Bachmann - 17255 - Gondola, 40 Foot, Steel - CSX Transportation - 484155

Specific Item Information: 40' Gondola Car - CSX® with removable coal load - N Scale. Gondolas have been used since the early 1900s to transport various bulk materials. Due to their low side walls, gondolas are also suitable for high-density cargo such as coal, steel plates, coils, and bulky items such as pre-assembled track pieces. Bachmann Gondolas, come in a variety of colors and road names.

Model Information: This model appears in the 1972 Bachmann catalog six road names at $1.50 each. Similar to other Bachmann releases of this era, the model features Nickel-Silver plated deep flange wheels and Rapido couplers. This model was manufactured in Hong Kong.

In 2020, Bachmann updated this tooling. It now features blackened metal wheelsets and body-mounted EZ-Mate couplers, The feature list from Bachmann is: Highly detailed painted bodies, Precision graphics, Blackened-metal wheels with RP25 contours, Body-mounted, magnetically operated E-Z Mate Mark II couplers, front and rear, Non-magnetic blackened brass axles with needle-point bearings, Celcon trucks, Added weight for optimum tracking performance.

Prototype History: In US railroad terminology, a gondola is an open-topped rail vehicle used for transporting loose bulk materials. Because of their low side walls gondolas are also suitable for the carriage of such high-density cargos as steel plates or coils, or of bulky items such as prefabricated sections of rail track.

All-steel gondolas date back to the early part of the 20th century.

Road Name History: CSX Transportation (reporting mark CSXT) is a Class I railroad in the United States. The main subsidiary of the CSX Corporation, the railroad is headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, and owns about 21,000 route miles (34,000 km). CSX operates one of the three Class I railroads serving most of the East Coast, the other two being the Norfolk Southern Railway (NS) and Canadian Pacific Railway. It also serves the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. Together CSX and Norfolk Southern Railway have a duopoly over all east-west freight rail traffic east of the Mississippi River. As of October 1, 2014 CSX's total public stock value was slightly over $32 billion.

CSX Transportation was formed on November 1, 1980, by combining the railroads of the former Chessie System with Seaboard Coast Line Industries, and finally with the Seaboard System Railroad in 1986. The originator of the Seaboard System was the former Seaboard Air Line Railroad, which previously merged with the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad in 1967, and later with the Louisville & Nashville Railroad, as well as several smaller subsidiaries such as the Clinchfield Railroad, Atlanta & West Point Railroad, Monon Railroad and the Georgia Railroad. The origin of the Chessie System was the former Chesapeake & Ohio Railway, which had merged with the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, and the Western Maryland Railway.

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Brand/Importer Information: Bachmann Industries (Bachmann Brothers, Inc.) is a Bermuda registered Chinese owned company, globally headquartered in Hong Kong; specializing in model railroading.

Founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the home of its North American headquarters, Bachmann is today part of the Kader group, who model products are made at a Chinese Government joint-venture plant in Dongguan, China. Bachmann's brand is the largest seller, in terms of volume, of model trains in the world. Bachmann primarily specializes in entry level train sets, and premium offerings in many scales. The Spectrum line is the high quality, model railroad product line, offered in N, HO, Large Scale, On30, and Williams O gauge all aimed for the hobbyist market. Bachmann is the producer of the famous railroad village product line known as "Plasticville." The turnover for Bachmann model trains for the year ended 31 December 2006 was approximately $46.87 million, a slight increase of 3.36% as compared to 2005.