Rush Hour in HO Scale - a load of secondhand 1:87 vehicles for the modules

I picked up a couple of lots of HO scale vehicles on ebay over the past couple of weeks, and I now have a selection of different cars and commercial vehicles suitable for any era from the 50's to present day.

These were bulk lots and they included a few random matchbox toys and other non-scale vehicles which I have already discarded, the joys of purchasing job lots :)

 A pair of Busch GMC 'fishbowl' New York buses.  One of them is faded and missing the aircon unit.

Three Ford C trucks - Dawson Lager tractor/trailer and a couple of short wheelbase units.

 A couple of Classic Metal Works International R-190 trucks.

 An Athearn Ford F850 stock truck in New York Central livery.

 

A Busch La France articulated fire ladder truck. 

 Three squad cars, each from a different decade.

 A classic ConCor U-Haul truck and a Boley GMC Topkick wrecker.

 More Busch, including a couple of fifties classics and an airport taxi.

 

 A pair of Promotex Mack CH603 tractors

 A Boley International dump truck.

A Boley International refrigerated box truck.

These vehicles should cover most of what I need for my freemo modules, and because they were so cheap I can safely use them at exhibitions without worrying too much about them getting lost or broken.

It's incredible how much these models cost new, the Busch models are especially expensive with new ones listed at over £20 on the Walther website.  Because I bought in bulk these cars only cost me an average of £2.50 each which is a big saving (or a massive depreciation depending on your point of view!).

I'd still like a few more sedans and regular cars to bulk out the streets, and I'm particularly keen to get some of the civilian version of the Atlas 'Automotive Masterpiece' Ford Custom sedan and the Mini Metals Impalas - especially the Taxi version.

I'll be keeping an eye on ebay for more bargain lots.  You should do the same if you fancy adding some cheap traffic to your HO layout or module.

Proto 2000 50' Single Door Boxcar Kits

I picked up another couple of boxcars for Godinez, these are Proto 2000 50ft single door boxcars in kit form, the original Life Like release from around ten years ago.  

These cars are available in the Walthers Proto range as assembled models for around £22 but I picked up these kits for less than £6 each on ebay.

These are the first Proto boxcar kits I've bought, but they are every bit as detailed as the Proto locomotives and include lots of detail parts and come complete with knuckle couplers and metal wheels.

I'm planning to paint over the roadnames and decal these models for 'The Rock' with the expectation that the weathering will cover any differences in the paint colour becasue matching the exact shade of brown on these cars will be tricky.

Crawley Exhibition 2013

The first official outing for our club modules was this years Crawley MRS held a couple of weeks ago at Tanbridge House school in Horsham.

The weekend was a bit wet and windy, but there was still a good turn out for the show, especially on the Saturday, with plenty of families in attendance alongside the regular hardcore modellers.

I put some extra time into my module to get the buildings completed and painted, I was able to finish the glazing and roofs on all of them, but the signage and interior detailing will need to be completed later.

The other club members pulled out all the stops to get the connecting boards and the yard completed in time, and we had a full circuit of boards with scenery that included my town and Pete's swing bridge.

I was able to run some of my stock, including my new Genesis GP38-2 and a host of Norfolk Southern locos including my Kato GE set and the SD80MACs.

There were plenty of great layouts and exhibits to see and I've added a few photographs of them below:

 

 

High Nose Genesis Geep 38-2

The latest addition to my roster is a brand new Athearn Genesis GP38-2 in Southern livery, this is the latest release in the Genesis range and comes with an incredible number of factory fitted detail parts.  I opted for the Tsunami sound equipped version which gives the usual high quality audio and rounds off the model nicely.

I pre-ordered this model when they were first announced over a year ago, with my model coming from Model Junction in Slough who were very efficient as usual and it arrived very safely packaged and ready to go.

I have several Athearn blue-box geeps on the workbench but this Genesis model really sets a new bar for superdetailing, even more so that the recent Athearn GP15 or SD70ACE releases, and the sheer amount of detailing on this model would be hard to beat even with a box full of Detail Associates parts.

The thing that strikes me about the factory detailing is how crisp and perfect everything is, even the tiniest details are applied with no visible glue residue and the factory paint is incredible, with even the smallest warning stickers easily legible.  

The factory printing on these models is far beyond what can be achieved with waterslide decals and it's unlikely that any of my own superdetailing projects would stand up to the level of scrutiny that this Genesis model can.

This Southern version features the same hood bells as the Genesis SD45, but the model also has walkway lights, sight glass and what appear to be even finer handrails than previous releases.  Compared to Atlas or Proto these details are much finer.

So, yet another superb model from Athearn Genesis, and one of my favourite locomotives.  My first US outline model was a blue box Geep 38-2 in the late eighties so it's great to have a new version from Athearn after all these years and this model certainly sets the bar for other manufacturers to match, my only real worry would be that the detailing is so fine that it's really difficult to handle the model for fear of damaging it!   What we really need is an enterprising company to devise an affordable method of transporting models like this for shows and the like, because getting it in and out of the sturdy Genesis packaging can take quite a few minutes.