Well... not just yet... and when it does happen it will have its own thread which will ultimately have to be locked by the administrators. We will keep this thread as civil as possible... after all we can now 'almost' officially rejoice the decision by Kato to make a new steam locomotive. There will be plenty of time to stir-up a hornets nest of complaints once they are actually produced. In the meantime... I'm sure there will be soooo... many disappointed eastern railroad modelers complaining that Kato has 'snubbed' the eastern US railroads again and begin requesting a New York Central 4-6-4 Dreyfuss Hudson or at the very least a 4-8-4 Niagara for next year. Pennsy fans will continue looking for a new K4 Pacific class as well. The C&O & Virginian modelers are still waiting for the Allegheny/Blue Ridge 2-6-6-6 as well. But western modelers of the Milwaukee Road will want a 'shovel-nosed' F7 Hudson as well as a Bi-polar Electric. The Santa Fe crowd is wondering when they will get an 'actual' Santa-Fe class heavy 2-10-2. I'm sure there are many others that are waiting for an essential steam locomotive for their rosters. For many modelers... the announcement of an FEF-3... will be just another disappointment because they are waiting for other steam or diesel power. I'm not an avid Union Pacific modeler... in fact... for years I was anti U.P. I would not buy anything made with the Armour Yellow/Harbor Mist Grey paint. But... I finally got assimilated with the arrival of the Athearn Challenger and Big Boy. I now look at the 'missing' ICONIC steam locomotives as items to obtain even if they don't really fit my model railroad preferred era and locale. Those of us in the +60 age group want these ICONIC locomotives or passenger consists now ... so we can enjoy them. It goes hand-in-hand with Carl Sowell's comment on this thread... which I'm guessing was about buying into rumors. My feeling is that his comment also applies to getting something you want before it's too late.
Hey, I am part of the ATSF crowd and I already have all the Texas class steamers I need. I am screaming about 4-8-4's, which greatly outnumbered the 2-10-2/2-10-4's in my modeling adaptation. Give me more Mikados with oil tenders not coal, and while we are at it, make it easier to install decoders in the Mikes! Member of ATSF crowd signing off......
The boiler is a scale 1 inch to wide ! The windows are a scale 1/2 inch to short ! The headlight led is the wrong color ! The ride height is to high ! The drivers are all wrong ! The handrails are way to thick ! A coreless motors...what where they thinking ?? ! The couplers are waaaaaayyyyyyyyyy to big !! The siderods are all funky !! It wont do a scale 120 mph at full throttle ! The pilot truck just looks wierd ! Whats up with that articulated undercarriage on the tender...thats not prototypical !!! The color doesnt match anything I own ! They didnt make it in my roadname ! I want a K4 !!!!!!!!!! *I'm sure there is more...after all...its a Kato !!!!!
David, Count me in. Add one more to your request. George, LOL some awesome list you have there. You are so right there is more. You forgot to nitpick one essential flaw. It says Onion Pacific and not Union Pacific on the tender. Ok, so the locomotive is fictitious and although this isn't April Fools, it is Father's Day and darn if this dad didn't have his hopes up. Let me guess it doesn't (does not) come DCC ready and there is no sound. It must be my turn again for the internet to frustrate me. I've tried a edit twice and it got lost in the wash. One more time. The paint scheme is not the UP Black or the Greyhound, it's a yellow Heritage paint scheme. All said that's ok with me as long as it has directional lighting and there are figures sitting in the cab running the locomotive. Oh and if all it does is run backwards...well...I may have to think that one through. Have a great Father's Day.
George, Good one...LOL. According to certain NMRA Ninja's the nose is that of a Hudson and not a typical northern. Never mind the shovel nosed scoop of a snow plow on the cow catcher. Welcome to nit pickers row. Pick you a basket full and enjoy the day. Heeheehee
At least one dealer has posted the news to their site: http://www.nscaledivision.com/frames_page.htm Note to moderator: No discussion or commentary involved. Simply posting the fact that a particular dealer has certain info on their site - just as someone else did recently with a dealer listing on that auction site.
What ever the purpose was for Kato USA, they have stirred up interest. I like American steam locomotives, so I might opt for one if I still have a layout.
Our son and daughter in law drove in from Nevada with our new 4 week old grandaughter ! Its a great Fathers Day weekend already
This is for real? Kato News of a FEF 3 is welcomed by this TB participant. Let's see how many cans and plastic bottles is that? Are those real elephant ears on the front end?:teeth:
Good news indeed! Question for the UP experts: Did the FEF ever pull a COLA and, if so, how close/far would the prototype consist have been (era wise) from the current Kato COLA? Thx.
Jack, that would be a no. The COLA was conceived as a Streamliner, and from the very beginning always had E units "assigned". Did it ever beak down and got bailed out by a steam engine like the FEF? Well, not likely but possible, but certainly not with the more modern KATO set which has cars dating it to what, post 1954? By that time, there were plenty of other diesels available to pinch hit. Sorry.... The 800's would be more appropriate on second tier trains like the Challenger, LosAngeles Limited and the Transcon. As a side note, the the famous Transcon wreck caused by excessive speed just outside od Victorville had an FEF-3 on it, in two tone gray, along with a bunch od TTG cars. Pretty... Regards, Otto K.
My head is about to explode (along with my wallet)! BLI releasing the M1 and now Kato finally releasing the long rumored FEF on similar timeframes. This is awesome for n scale steam fans. I'm already in for 5 M1s...time to finish the layout so I can pull the UP excursion train with the kato FEF. Thank you for sharing the info. John
Thanks for the info. I'm now wondering if there is any chance that Kato will release an appropriate set of passenger cars for the FEF. I'm not much interested in modeling the current excursion train, but would be delighted if Kato were to offer something prototypically correct for the timeframe when the FEF was in full service.
No doubt they will paint it some day in TT gray. And they would be smart to paint cars to go with it.
