On the Intermountain site, they said that the autoracks are in transit. I can't find a single on line dealer saying anything these. Has anyone heard anything?
I believe when the say in transit it could mean that they're on a boat floating across the Pacific. I've got several on order, and I'm guessing they'll be on my layout before the end of the year.
I can't remember exactly but somewhere I saw Feb 2022. They went to "in transit" status last month if memory serves me right so you got the journey across the pacific then about 30 days of sitting in the harbor. Completely unknown to me till a few months back was that scaletrains is putting out their rivet counter autoracks with an arrival date of Dec 6. I'm already on the hook for some intermountains but I'm going to try and snag at least one of the scaletrains versions.
The Scale Trains versions look really nice EXCEPT the sides are plastic instead of the etched metal sides. I have always thought the Red Caboose models were far superior to anything other autorack because of the sides. The Scale Trains autoracks are very modern ones and I did order six different ones. I see about half of them are sold out as well.
The intermountains seem to be lacking in the brake detail department.. specifically, showing the chain linkage from the hand brake lever to the connecting rods. Maybe these are all pre-production images and that will be modeled on the final product? I can model that detail myself if they don't and it annoys me enough lol. The other miss that all of them seem to make is using molded hand grabs instead of applied. Maybe scaletrains is applied? I can't tell from the illustrated images on their site. All of these observances are nit-picky but for as much $$$ as they ask I would hope there would be at least one model that addresses all of these to make the king of all n scale autoracks. Operating doors would make me weak in the knees I've got a few of the micro trains versions all of which are well done. If scaletrains use plastic sides I might steer clear of them if they look it. Would clash (to me) with the MTL's I already have. I've never seen the red-caboose IRL. Comparing pics of red caboose autoracks to what is on the intermountain site it looks as if intermountain purchased red caboose's molds and used them for this recent production. What got me interested in the IM versions was the ability to get up to 12 more cars in the UP road. Won't be getting all of them but waiting and hoping for MTL to release another UP version could see me well into my twilight years
