Will 3D printing continue to expand the options? What would it cost to make in N Scale * 40' flat car * 40' box car * Shorty tank car * Longer tank car?
Well I thought about my original post here, saying I am cheap, C&L Layout, stands for Cheap Layout. Nothing cheap about it, really. But guess what, not this year. I have spend more on this hobby this year in one year than ever. Since I finally decided to make it an actual layout, well my way, build two new nice bases, with 2" foam, paint it, try to make it as nice looking as my skills will allow New and used locomotives, repairing locomotives, new motors, etc... and a ton of other stuff. To the point finally. I was running my trains last night and noticed most of my MT coupler ones are not very good. So 2022 and beyond gonna try and find good deals in the Swap Meet, which I prefer, local hobby shop, also prefer and can find great deals too, and last online, I hate paying shipping to those big retail train online stores! I would like something in N Scale that I can put my trailers on, similar to this. Bought the trailers on here in the Swap Meet! I would like something like the Atlas Yellow ones. But they don't stay on the track very well and have old style couplers on them, not MT type!
In2Tech, BLMA made some nice trinity 5 & 3 unit spine cars for trailers. Atlas also made some front runner spine cars which are nice too. The latter accommodate up to 48' where the trinity's work up to 53'. Both can be found on ebay although the atlas ones are more reasonably priced. You may also need to swap out the couplers on the atlas as most came with the rapido couplers. I converted mine using MTL 1129.
Atlas is very close to releasing the spine cars but they will be expensive. I think list price is $200 for a 5 pack so expect street price around $140. These are the BLMA tooling.
Absolutely! Pennies, literally(if you don't include the cost of wheels). I'm planning on printing a unit coal train of 50 - 100 cars. I've still got a bit of work to do before I'm happy with the final design, but I've got working prototypes where I have printed the entire car except for the wheels, so that includes couplers and trucks, for about $0.50.
Yeah I am gonna try swapping out the coupler to MT first, but I still have my doubt's about them working very well! We will see! I do know I am buying the MT couplers already assembled, been through the trying to assemble them myself. Did not work out well
Hope so. These are the kind I would be interested in. Of course getting small engines would be nice to. And assembled couplers for this old fart.
When retail prices climbed past the upper twenty dollars range, they exceeded my budget. Have not purchased a car in quite some years now. I wish otherwise, but that is MY reality.
I have too many cars and too many too many locomotives to even worry about anything new. I think the FVM GEVO's were the last purchase of any rolling stock. Just could not pull the trigger on the NYC passenger cars and locomotives, and I love passenger cars!
Well, I don't know about the rest of you but I got an overabundance of rolling stock (and engines too). That includes a lot of open hoppers, mostly 2 bays, that I purchased back in the day when one did not have to refinance their home to buy stuff. Since switching to DCC, my analog stuff has rarely seen the light of day. I want to pack it up (the engines) and sell them just to clear the way. As for the rolling stock a lot were going to be fodder for projects that either were never started or were halted mid-way through. All those MT truck/couplers purchased for when the projects were finished made their way to other uses. I guess I know what is going to be first on my New Years resolution list!
