I’ve seen a lot of different things on eBay over the years. Never saw something like this before. Described as “heavily damaged” brass Overland cabooses. Looking at the details and they appear to be LV North Eastern cabooses. What a shame. These images lifted from the auction.
I will admit to looking at what hits the auction site. I have picked up a few things there over the years. Ok, more than I want to admit to, but this auction this week really amazes me. A Golden Gate Depot PRR 10-6 Pullman Factory painted sold for $1731.00.
Someone REALLY WANTED this one. I hope they don’t change their modeling focus in a year or two and try to sell it for this price.
We have all watched auctions that the seller set too high a starting price for something and then it sits on the auction site for months while everyone waits for the seller to lower the price. We all also know folks that have no patience and go after some of that overpriced stuff just because they think they may never see another one and they have to have THAT one.
This one started at a reasonable price of $100. I know I watched it with the thought of turning it into something other than PRR if it stayed low enough. It didn’t.
To put this into context, the new B&O 10-6 Pullmans that Golden Gate Depot has on their website currently are priced at $349 each.
This was not an accident. There were 29 bids on this car. I don’t get it. It’s not a set of cars. It was ONE car!
I’m happy for the seller, we all know the background in the images. Here are some of the images of the car from the auction.
“Caveat Emptor” is a Latin phrase that means “let the buyer beware.”
I had two years of Latin while in High School, but that is not what I want to talk about. I think I’m going to start a new “Category” for the site called “Caveat Emptor“
Today, I saw this on the auction site. It was listed as “YODER PRR 50 TON FREIGHT TRUCKS.” It clearly isn’t.
As you can see in the photos, the truck does not have a spring plank, brake beams or brake shoes. Also the wheels appear to be plastic and without any backside relief. This sure looks like an Athearn truck that was painted red.
We have all done this, buy a pair of trucks at a show to replace a pair on a finished car. When you are done installing the new trucks on the car you put the old trucks into the box. It a convenient place to store the old trucks. I know I’ve done it with some trucks.
Trouble is when someone buys a collection and has no idea what these are and lists them as a pair of brass trucks when in reality they are cheap plastic trucks. It’s even worse when they ask more for the trucks than when they were new from the importer.
Just be careful, not everyone selling stuff knows what they are selling.
Model photos cropped and edited from online images.
Sunset imported EMD F3 A’s and B’s painted decorated for the Reading a few years ago. I did not order any as I DO NOT like to buy any new model sight unseen. This was the first time they were being built and you have no idea if the model will be accurate.
This weekend I finally saw photos of an actual model that was produced. I was not impressed and I’m VERY GLAD I did not order any.
The Reading EMD F3’s were classed as DF-2. They styled very similarly to the later F7’s. The had the later low profile 36 inch fans on the roof. They had the later large angled number boards on the nose. They also had Stainless steel grills on the top of the sides of the locomotives. Outwardly they were often misidentified as F7’s. The only real visual difference is the dynamic brake grid on the roof, they had a pair rectangular roof grids for the Dynamic Brakes instead of the F7’s 36 inch low profile fan.
Below are photos of the Sunset 3rd Rail Reading EMD F3 release.
These views of the A unit show what is wrong with the model:
The B Unit also has inaccuracies:
I’m not a fan of the model companies current practice of producing a run of a model. They expect you to buy a model sight unseen before ANY photos are released of an actual model. I have only done this one or two times before. Haven’t always been happy with what was produced. And haven’t always been able to sell off the unwanted BAD model.
When you mention this to other modelers they just say order it or don’t, the manufactures don’t really care. Well I care. I’d rather have a correct model than the beginning of an expensive project to add to the project list. My project list is already too large!
Faced with the future options of having to order a model before it’s produced, I think I’ve ordered my last new model for this lifetime.
I did not order any of these models from Sunset 3rd Rail. Now having seen the actual model that was imported, I’m VERY glad I didn’t.
Makes me again say, I will not order any models sight unseen. If that means I don’t get the New Whatever, so what? I have more than enough models here now to keep my project list full for the rest of my lifetime and maybe another lifetime in addition.
Model photos cropped and edited from online images.
Prototype images from scanned photos and negatives from my collection.