Zeus Posted October 8, 2019 Share Posted October 8, 2019 As the title suggests im looking at picking up a GP-38-2 in HO scale, ive got around £175 to spend but would like some in the kitty for freight cars, thanks in advance for any advice, Zeus Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
DanielB Posted October 8, 2019 Share Posted October 8, 2019 Kato would be my recommendation. What are you after, DC, DCC, Sound, etc? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisH-UK Posted October 9, 2019 Share Posted October 9, 2019 Horses for courses, do you have a specific railroad or region in mind? I've owned Athearn bluebox, Proto 2k, Atlas Trainman and modified an Atlas Master GP40-2 shell, all to represent specific prototypes operated by Conrail, CSX and NS. Athearn bluebox are widely available for reasonable money, as supplied they are a bit rudimentary but with a bit of work can be detailed up nicely, Atlas Trainman comes with a bit more detail but still need some detail work. Proto 2k aren't around as much, they were usefully priced and included a reasonable amount of detail but were lacking in certain places (such as bogies/trucks). I've yet to try the newest Athearn offering but I would expect it to have most of the right detail for each railroad but not leave you with much change for your freight cars. At this point in time modifying the atlas shell is neither economical on cost nor on time needed, but was a good way for me to combine all the details I needed at the time I did the work (about 10 years ago). Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
pH Posted October 9, 2019 Share Posted October 9, 2019 There's discussion of the different makes of US-outline locos, including GP38-2s, in the first three pages of this topic: https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/130323-possible-us-small-it-started-out-very-small-but-is-turning-into-medium-size-ho-project/ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zeus Posted October 9, 2019 Author Share Posted October 9, 2019 11 hours ago, DanielB said: Kato would be my recommendation. What are you after, DC, DCC, Sound, etc? im looking for atleast DCC and maybe sound if its in the budget. as im building a small 4'2' switching layout as my first build id like sound to provide a little more entertainment Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
mdvle Posted October 9, 2019 Share Posted October 9, 2019 15 hours ago, Zeus said: As the title suggests im looking at picking up a GP-38-2 in HO scale, ive got around £175 to spend but would like some in the kitty for freight cars, thanks in advance for any advice, Any particular reason it has to be a GP38-2? If you can be more flexible you may be able to find a better price. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
long island jack Posted October 9, 2019 Share Posted October 9, 2019 You might be better working your track plan out first, before buying your stock, as you may find stuff to big to fit, just an idea of size a GP is about 8" and 50' box cars are the same, even a 3-2-2 inglenook the head shunt needs to be 24" (GP +2x50' box cars) you may after use 40' box cars and a switcher( 6") for things to fit your 4x2 space. I've tried to work a plan in to a 4x2 pace ,never found anything I was happy with, good luck trying! Ray Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
mdvle Posted October 9, 2019 Share Posted October 9, 2019 Agree, 4x2 is likely to be a disappointment in HO. Really need to look at N if you are stuck at that size, or if N is not for you then maybe OO with some of the industrial stuff that has been recently released (it would be nice if someone would release a model of the TP56 which would help a lot with coming up with feasible American small layouts). 1 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zeus Posted October 9, 2019 Author Share Posted October 9, 2019 2 hours ago, long island jack said: You might be better working your track plan out first, before buying your stock, as you may find stuff to big to fit, just an idea of size a GP is about 8" and 50' box cars are the same, even a 3-2-2 inglenook the head shunt needs to be 24" (GP +2x50' box cars) you may after use 40' box cars and a switcher( 6") for things to fit your 4x2 space. I've tried to work a plan in to a 4x2 pace ,never found anything I was happy with, good luck trying! Ray Hi Ray Im im probably going to use this plan and im probably looking more towards a smaller switcher, but I do like the look of the gp-38-2 so I would like one to shuttle around, im looking more towards an sw1500 or GE 70T with 40' boxcars thanks, Joe Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prof Klyzlr Posted October 10, 2019 Share Posted October 10, 2019 Dear Joe, SWs, NWs, and Alco S switchers are a good match for "Pine Ridge 2", esp when hosting 50' cars, as I found with "Brooklyn : 3AM" (a kitbashed variant of "PR2", tweaked to better represent the Loft Building 20 area on NYCH RR, on the corner of 41st and 2nd) http://www.carendt.com/small-layout-scrapbook/page-87-july-2009/ Geeps and CF7s can work, but it can get awful squeezy... (and by strange quirk actually seem to fit better with 40' cars...) 4x ? has never been a disappointment for me personally in HO SG, but _any_ "Micro layout" sized mission takes conscious and studious effort to optimise, when you only have 48 linear inches to work with, you can't afford to waste a single one... (as Iain Rice noted "...a spur which holds 1 1/2 cars is no more useful than a spur which holds only 1 car, and significantly less-useful than a spur which holds 2x cars clear at a pinch...") Looking forward to seeing where this mission leads you... Happy Modelling, Aim to Improve, Prof Klyzlr PS Might be worth doing some roaming around on Lance Mindheim's site and here on RMWeb RE "clip on staging". even the excellent PR2 plan can benefit from a "track on a stick"/"offstage" extension, if space allows... 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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