MEGA Vintage Athearn Locomotive Collection - Let's See What Runs!
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- Опубликовано: 14 фев 2024
- In 2021 I received a message from a guy named Ricky saying he had acquired a massive lot of vintage Athearn blue box locomotives which he no longer had space for.
He offered me the entire collection provided I paid for the shipping which seemed like an incredible offer so I sent him the funds. Around a week later he said he was ready to ship out the trains and then his account disappeared.
At this point I assumed I had been scammed however a year and a half later I received another message explaining what happened and that the trains were on their way.
They eventually arrived and today I finally got the chance to open them up and see what the condition of each locomotive was. 
Развлечения
The red black and yellow SF locomotives are Santa Fe. That’s the Kodachrome paint scheme from when they were going to merge with southern pacific but the merger wasn’t approved. They were going to paint SPSF on them once the merger was approved. Since it was never approved the joke is that SPSF stands for “shouldn’t paint so fast”. You can also find Southern Pacific locomotives with the same paint scheme just lettered SP.
Don't forget the SP locomotives have the text offset from the Santa Fe units, they were all set so they just had to add the two letters to all of them and they were pre-aligned. Would Have made the merger paints simple to do had they been able to merge
@@raymarshall6721 most of them were lettered as SPSF but were "fixed" after the deal fell through
@@aspenGF8 incorrect
To
BNSF should do a SPSF Heritage Unit
I am jealous of the fact that every single one of these units is an Athearn blue box
Seeing all of those BNSF locos reminds me of when I used to work with the BNSF at their Phoenix Mobest yard. Phoenix is a terminus for BNSF, so loaded trains would come in with 3 or 4 locos on them and stop. Then they had to get empty train cars out of Phoenix to the rest of the system. They'd also occasionally have to send extra locomotives out to the rest of the system. Twice a day they'd run a "Baretable" train of empty container cars out to LA, and occasionally combine it with a "power move" of excess locos. I saw trains with 9 or 10 locomotives heading out at least once a week.
Were you working there prior to the merger or only after it was known as BNSF?
@@SMTMainline After the merger. It was back in 2014.
@@SMTMainline❤😂😊
Great way to start a Friday morning
Super. A lifetime supply of HO locomotives for most model railroaders for free, and only three out of dozens of boxes of locomotives and train cars and train stuff donated and mailed to you. Incredible. Hello again from the Tracy Mountain Railway in Colorado. 💙 T.E.N.
In a time where products are designed and manufactured for planned obsolescence it is so nice to see the longevity of an Athearn Blue Box locomotive. A model that could be built 30 years ago, run hard for years, put away in storage for a decade then brought back into operation with minor servicing. I could handle a few Athearn project locomotives but the amount sent to you would seem a bit overwhelming to me!
They are remarkable. I’m sure they were a brand of choice compared to much of the junk being rolled out in the 80s
Got an Athearn blue box Milwaukee Road GP9 when I was a kid, so would have been about 1991 or '92. It was still working when packed up around a decade ago, and I wouldn't be surprised if I took it out of storage today and put it on the track it would start right up!
@@BadgerlandRailVideos My wife got a standard issue Athearn F7 Santa Fe Warbonnet with the chunky metal weight that sits above the motor back around 1988 on her 16th birthday. Probably run just for a couple years then packed up. Got it out of storage last month, lubed it, added kadee couplers, and replaced the wheelset since the gears on the originals were cracked. It runs really well! It is now the designated passenger train locomotive. Meanwhile I also got my childhood Life-Like and Bachmann F9s and GP38-2s out of storage as well...yeah those units... hmmm...not run so well LOL!
He did it again, folks, he bought another collection of engines
Better yet, they’re all Athearn!
The strength of the blue-box line (of locomotives and rolling stock) is their simplicity and robustness. They’re really easy to service as well. One thing I like to do is solder some 24-26 ga. stranded wire from the metal strip on top of the motor to the metal current-pickups on both trucks, as well as the one on the light; this improves the conductivity as opposed to the metal current pickups just riding on the top strip with only the springiness to rely on. 😊
The long nose Santa Fe SD units were called "Snoots". They held the first version of electronic loco-control in the nose. Yep, late 70's or early 80's electronics. No vacuum tubes. "Solid-state" as we called it back in those days.
Edit: Michael beat me to it. Still, for the algorithm. One more thing. If you want to accurately portray the Espee units, mask off the numbers and then completely coat the sides/top with grey primer and then dust the roof with flat black. You want to barely see the color underneath. I saw many an Espee with the cab numbers wiped clean, and nothing else. Running diesels constantly in tunnels and snow sheds makes that happen.
I’m definitely sad to see that they weren’t handled properly during shipping but super happy you finally got to see what was in those boxes!
Have fun!
Ricky 🚂
OMG it's just unbelievable, here in Argentina you have to save a lot of time to be able to afford one of those, they're sold as "new" and really expensive :(
You're really lucky to live in a country with good economy and to have such generous friends!!
Yes, feel lucky here in USA too. I feel for you that the situation in your country makes it more difficult and expensive for people to enjoy this cool hobby and others. I'm glad hat a minimum of used equipment can still offer lots of fun operating potential. Plus, there are so many other fun parts of the hobby to enjoy like I do.
Not everyone in North America has the time, money, space or anything else to get into a hobby. Many struggle just for housing, food - things are not cheap, many hours must be worked by lower income people just for basics.
I bought only my first HO train set new and a few engines and cars on sale a long time ago. I could not buy any new equipment these days. I am content and thankful that I can buy a used piece here and there and fix it up. Learning how SMT Mainline fixes these things is inspiring to me and fun to watch!
It’s fun having you pen boxes! Feel like I’m right there w/you!! A ghost…haha😂😅🎉❤
Wow Harrison nice haul from this guy named Ricky here! Very generous of him to send you all of this! I also have a Santa Fe fp45 too from athearn.
The "SF" locomotives are actually Santa Fe locomotives in a paint scheme called the "kodachrome" paint scheme. Some SP or Southern Pacific locomotives also had the "Kodachrome" paint scheme. It was supposed to be a merger between the Santa Fe and Southern Pacific in 1987, but they were a little too confident the merger was going to happen, so they painted some units in the kodachrome paint scheme and the railroad that the unit belonged to would for example if it was a Southern pacific locomotive it would only say SP and they would add the SF later when the merger happend and vice versa with the Santa fe. But when the "SPSF" (Southern Pacific Santa Fe) merger was denied by the ICC, they had units that were left on both railroad in a merger scheme that never happened. Railfans eventually made a joke about the failed merger, and they started calling it a joke. "Shouldn't paint so fast," railfans called it. I think there might still be at least 5 units still in the kodachrome paint scheme from 1987 running around the United States ringht now. Well, besides that, this was a fantastic video!
The ATSF Geep is a GP50. You can tell by the longer hoods and larger radiators (as compared to a GP40). GP38s only have two fans. Also, the road number checks out against a GP50 (796317-4) built in 1981.
here's some info on the actual locomotives (if they existed in real life):
2:20 ATSF 0-6-0 switcher, appears to be fictitious.
2:35 ATSF F7A #271C, no information found, although likely retired.
3:03 BN SD40-2 #6777, appears to be retired.
3:11 BNSF SD40-2 #6836, still in service on BNSF to this day.
3:17 BNSF SD40-2 #6915, still in service on BNSF to this day.
3:22 ATSF SD40-2 #5059 "Kodachrome", still in service on BNSF to this day.
3:43 ATSF SD40-2 #5027, still in service on BNSF to this day.
3:55 UP SD40-2 #3626, appears to be retired.
3:58 ATSF SD40-2 #5036, appears to be retired.
4:06 ATSF F7A #326, no information found, although likely retired.
4:37 BN SD40-2 #6784, appears to be retired.
4:45 UP SD40-2 #3623, still in service as RCPE #3434.
5:22 CNW F7A #4073C, preserved as SLRG #576 in the Lehigh Valley paint scheme.
5:30 CNW F-unit, unknown number.
5:33 MP #234, no information found, although likely retired.
5:42 ATSF FP45 #92, preserved in the IRM, looking to be restored.
5:48 CNW AC4400CW #8814, still in service on UP to this day.
6:06 (top): UP AC4400CW #6872, still in service on UP to this day.
6:06 (bottom): UP C44-9W #9711, appears to be retired.
6:13 BNSF C44-9W #1000, still in service on BNSF to this day.
6:23 ATSF GP50 #3827, still in service on BNSF to this day, although the model appears to be a GP38-2 instead of a GP50 like its real life counterpart.
6:28 UP AC4400CW #6736, still in service on UP to this day.
6:45 ATSF FP45 #5946, destroyed in the 1994 Cajon Pass derailment.
6:47 ATSF FP45 #5945, preserved in Barstow CA.
6:51 ATSF FP45 #93, preserved in Wichita KS.
6:55 ATSF FP45 #5975, appears to be retired.
6:58 ATSF FP45 #5950, appears to be retired.
7:01 ATSF FP45 #5913, no information found, although likely retired.
7:05 Amtrak SDP40F #506, appears to be retired.
hopefully this helps.
Thanks for all this information!
Nice to see people sharing their equipment!
I was at the Mad Town train show this morning and i got a SF Kodachrome F45 at the cost of 25 dollars! And it was also an Athearn.
Sometimes I think I need to start posting more train videos on here so I can get followers who would send me stuff.
Then I look at the pile of projects I've already got going and realize... I'm doing fine on my own there.
The blue and yellow Santa Fe F-unit is the same paint scheme as my very first engine (also an Athearn blue box F7) back in the early 200X's. It's gone through a lot but thanks in part to things I've learned watching your videos it's still running strong.
Wow so fantastic thanks Harrison some more fixer uppers!
Please record your fixing of some of the trains. Your previous videos tackling taking apart and fixing your broken locomotives have inspired me to fix an old GO train n scale locomotive from my childhood. Your videos explaining the parts and what to look at for which problem, helped me get the courage to figure out and fix mine. Runs great now, it was only drawing power prior.
I'll probably do videos on all the units which don't run. I haven't done too many Athearn videos (mostly because they're hard to break) but there are some common failure points I'd like to show how to fix.
Those SD40-2s with the longer nose was called a "snoot". The longer nose was necessary to house the radio control equipment for the remote helpers in mountain territory. Some SP tunnel motors had that long nose as well.
Wow a really nice collection I love all of the Santa Fe I also like the one Chicago great Western
That's an amazing collection of athern locomotives.
Athearns are practically indestructible. A little TLC is all that's needed. Good unboxing. From Texas.
When you said great big Rollin railroad had me dying 🤣 😂
WOW, that is a massive score. Well done Harrison.
Those Santa Fe "Kodachrome" SD-40-2s are sweet! I have a pair of them myself (1 powered, 1 dummy) which my mom bought for me back in 1989 or 90. When I sold off most of my collection in the late 1990s, I kept those because, well, they're gorgeous and for sentimental reasons.
I also have a few SD40-2 kodachrome units as well
It looks like you now have a Western railroad starter pack. There are a lot of locomotives with detail parts, but two caught my eye. The first would be the Red and Silver Santa Fe Warbonnet F7A. I noticed that there was not any steam generator detail which should be actually correct for the locomotive. The Red and Silver Warbonnet F7Bs would have the steam generator, but not the A units. Steam generation was necessary for passenger operation, but not all of the locomotives needed them. The second unit was the Mopac geep. I noticed it had four exhaust stacks which the Athearn shell normally had the standard two. Also, the person went the extra step to remove the dynamic brakes which was a standard feature on the Athearn shell. Overall, this is a neat addition to the collection, and it will be nice to see a future update(s) on how these locomotives are brought back to top order.
I got an old steam model train it broke way back when plus my brother has a Santa Fe train the red and grey broked as well enjoyed the video going to watch some Jaw Tooth train videos sorry for getting off topic.
That is a serious haul of loco's. Very nice 😁👍
Athearn bluebox is a good well rounded product they last long and I’m happy to own a few products from the bluebox range that run well and are great for simple dcc units
Wow Harrison those are nice looking athearn locomotives and I wished I could get more of those C44s because they're usually a lot of money and those long nose sd40-2s are called "Snoot nose" and awesome video and I always enjoy watching your videos and so does my grandmother and I also love your older videos and also greetings from United States of America
WOW!!! I'd say that was worth the wait! Knowing you Harrison, these be riding the rails within a few weeks!! :)
Probably one of the biggest collections you’ve unboxed! Lots of variety and look alike as in there lol! I have a CNW AC44 from Athearn asw and I hope someday to find some SPSF merger painted power for my layout sometime! Kinda sucks not all of them run but I think you might be able to tackle the problems!
I doubt any of them have serious issues. They probably just need fresh oil and some stuff put back in place.
Can't wait to see the maintenance and repair vids for these engines!
Looks like the Santa Fe Corwith yard engine facilities circa 1996 in HO.
The CNW dash 9 was the last new power the CNW got before being borged and saw similar Fs hauling commuter trains through town growing up. The long nose -2s were called snoots in the railfan community for obvious reasons. IIRC they were SF and UP only and the extra nose space was to house the radio control gear for mid train helpers.
The Superchief FP45s are interesting in the fact the smaller Santa Fe lettering one is the actual passenger livery one while the billboard lettering ones are the late 80s/90s repaints for hotshot intermodal service.
The Amtrak FP45 mod could possibly be an attempt to simulate an SDP40 (IIRC) an early Amtrak loco that had a derailment issue the ended their careers fairly early. Something to do with the location of the steam generator at the rear of the locomotive and either weight of the water tanks or sloshing of the water as the tanks emptied would under certain circumstances force the rear truck to derail. Kind of a PITA if it does that in the approach to Chicago Union Station but can ruin your day very effectively if it happens at speed out where Jesus lost His sandles in Nebraska.
yesterday I went to the Pasadena Texas Convention Center for this year's train show taking place there. I ended up setting a budget of 60$ because if I had more, guaranteed I would've spend ALL of it. I ended up buying a bag of a few fully assembled buildings consisting of a schoolhouse, a logging/industrial building, a small garage, and a train station. Along that at the same person's selection, I bought an old Athearn F unit in the Union Pacific paint scheme and a b unit to go with it. At the same selection, I also bought 3 pieces of old rolling stock for 10 dollars. I'm happy with my purchases, the locomotive runs, but it smells toasty whenever I run it but otherwise runs perfectly fine. Probably just needs some cleaning.
That truly is an amazing collection of locomotives. I particularly like those Kodachrome units. Also you should do a video organizing all your locomotives into different railroads, I feel like that would be really cool to see.
18 of 32 officiallly run - yes I was keeping track WOW what a great find
You know what's crazy, when you find somebody with the same name as you.
Love all of the F and FP45s. By some of my favorite locomotives
Quite the haul,, looks good probably could get 85% running just fine.
Talk about being Loco loco 😂. Imagine a lashup of all those, looking as if they were all on the way to the desert storage tracks.
Amazing the stuff people give you, all is well deserved too...!
...watched some of your last livestream, enjoyable, seems alot of "Youngsters" follow along
The MEGA anything box/lot videos generate the most views...
...I'm an "Oldster", love watching you dig through those boxes P.S. enjoy your trip!
5:44 OMG! A Illinois Railway Museum Resident!
The nice thing is, you can still find replacement parts for the old Athearn locomotives. They are really easy to upgrade as well.
What an amazing haul of engines!
I’m a locomotive engineer for BNSF I’ve been trying to get my hands on some BNSF units mainly a dash 9 or some kind of gevo. Also I’m looking forward to a video of the repair video.
im jealous of the fact that theres that many locomotives smt mainline i love your content keep it up!!! i have never had any athearn locomotives ever keep it up!!!
Man this would be a dream haul, all those engines to work on, tune up and get rolling. I wish Ebay and the like sellers wouldn't be so greedy, a shame to see many old items just sitting and not running on a store page. Great video, looking forward to seeing some of the repairs. Can't beat an old Athearn, they run forever and when they don't they are very easy to get going again.
Five years ago you could find nice lots for under $200, now it seems to be rare to find a decent one under $400.
Wow you hit the jackpot I’m generally surprised that you got that many engines in one haul congrats
What s cool unboxing! Thank you for sharing!
I love this video! Great lot, and I would love to see you work on these locomotives SMT!
Saludos hermosas locomotoras
Hi Harrison its jacob. I was watching your video about your ho scale shinkansen. And it made my think that my aunt and uncle are going to japan. And they are going to ride on the newer shinkansen.
Lots of good EMDs! The SF is Santa Fe. The UP 9700 series are D9Ws. The 6700 series UP should be an AC4400CW. This is an impressive unboxing! Lots of project locomotives! Keep it up Harrison
I love the old kodachrome paint on those three
The up and cnw operation lifesavers are both AC4400CWs. Note there big AC converter box under the dynamics vents on the conductors side. The santa fe GP unit you called a gp38 is either a gp40 or gp50
Wow Harrison that Haul is Great Double Nice!!!!!!
This is incredible. Surely you are running out of space, hahaha. Don't worry, I still have some empty shelves if it just gets too much for you.
Harrison=you're like a kid at Christmas time==HA HA==you are so lucky
Nice haul Harrison! I think the silver and red F unit is either a Genesis or Intermountain model.
Agreed. It looks too highly detailed to be a blue box unit
I think someone talented got their hands on it and repainted the locomotive and added those details.
Dang, worth the wait for sure. That’s my kind of haul, full of Santa Fe. I can just hear all the kids who watched this video.
Kid: Hey ma, pa, can I have a PO Box?
Parents: Why?
Kid: People will send me trains.
Amazing video, truly the previous owner was very dedicated. And I fell quite jealous I've been in the hunt for a BN sd 40-2 for quite a time.
Very awesome collection!!! I’m sure you will have fun with them!!! I’ve definitely been looking for some of those red black and yellow Santa Fe units for quite a good amount of time now and also either the FP45 or F45 locomotives but I’m sure the day will come eventually!! I absolutely love Athearn locomotives they just have some of the best detail and run absolutely fantastic!!!👍👍
I love them too. I started collecting them back in the early 90s and still have them Atsf espee Mopac Mkt and Burlington Northern
I've always said, Athearn Blue Box engines are built like a MACK truck 👍
Very nice haul Of locos.
Most just need a Cleaning and regrease. Probably just cleaning commutators ect....
Cosmetically.....some clue and re-alining rails
Overall man good find!!!
Along time ago, there were many trips to the hobbyshop that started out like this."I'm looking for something in an SD40-2,"😂 I know. I do the same thing with GP38-2&GP9s😅🚂🇨🇦
That's an interesting way of looking at it. I wonder how long it took to accumulate all these engines.
Normal person... Life time. You or I. 2or3 trainshows lol
Video got my 'like' when you found the 'low rider locomotive;' :D
Actually working on my layout at the moment of watching one of your videos so maybe I'll make a video before it gets too late but I'm not sure
One amazing haul!
Very cool Harrison! The UP and C&NW units are actually AC4400CWs, the way you can tell is the large electrical box on the conductor's side, whereas the BNSF C44-9W only has the air conditioning unit behind the cab. You can use Athearn ready to roll parts (geared axles, truck assemblies, etc) on these blue box locomotives too! While not the cheapest option, it does improve the performance quite a bit!
I also discovered recently the screw in motor mounts and their screws (part numbers 84026 and 84027) are the perfect replacement motor mounts too which helped smoothness immensely.
The amount of locomotives he's sent you is impressive hope we get a video of you fixing some of them
hello SMT Mainline & it's is Randy and i like Yours video is cool & Thanks Harrison Friends Randy & Good Luck on The Vintage Athearn Locomotive Collecttion Thanks Harrison Friends Randy
Thanks 👍
fantastic video allways love your videos
The "SF Unit" is actually a Santa Fe unit From The Failed SPSF Merger
Genuinely cool
03:35
Such a cool moment
I was surprised at the number of these that were runners. If you asked me,when you opened the box I would have bet that only a handful were going to run.
Awesome locomotives!!
i just adore his unboxing videos
Wow thanks alot of good stuff. That will keep you busy.
I’ve got that same little 3-axle N-scale switcher, but different paint scheme. What’s weird about it is that - although a 4-axle unit like a GP30 will go around a somewhat tight curve just fine, the little switcher has a nasty habit of derailing. I don’t know if it’s because it doesn’t have a “blind” driver in the center, or if one of the wheel sets is out of gauge. So I’d check the gauge on yours if you’re going to put it in service. 😊
Thanks for the tip!
I'd take the best of the best and repair them. The other ones I'd part out and store the spare parts. Then, the shells can be sold or given away to the people looking for such. Only because I've noticed that several people are voicing a desire to own certain models. Best regards, and keep them videos coming. A Fan in Washington state.
I think they should all be revivable but time will tell.
those yellow bonnets are beautiful
10:38 that one does have a loose fly wheel, I have a few athearn units with loose fly wheels and they sound the same
3:59
ATSF 5036 was then repainted and renumbered to BNSF 6351, but sadly it was wrecked in 2004 near Gunter TX
Love the video SMT. Jealous!!!
Whish I could come across a deal like that congratulations on your purchase
That's a nice haul
Boys, SMT uploaded. Get out the popcorn and soft drinks.
I got my snow spreader today and also bought my first ho swicher locomotive today now just waiting for it to be shipped out its the exact same locomotive our mill had back in the day it a Pennsylvania rail locomotive but I will repaint it to match the one our mill had I'm going to make an unboxing video when I comes in and I'll insert a picture of the actual smurfit stone locomotive from my home town little fact our mill went through a bunch of different owners but the first name was BATHURST POWER AND PAPER all caps olive green with black accent and gold pinstripe On the first diesel locomotive from our meal before that one they had steam
Thanks for the positive feedback and I am going to make an unboxing video when I get that switcher locomotive and I'll also unveil my new snow spreader at the same time because I bought the switcher to go with the plow end on a side note I already started building our Old Paper Mill that we had here in our my hometown and it's coming along very well because thankfully there's lots of pictures I can use to reference it and I'll also unveil that part of the layout in the unboxing video
Well, could be worse. What almost killed the hobby for me is I sent a Fox Valley Milwaukee Road A class, a MTH GS4 in the BNSF Black, and a fewer lesser locomotives to someone who I thought was a buddy to get some work done on them, because I was relatively new to the hobby and didn't have the knowledge at the time to work on them. Well he disappears off the face of the planet, along with a lot of other people's locomotives. Some rumors say he passed away, but who knows. I have looked everywhere for them to reappear, but in the 5 years since he disappeared, nada. Haven't been able to replace either.
I'm sorry to hear that. I always like to give people the benefit of the doubt but it's hard to tell if someone is being honest or just making up excuses sometimes.
Nice locomotives
That is awesome.
NICE collection i have alot of the early 90s blue box Athearn Ho
well folks in todays video 🗣️🗣️🗣️💯💯🔥🔥❗️❗️❗️❗️
SD-40-2s are amazing. very lucky!
Cool trains love your vids keep up the good worl
Very cool lot of stuff, could make a nice santa fe lashup