Model Railroading > American Limited Models Trinity 3281 Hopper - second run

Greetings. We are working on road names and artwork for the second run of the Trinity 3281 covered hopper, and we could use some assistance. There are thousands of photos on the net of these cars, but the fine print such as paint info and lot number, as well as end lettering, is usually not readable or not available. Many of the side shots on the web have the info, but the resolution isn't high enough.

We could use a few high resolution side shots and end shots of these cars - especially these road names:

Norfolk Southern
Winchester Western
BACX Blue Circle Cement
HWCX (the new pink cars - we have found three road numbers - are there more?)
SLCX in the 1-48 series
NRLX Ciment Quebec (with the logo)
ICE-GATX
TXI 1052 series

This list doesn't mean that all of these road names will be made on the second run, but we do plan to make them all at some point.

Can you help?

e-mail me at    sanjuancar@durango.net

We're completely sold out of the first run, and it's time for more.

Thanks in advance.

John Engstrom



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/15 16:56 by sanjuancar.

glad to seethere is going to be a second run

Love the cars...excellent job!  Looking forward to the second run.  

Here's a couple of examples. Full resolution images of these and others are in a Flickr album at: https://www.flickr.com/gp/33710285@N08/c0QT69
 

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There is a photographer on http://www.rrpicturearchives.net who has taken hundreds of shots of the Norfolk Southern 3281s. How can I contact him directly? Anybody know? He has a couple of shots that would wrap up our NS research.

John

if you register on the site you can contact the person on the add a comment button on the bottom of the pic

So easy. thank you!!!

John,

Thanks for doing this car-They are all over on my prototype....

I sent 5 pics from my iPhone of the pink-HWCX cars under separate mail as they arent on my laptop. Unfortunately thats all the camera I had at the time, and I havent see any since. 4 numbers 7993-7997. I have others for some plain Jane leaser reporting marks once I track them down to send. Lots of those floating around up here in the sand capital of the world!

Dave Burman
modeling the modern Twin Cities
Trempealeau, WI

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Thanks, Dave. fpr the shots of the pink hoppers!

Here's what we still need for the pink HWCX cars:

1. High res shot of end lettering.
2. High res shot of the data along the bottom of the side - paint info, lube plate, Lot number, etc. That data is so small that it's generally impossible to read it from a web shot or a snapshot.

We'd also like at least one more road number to give us six numbers. And can anybody supply a paint sample?

Here's hoping.

Best Regards,

John Engstrom

sanjuancar could post a pic of  the NS Hopper?

What do people get for supporting your companies research on these prototypes?

Posted from Android

DG .
Unknown, US

Tens of thousands of dollars in royalties, and all the free models you can carry? Or (more often)... the satisfaction of being able to buy a correct model, knowing you helped make that possible. 

Reporting as an occasional data contributor (and not to American Limited, to date) -- I can say that my experience has been that compensation is customarily based on the size and quality of useful contributions, balanced against the size and profitability of the manufacturer and how flexible their R&D budget is for a given project. It can vary from a nice 'thank you' to possibly a comped model. And sometimes, one or two harried and overworked cottage industry manufacturers may forget to even acknowledge something they actually appreciate very much. 

Helping manufacturers is just about helping, usually, and knowing that a bit of info can advance the state of the art. Doing it as quid pro quo or counting on compensation is usually a fruitless business plan, both for the contributor and for the thin-margin hobby manufacturer as well. To amplify, it's tempting to imagine that manufacturers are awash with models that cost them only pennies on the dollar to make. Actually, the costs are nowhere near the high margin percentages of volume goods. And with the small quantities on some models, and the need for ever-more specific details, as John's called for here, it might be only a slight exaggeration to say that one model could have almost as many data contributors as there are models to sell! And that especially holds true if the models are extremely-limited-run brass, or made-to-pre-order plastic.

Again, I'm only offering my own thoughts, and not speaking for John or to any other manufacturer's or data contributor's experiences or policies. But as I rule of thumb, I think it's always best to expect nothing except the satisfaction of helping, and then be pleased if occasionally offered a token of thanks. But figure on helping first, and letting the people you're helping make the compensation overture. Or ask them up front what their customary compensation policies are. Which, I guess, is what you just did, trkspd!

It's a great world -- the data has never been easier for the makers to collect. And as John points out, even then, it's still a tough search. So there is value to contributions. It just might be a little less these days, as it is with almost everything. 

~ BZ



Edited 8 time(s). Last edit at 08/02/15 16:46 by Notch16.

I was curious, so I asked.
It's how I operate.

Thank you for explaining.

I model passenger BTW, but when I saw these hoppers I bought one just because I appreciate how detailed they are (Also to support the manufacturer). It won't be on the rear of my Amtrak consist any time soon, but its in a box somewhere. I try to buy something from every hobby shop I visit, just to support what is a dying breed of businesses.



Posted from Android

DG .
Unknown, US



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/02/15 21:41 by trkspd.

Here's where we start:   http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/rsList.aspx?id=NS&rid=236100

We don't have any photo of the model because we are still in the research stage. When you look at these photos, you see that a lot of the fine print is blurred - it's that fine print that we spend hours looking for (and begging for if necessary). The Job number, the paint data, the end data -- all are important to get the best model possible.

John

DG, Notch16 answers this perfectly. We don't have a "policy" as this is our first car, and only the first time that we have come here to ask for help. The photographers/modelers who have send photos have done so I think because they want to see the models built, and not as a source of profit. We're a very small company and need to look at each situation individually. 

John