Finally New Walthers HO Amfleets are on the way!!

timberley, I hear your rant. For some reason, the "experts" at the big modeling magazines never seemed to get it through their thick skulls that VIA's F40s did not have the phase I OR the phase II underframes, but instead yet a third arrangement...and as a result, most model railroaders seem to believe that they're not the unique beasts that actually ply the rails. It's really not that hard to look at a photo, but I digress...

Back to the Pooches, the Sunset Limited and AutoTrain were their bastions. AutoTrain typically consumed six at a time (three in each direction), while my best guess on the Sunset Limited is that it chewed up 12-18 (three trainsets in each direction with 2-3 units each set, being a 3-day run). Ya don't need much more action to use up a fleet of 25...or maybe less if some were retired early. During the early years, I saw photos of them running on the San Diegan with Amfleets, on the Illini with Superliners, and various other short-haul trains...but pretty quickly the F40 put a stop to that and they moved on.

Anyway, the discussion of Amfleets, F40s, and another thread about E8's all go back to a common theme: when manufacturers don't get the key dimensions right, some number of us will always be begging for a new model no matter how much the other models were over-produced.

Well this is what I saw in my inbox today:



Impressive. Can't wait to see the finished product

OK,so walters went with a inside "bronze" bushing,this should be fun to maintain,
hopefully they will offer replacement trucks like they have done in the past.
Picked up 1 Superliner Sleeper with the wrong trucks installed.

I pre ordered this car on Saturday July 28, 2012, the metroliner car was pre-ordered as well back in June. Now lets see what walther's releases next so I could possible pre-order that as well

Backshophoss.......regarding maintenance of the inside "bronze" bushing........ we will just
have to send our HO scale car knockers out with their tools when trouble arises!

peanut1 wrote:I pre ordered this car on Saturday July 28, 2012, the metroliner car was pre-ordered as well back in June. Now lets see what walther's releases next so I could possible pre-order that as well

Recieved an email today and I missed out. No amfleet car.

peanut1 wrote:

peanut1 wrote:I pre ordered this car on Saturday July 28, 2012, the metroliner car was pre-ordered as well back in June. Now lets see what walther's releases next so I could possible pre-order that as well

Recieved an email today and I missed out. No amfleet car.

???

What do you mean?

I placed an order with my hobby strore before the deadline of when the pre-order was supposed to be in. The order went through. I recieved an email from trainworld where I placed the order (also placed the metroliner order their as well) telling me they were sold out and no longer getting anymore. I will be waiting for the next release of amtrak amfleet cars.

Like the "El Cap" deluxe edition,the Amfleet cars have sold out! Thats real fast,should create demand for a 2nd run.
There's no mention of the sellout on Walter's website.

The stores that you placed orders with probably already had a set amount they placed orders for and simply did not add additional quantities. My guess is that the cars have not gone into production yet and thus up until the deadline, there was flexibility to add more quantities but for what ever reasons, the stores decided to stick to a set amount. That's pretty unfortunate should that be the case.

Possibly, the name cars were sold like the El Capitan, where dealers had to commit to X number of the basic Amfleet cars to get Y number of the fancy ones.

SlowFreight wrote:Possibly, the name cars were sold like the El Capitan, where dealers had to commit to X number of the basic Amfleet cars to get Y number of the fancy ones.

If true, it would be consistent with my assumption. For some reason, there's a quantity constraint that may or may not be self-imposed. I can understand if the dealer wasn't going to order X more over what they were willing to commit to for additional orders (there's always the risk of the extra rolling stock not moving).

Just an update.

While tracking the developments of the re-tooled Amfleets, I think it would be prudent to continue emailing walthers as there is no guarantee that additional, more modern phases will be released (although business practices suggest that it would be prudent to do so for ROI purposes). It may not be so much a matter of if but when. I would think that if more interest is shown, the likelihood is we would see them sooner rather than later.

First be sure to thank them for taking the step to re-tool the product to begin with. As a manufacturer it is always a risk when re-tooling a product and the fact that Walthers has done this should not be taken for granted especially for a "non-mainstream" market. Email them letting them know your preference. I now my personal preference is IVb but obviously it is up to you which phase you'd like to see next .

Kyle

mlrr wrote:Just an update.

While tracking the developments of the re-tooled Amfleets, I think it would be prudent to continue emailing walthers as there is no guarantee that additional, more modern phases will be released (although business practices suggest that it would be prudent to do so for ROI purposes). It may not be so much a matter of if but when. I would think that if more interest is shown, the likelihood is we would see them sooner rather than later.

First be sure to thank them for taking the step to re-tool the product to begin with. As a manufacturer it is always a risk when re-tooling a product and the fact that Walthers has done this should not be taken for granted especially for a "non-mainstream" market. Email them letting them know your preference. I now my personal preference is IVb but obviously it is up to you which phase you'd like to see next .

Kyle

Agreed Kyle,

I'm sending e-mails for the other phases of the Amfleets, (Amfleet I in phase I hasn't been in a while and would be nice), a re-tooled Horizon car (a commuter version with center doors!) and a Penn Central version of the Metroliner.

UPDATE:

AMFLEET I and II PRE-PRODUCTION PHOTOS:

http://www.pbase.com/joppasub/image/147277182
Amfleet I

http://www.pbase.com/joppasub/image/147277183
Amfleet I

http://www.pbase.com/joppasub/image/147277181
Amfleet II

***ALL PHOTOS BELONG TO THOMAS E. AUSTIN, credit belongs where credit is due.

NOTE: Walthers recieved these cars a few days before Trainfest and just threw them together. They look FANTASTIC already, so expect them to be even MORE fantastic as production nears. A quick note is to state that the Amfleet I cars will NOT have the L-shaped handrails on the car ends which belong to the non-vestibule end of the Amfleet II cars. This is the prototypical way and Walthers recieved a bunch of e-mails alerting them to this, they admit they already knew about it, and assured it will be corrected for production models. Once again, the L-shaped handrails are only on the non-vestibule ends of the Amfleet II cars.

Okaaaaaaaaaay boys and girls, let the opinions fly! I personally LOVE the look of the cars. They sloppy diaphram design that plagued the older Amfleet models are gone, and look Amfleet I fans....PROPERLY SIZED ROOF VENTS! ha ha. We asked for accurate carbodies, etc, and Walthers HAS delivered.

Quick note, I believe it was on the Atlas Rescue forum, these cars roll MUCH better than the old ones (as they should cause this is a whole new model.) One attendee gave a car a "push" and it rolled quite freely.

-Tom