IHC/ President's choice Hudon mods

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Glen Haasdyk

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Feb 2, 2004
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IHC/ President's choice Hudson mods

I was given a presidents choice hudson (CNR) by my club to work on. For those of you that don't know The Canadian Superstore comes out with a train set every year with a fairly decent steam engine in canadian colors.
here's what it looks like stock:
ahd.sized.jpg


I decided to cut the smoke deflectors off and was getting my dremel all ready when I realizes that the green skirts and smoke deflectors and one peice and only lightly glued on. I carefully pried off the two sides and underneath was the original running boards. seems as though IHC just added the skirts right over the original huson parts with makes my job a whole lot easier. I also shortened the tender 1" since the tender is almost as long as the engine itself. Now it looks a little more in proportion. anyonme wanting to do this should find the May/June 2002 Canadian railway Modeler. There is an excelllent article By Bob Bourdeau on this mod.
I dissasembled the engine, masked the smokebox and painted the boiler, cab and running boards in flat black with a tinge of grey. I also painted the Tender body and underframe. Now it's just waiting for decals.
I'll post pictures when possible.
 
Canadian Superstores

That is a nice looking loco. I regret that I did not stop at the Superstores this year to see it for myself. Is it built by IHC and does it have the oversize wheel flanges? How much did it sell for?

Looking forward to seeing the completion of your modifications.
-Ed
 
Ed,

I don't know about the wheels, but at "full" price, it would have been CAN$100 for the set, which included a cheap-o power pack, brass track, and an assortment of cars. I think this year they were lettered for Loblaw's "Mini-Chefs" kids snacks. After the Christmas rush, they can usually be found 40% or more off the full price. I could have had the last "Yard Bull" set (0-8-0 switcher and ore cars) for $27 but the entire set was really beyond repair...

Andrew
 
The Flanges are not the tall pizza cutter size. These engines are of IHC's 'premier' series with a can motor and brass flywheel inside. it runs really nice and quiet too.
I bought mine on boxing day at the princly sum of $79.99. I've been checking ebay and the same hudson engine, lettered for US roadnames (and without the smoke deflectors) is going for about $130.00
I wish I could have found that yard bull set, even if only for the parts.
 
I belive IHC has only recently come out with the Hudsons anyway so that model should be up to modern standards - from what i know of one a member of my club has they have a DCC socker in the tender as well as working backup lights (unlike my older IHC Mountains).
 
My local Loblaws family store still has around 30 sets at the $79.99 price. I'm waiting for them to get a little cheaper before I scoop some and start parting them out. :)
 
Chad - just go and ask. With them in inventory for more than 5 months at this point, you might get lucky. The one I referred to above (that I eventually declined) was still listed at $69, but I just said "is that your best price?".

Andrew
 
The superstores around here (Amharst/Truro) still have lots of the Hudsons .Every show I've been to in the last year has had at least one Yard bull set, generally goin' for 100 Canukian dollars
 
Relic...

That seems to be the problem... Lots of people value the "set in the box" for their collectability. I have seen reports of original sets (from 10 or 11 years ago) going for $600 or more. But in terms of the component parts of the set, you could get similar stuff on ebay for about $30...

From a modeller point-of-view - throw-away power pack, oval of brass track, and lightweight, Tyco-like rolling stock with truck mounted couplers. Not worth much. Even the loco has been a middle of the road engine for the most part - produced by Mehano/IHC (the year they skipped was apparently due to a fire at the Mehano factory). Glen's report leads me to think that they are increasing the quality of the loco.

Andrew
 
I don't know about the quality of the early ones, but I do know that both the Yard bull and the Bullet nosed express have the same drive components as the hudson.

- from what i know of one a member of my club has they have a DCC socker in the tender as well as working backup lights
Click to expand...
I have my tender apart and yes it does have a working backup light but it doesn't have a dcc socket. There is an electical socket in the fron of the tender (external) that conects it to the engine itself.
 
These are helpful comments regarding these IHC locos. I have the CNR 2-8-0 freight loco which I believe was released in 1994. It runs well and quietly. Sometimes it struggles if I add too many freight cars. Of course, it depends on the weight and size of the cars -- to my surprise, I had it successfully hauling 7 or 8 the other night. But it can struggle to with 7-8 cars if they are too weighted down. Otherwise, it's a good loco. Rob
 
As mentioned in another thread, I now have the IHC Hudson and have been impressed by its quality and performance.

I was at George's Trains yesterday (a well-known Toronto LHS) and I saw a very similar Hudson, with similar number, for sale and was amazed at the amount of detail. It's hard to describe other than the appearance and detail were much better -- a noticeable difference. At first I was kind of taken back, but it's really not surprising when you consider that I paid a mere $50 for the Loblaws version whilte this one probably cost a few hundred (I couldn't see the exact price).

I was just amused and sort of surprised by this and thought I'd mention it. I'm still happy with mine, especially at that low price! As folks have said elsewhere, for $50 you can't go wrong and it's good value.

Cheers,
Rob
 
I was a little leary when i saw that loco in a set with some of the cheapest cars i have ever seen,,, but i bought 1 set for 79$, and was really impressed,, so i waited a while and they came back on the shelf at $49.99 so i got another,,,, should likely have got a couple more. i'll be on the lookout for next yr!! Sad that you can get a set for less then IHC sells the engines for.. imagine what there "cost" is. and IHC never has what i want instock,,, do they do runs at random?? i need some CP locos
 
Did you do anything to fix the oversize boxy front part of the tender?? A lot of IHC engines that would otherwise be pretty good looking are ruined by this totally unprototypical "Vanderbilt" tender.
 
ChadYelland said:
I was a little leary when i saw that loco in a set with some of the cheapest cars i have ever seen,,, but i bought 1 set for 79$, and was really impressed,, so i waited a while and they came back on the shelf at $49.99 so i got another,,,, should likely have got a couple more. i'll be on the lookout for next yr!! Sad that you can get a set for less then IHC sells the engines for.. imagine what there "cost" is. and IHC never has what i want instock,,, do they do runs at random?? i need some CP locos
Click to expand...

Hi Chad: I've heard that their next "Loblaws" IHC set is coming out on Nov. 11 and that it's a 4-6-4 or 4-8-4 freight train (someone else mentioned which one on another thread here, that was about these sets!). To my knowledge, they always model CNR trains. So maybe I'll be getting this one late next year when the prices drop! They certainly are good value. Rob
 
wjstix said:
Did you do anything to fix the oversize boxy front part of the tender?? A lot of IHC engines that would otherwise be pretty good looking are ruined by this totally unprototypical "Vanderbilt" tender.
Click to expand...

No, I haven't changed the tender. I wouldn't mind correcting it, but I'm worried that I'd mess it up! Maybe I should buy another set and if I wreck that tender, I've still got a spare one! :)

I've heard that the tenders aren't right -- mainly that they're too long. You mention that the boxy part of the tender is incorrect. I'm also curious as what the other problems are.

The one at George's Trains sure looked good, but I'm still happy with this one (especially at that price).

Thanks, Rob
 
Well, actually now that I look at a pic of CN 6060, the tender is pretty close to the real thing. I was thinking it should be more like a standard Vanderbilt tender.
 
wjstix said:
Well, actually now that I look at a pic of CN 6060, the tender is pretty close to the real thing. I was thinking it should be more like a standard Vanderbilt tender.
Click to expand...

That's encouraging! I still would say that the tender's too long though, almost as long as the loco itself. I'm not an expert on this, but someone else pointed this out and it seems to be the case. I think I'll just tolerate that discrepancy though! Rob
 
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