Other items I collect.

Well, Country Joe, we all have our "druthers".
We won't hold it against you.



just curious, do you have a pile of magazines somewhere, or maybe certain glasses you use for certain drinks?

Not to be a smart guy but what is it?

Dave

Oh, I agree. IMHO, if you regularly run what you own, I don't consider that "collecting". Buying stuff and never taking it out of the boxes, or racking the stuff up and almost never running it, just to be able to say (or know) you have it, is the "collecting" I'm talking about.

OTOH, a lot of our fellow enthusiasts *do* seem to enjoy just accumulating the stuff rather than using it as it was designed. *That* seems a shame to me, if only for the enjoyment they are denying to all those who might actually make good use of the stuff. Collecting bottle caps or figurines or other objects does not seem quite as bad, but for items designed to be used (like model trains or cars, for instance), ISTM they should either *be* used, or passed on to those who will. But, to each his/her own . . . 

Welllll... as has been noted, to each his own, and one of those "own" categories is essentially a blend of collecting and "running" where "running" implies doing something besides just having the trains on display.

  For me a blend approach is the only thing possible.  Because of space considerations, operating layouts are, as I've mentioned previously, restricted to the world of the Broadloom Conspiracy - temporary.  The actual "active" space I have for "running" is about 4x6 feet. 

 There is also the issue of a train being able to run at all.  For example, ever since I learned about the second generation of American Flyer cast iron superstructure locomotives from the 1930-1932 period I've been on the hunt for them. Unfortunately, their drive wheels are diecast with nickel plated tires and, with only the rarest of exceptions, they are "blown" which means running is impossible. There are available pre-war reproduction drivers which can be made to work with these engines but they don't look anything like the originals and I really don't care for them....so, what to do.  

  I like photography and I enjoy assembling dioramas and 4x6 feet can give the impression of the whole world if you want it to.  Since a photograph is static, running is not a problem and I can use any train I want to.  In the case of the Flyer engines mentioned above I put together a ready line diorama featuring nothing but these engines.  I slipped a thin piece of plastic between the commutator and  the brushes.  This disabled the motor but still allowed electric current to get to the headlight.  On two of the engines the swelling of the wheel dicast had resulted in the gauge being wider than 3 rail O so I took a scrap piece of rail and ground out the inside part of the rail to accommodate the "swollen wheel gauge".  Once I had everything in place I set up the diorama and got the following result:


 

AF3020, here's my 3195/3196 (3197), or at least I think that's how they numbered them. I haven't had this on the track for years, but it ran fine last I did. Maybe I need to pull it out and check it over:




What do ya think? Original wheels? I'm not sure...

That my friend is a modified custom 1987 Pontiac Fiero GT. It features a reworked leather interior, a GM 2006 3800 SC(supercharged engine), 4 speed 4T65eHD automatic transmission with many select custom speed equipment parts on the engine and suspension. Its fuel injected and the best part is that it gets 29 hwy MPG on my trips to the GM Nationals at Carlisle every June. Most of the time it can be seen in NJ at area cruise nights in Somerville and Flemington.  The Pontiac Fiero was the only mid engined car that GM made up until the new Corvette made its debut.

healey36 I don't want to derail this thread but since you asked - you are correct - Flyer had separate numbers for the engine, the tender, and the engine/tender combination.  Most collectors don't bother with the engine/tender number identifier rather they will just give the engine number or if it is one of the "odd" combination of engine/tender they will give the number of each one.

For the second generation the engine numbers are 3195, 3195X, 3197, 3198, 3180, 3190, 915 and 1084.

3195 and 3197 are the same construct with 3197 having a manual reverse.

3195X has the same motor as 3195 and 3197 but has a different superstructure casting - as far as I know it is only marked as such (3195X) by a rubber stamp ID underneath the cab.

3198 is a completely different casting with 0-4-0 wheel arrangement and 

3180 and 3190 are essentially a "stretched" 3198 casting with a separate steam chest casting and either a -0-4-0 or a 2-4-0 wheel arrangement - (3180 is 0-4-0 and 3190 is 2-4-0).

The first version of the 3198 appears to have been very short lived.

The casting with the 3180/3190 superstructure was later substituted for the 3198 and can be found with that identification.  For this version as well as the 3180/3190 the ID is rubber stamped on the underside of the cowcatcher.

915 is  the bottom of the line and it went into production in 1932 and lasted through 1934 - it came in two versions an inside gear motor and an outside gear motor.

1084 is a "cute" cast iron engine - it was never catalogued and only listed/illustrated on dealer price sheets.

...and now I'll try to get back to the purpose of this thread.