Central and western European diesels and electrics

It's nice to see the "JC" logo on the locomotive.

JC - GySEV - Taurus - Electric loco - Liszt (AC)




Brawa - MAV - Passenger car

QUOTE (reddo @ 18 Apr 2016, 21:51) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Thanks - very interesting. If you do a search ACME katalog on Google - it brings up many links for pdf downloads of their catalogues. Seems 2011 was their 10th Anniversary year...
Next week, when I'm in Europe, I will pick up one or two of the ACME coaches to see what the quality is like and speaking of Munich, this next model isn't the greatest as far as detail goes but it's a nice souvenir from a couple of years back.

Marklin - Octoberfest refrigerated car


hobby trade - DB AG double-deck driving trailer (AC)

QUOTE (reddo @ 19 Apr 2016, 22:20) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Hi Adrian

Yes - they are strangely interesting, not least for the masochistic way they lay out their catalogs (do we guess which are HO and which are N gauge?)

I saw that Arleccino - it could only be Italian, especially with the ice cream vendor pelmet in the front windows And there is a silver version as well...some nice pictures in the 2014 catalogue which one of the dealers sent me.

I do like the way they focus on named carriage sets; quite a niche approach, and they seem to sell-out quickly...

Hello,
Yes Reddo, the named sets are an interesting twist and the carriage mix should agree with the members here who remind us that mixed carriage types in consists are the norm. Currently the Paris-Rome express 4-car set is on offer. According to the photo, a certificate included shows 450 sets made. The Holland-Italien set is available to pre-order.
These sets make a nice change from the standard, german, one-type-of-carriage issues. Whilst tempting, they're the wrong era for me and would open up another world of expense. I ended up ordering an EraII FS 2nd class coach as an evaluation.

And I'm back. I bought 6 locos and some cars to go with them and while most of the models will stay at my place in Europe, I did bring some with me and took a few pics before leaving. What's even more fun is that I managed to take pics of some of the corresponding 1/1's. The first model is a decent replica of a Czech railways workhorse made by Skoda and used in domestic and international passenger and freight service.

MTB - CD 163 029 2 Electric locomotive (DC)

I also avoid the Oktoberfest for a variety of reasons:

1. Cost of a hotel room can treble in price during the Oktoberfest
2. Munich beer is far too sweet for me
3. Getting drunken colleagues back to their hotels late at night is akin to herding cats
4. Trying to keep a straight face when your boss asks if he looks good in his newly acquired lederhosen
5. I always drink to the bottom of my glass whilst others only drink half of theirs
6. You have to drink fast or the bottom half litre in your litre glass gets warm
7. I forget who I am by the third day
8. Go blind on the 4th

Best to go at another time and search for a place that sells Andechs beer on draft (aus dem Fass) but of course each to his own.

Turning to the Czech locos ............ those Skodas come in a variety of guises, DC 1.5/3kV, AC/DC 3kV/25kV plus the DC 3kV/15kV variants. They also come in a dazzling array of paint jobs so model collectors and photographers always have something to look forward to.


Class 362 3kVdc/25kV 50 Hz at Praha hlavní (Prague main station) in March 2005. Re-geared from 120kph to 140 kph.

I have a couple of Piko models of these Skodas somewhere in a box in a garage!!!!

Also a note on the Taurus featured earlier in the thread .............. in trials it was found that a Taurus coupled to a Traxx loco could work in multiple as long as the Taurus was leading. Something to do with the flexibility of Siemens software as the Bombardier Traxx software could not control the Taurus. This is anecdotal as told to me by a homologation expert.

Best regards ................... Greyvoices (alias John)

QUOTE (Greyvoices @ 12 Jun 2016, 09:31) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Turning to the Czech locos ............ those Skodas come in a variety of guises, DC 1.5/3kV, AC/DC 3kV/25kV plus the DC 3kV/15kV variants. They also come in a dazzling array of paint jobs so model collectors and photographers always have something to look forward to.

I have a couple of Piko models of these Skodas somewhere in a box in a garage!!!!

Also a note on the Taurus featured earlier in the thread .............. in trials it was found that a Taurus coupled to a Traxx loco could work in multiple as long as the Taurus was leading. Something to do with the flexibility of Siemens software as the Bombardier Traxx software could not control the Taurus. This is anecdotal as told to me by a homologation expert.

Best regards ................... Greyvoices (alias John)
Hi John, nice shot of the 362 in Prague. You're right about the variety of colors and not only on the Czech Railways' rolling stock but also the Slovak and Czech cargo locos. At the model train shop where I got my MTB model pictured earlier, they also had a Piko version in the same livery but at nearly double the price. It was the better model of the two and I might still get it on my next trip.





Funny you should mention the Siemens vs. Bombardier issue. I just talked to a Metrans Rail driver who said that when they were looking for new locos, they test drove the Traxx and Vectron units and ended up buying 30 new Traxx locos.