Con-Cor - 0003-05551E - Locomotive, Steam, 0-8-0 - Pennsylvania - 6130

Specific Item Information: This model comes with a dummy-knuckle pilot coupler.

Model Information: Excerpted from Irwin's Journal. For the full review, please visit: Irwin's Journal

This was the first N scale steam locomotive based on an American prototype in the world! True if Lone Star's Treble-O-Lectric Baldwin based 0-8-0, released in 1963, is not included. Technically, that locomotive was not N scale because it was made to a scale of 1/152 but ran on 9 mm track. Introduced in early 1968 as Atlas? third, it was another rather unusual choice for Atlas/Rivarossi to have made since there were only three prototypes built and for only one railroad, the Indiana Harbor Belt R.R. (that?s why I included IHB in the title). Originally priced at $16.98, the price jumped to $19.98 when the loco was actually available. To quote Atlas? advertisement in the May 1968 issue of Model Railroader, "...which is slightly higher than originally announced many months ago. However, this new deluxe locomotive incorporates many new production and tooling changes to make it a truly superior product..." What those new production and tooling changes were, I have no idea. The locomotive was offered in IHB and Santa Fe (what else?) Road Names.

I remember that I wanted one of these so badly when they first appeared, but I didn?t have the money at that age. It would be about two years before I finally got one.

The construction is, again, a plastic shell over a zinc alloy frame. The same basic "dependable" Rivarossi can motor is used ,with modifications, to suit the drive in the new steam engine. The motor is mounted horizontally in the cab area and a longer shaft is incorporated with a worm on it to drive the worm gear. The worm gear drives various spur gears to eventually drive all four drive wheel axles. Thus, quartering is not critical and, in fact, the side rods are connected only to the first and third drivers. The rods have a slot at the front to connect to the first drivers to allow mechanism slop. Electrical pickup is with the four left side locomotive drivers from the left rail for the ground side of the circuit and with the right side wheels of the tender from the right rail for the hot side. The hot brush holder on the motor has an extension which reaches down to insert into a hole in the drawbar and a spring contact pushing against the extension conducts current to the brush holder. The headlight bulb socket press-fits into a recess in the front of the frame and this serves as the ground contact. The circuit is completed by a wire from the hot brush holder soldered to the center socket contact. The same bulb and socket is used as in the E8s.

After Atlas discontinued import of this model in the early 1970s, Con-Cor picked started importing them with dual-label packaging and multi-language instruction manuals.

DCC Information: Don't even think about it.

Prototype History: Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, 0-8-0 represents the wheel arrangement of no leading wheels, eight powered and coupled driving wheels on four axles and no trailing wheels. Locomotives of this type are also referred to as eight coupled..

Examples of the 0-8-0 wheel arrangement were constructed both as tender and tank locomotives. The earliest locomotives were built for mainline haulage, particularly for freight, but the configuration was later also often used for large switcher (shunter) types. The wheel arrangement provided a powerful layout with all engine weight as adhesive weight, which maximised the tractive effort and factor of adhesion. The layout was generally too large for smaller and lighter railways, where the more popular 0-6-0 wheel arrangement would often be found performing similar duties.

From Wikipedia

Road Name History: The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR) was an American Class I railroad, founded in 1846. Commonly referred to as the "Pennsy," the PRR was headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

The PRR was the largest railroad by traffic and revenue in the U.S. for the first half of the twentieth century. Over the years, it acquired, merged with or owned part of at least 800 other rail lines and companies. At the end of 1925, it operated 10,515 miles of rail line; in the 1920s, it carried nearly three times the traffic as other railroads of comparable length, such as the Union Pacific or Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railroads. Its only formidable rival was the New York Central (NYC), which carried around three-quarters of PRR's ton-miles.

At one time, the PRR was the largest publicly traded corporation in the world, with a budget larger than that of the U.S. government and a workforce of about 250,000 people. The corporation still holds the record for the longest continuous dividend history: it paid out annual dividends to shareholders for more than 100 years in a row.

In 1968, PRR merged with rival NYC to form the Penn Central Transportation Company, which filed for bankruptcy within two years. The viable parts were transferred in 1976 to Conrail, which was itself broken up in 1999, with 58 percent of the system going to the Norfolk Southern Railway (NS), including nearly all of the former PRR. Amtrak received the electrified segment east of Harrisburg.

Brand/Importer Information: Con-Cor has been in business since 1962. Many things have changed over time as originally they were a complete manufacturing operation in the USA and at one time had upwards of 45 employees. They not only designed the models,but they also built their own molds, did injection molding, painting, printing and packaging on their models.

Currently, most of their manufacturing has been moved overseas and now they import 90% of their products as totally finished goods, or in finished components. They only do some incidental manufacturing today within the USA.

Important Note: The Con-Cor product numbering can be very confusing. Please see here in the article how to properly enter Con-Cor stock numbers in the TroveStar database.