little interest in the all-coach Columbian.

ChessieMan,
The plan to offer 4 car sleeper sets for numerous roads has been changed (read postponed) for the time being. It may be resurrected after the sleepers for The Broadway are produced.

As you are aware the problem for B&O is that the 14 and 4 and 10 and 6 are the best smooth side cars to do and The Broadway did not have Pullman Standard 14 and 4 cars leaving the 10 and 6 as the only accurate sleeping car for the B&O that GGD has plans to do right now.

Keep the faith. It may still happen in the future, as I sure could use some streamlined B&O sleepers on my layout.

Rjake,

I own the latest release of the Weaver Pennsy FOM cars. To answer your questions:

The side marker lights are lit in red, and the rear taillight is lit in white. There is a drumhead, and it is not lit.

As compared to the Lionel 18 inchers, the Weaver cars are a scale 21 inches long. The additional lenght IMO makes them look more realistic than the shorter cars, especially when being pulled by a long ABA of EMD E units. I can't help you with more comparisons as I dont own the Lionel 18 inchers.

My only complaint with the Weaver cars is that the couplers tend to open by themselves...so I wired them all shut...end of problem.

These cars are very nice.

Craig
I saw the FOM cars at the WEAVER plant.
I agree they are good looking cars, with very nicely done paint and lettering.

I have two of the older WEAVER FOM sleepers and a postwar lounge.
I frequently mix in with my K-Line 21" cars

Charlie,

I bought these at the Weaver plant on the OGR tour this Spring, and carried them back with me. Weaver had them discounted to a very nice price, the savings paid for the Tour, and then some.

Thanks Weaver and OGR!