[oldsteamer4]

Greetings, all, and welcome to all new members. Not only is there a vast amount of help with model trains here, there's a lot of humour too.

My question is, does anybody know of a manufacturer who makes two-truck shays? I see lots of ads in the model railroad magazines for three-truck shays, but nary a one for HO two-truck. My research into oldtime logging railroads here in Canada indicates that the three- truck type was pretty rare up here. Cheers, Brian.

 

[tjcruiser]

OldSteamer,

I don't have an answer for you, but merely a suggestion ...

You might post a picture of a real shay here, so that others can see exactly what your looking for.

Cheers,

TJ

 

[shaygetz]

Yes there is...or was. MDC/Roundhouse put one out many years ago. They're found on Ebay regularly, the early ones being very hard to build kits, the later being ready to run versions of their original kits.

 

[oldsteamer4]

Thanks, TJ and Shaygetz. Right after I posted my question, I Googled "Two-truck Shay". and only 2 sites came up. I went to the first one and there's a whole bunch of Youtube videos with shays-but most are 3-truck. Shaygetz, you are right, the first video I watched was an MDC shay. Apparently, Bachman also made them, and maybe still does. Thanks again, I'll do some more digging. Cheers,Brian PS- Check out the shays snowplowing!

 

[tooter]

Bachmann Spectrum two truck shay... but in On30...

I looked around for one, too and read that they had a number of inherent problems... so I ended up with a Roundhouse Climax Logging Locomotive...

It's quite heavy for a small short engine (10 ounces), has a flywheeled motor, all wheels are driven, it's geared super low and only does about 30 scale miles per hour flat out... which makes it perfect for pulling logs up steep winding grades.

 

[stationmaster]

Rivarossi made one, Roundhouse made a couple, one as a kit(a real adventure in the patience department).. of course Bachmann(Spectrum) in ON30, though I don't think it is the quality as the other two....looks nice though.

Being strictly HO they are hard to come by in that gauge. Narrow gauge is usually the rule on those engines.

I've got one of the Rivarossi's both in two-truck and three truck versions. Nice runners. I did add a few details, but that was minimal. Air tanks and pumps, mostly. The details were brass and I can't recall the name of the manufacturer. Brain fade..... Details West, maybe.

There are also a couple of brass offerings, one by Premier or Key Imports, I believe. You'd better pawn off the wife, kids and dog, then take out a second mortgage on the house for one of those. As I recall, they were in the $1200-$1500 range years back brand new. Those are REAL nice, though as with most brass units, a bit noisy. Brass on brass gears will do that. I've seen a couple though I could never bring myself to part with that kind of money for one.

Bob

 

[b12brother]

If you want a small 2-trucker PSC will release a new one soon.

http://www.google.lu/imgres?imgurl=.../images?q=Psc+shay&um=1&hl=de&sa=N&tbs=isch:1

Or you can take a Bachmann 3-truck shay and convert it to a 2-truck model.
This is mine but still unfinished.

If you decide to buy a Bachmann shay then try to get one from the second run those which are Dcc with sound (blue plastic box).
The first run DCC-ready (Black box with foam) ones have mostly cracked gears. I bought 8 second run ones with no gear issue but the one from the first run had all gears cracked, this is also due to the long time it was lying in the box on the shelf.