“Press here for pickup a car” I don’t know why Sam but the way you said that had me laughing uncontrollably!

Ah, Conrail. My bread-and-butter for my own personal modeling hobby. They managed to salvage railroading in the American Northeast following the absolute _disaster_ that was Penn Central ("You can count on us!"), which continues to haunt American railroading to this day. Unfortunately, Conrail wasn't destined to last. America's obsession with the almighty dollar meant that once it began making meaningful profit, it was split between CSX and Norfolk Southern, ostensibly to "preserve competition". EDIT: If you're also looking for a locomotive to pair with this, I'd recommend one of the Atlas-made GE Universal-series locomotives (more popularly known as "U-Boats") and probably one of the 4-axle variants at that. Atlas' stuff tend to be very reliable runners and are built like tanks, and their runs of U-Boats are typically inexpensive (no more than $150 or so for a straight-DC model).

You should make a t-shirt with the slogan “Sam’s Trains here, press here for pick up a car”. Wear it for every future review. The shirt should be Conrail blue. I would totally buy it!

Hi Sam. In their heyday, cabooses were multi-function; there were toolboxes for holding supplies like extra coupler knuckles, brake hoses, wheel chocks, a few tie spikes and tie plates, bearing grease, and so on. They also had stoves for heat and cooking, and a bed or cot. They usually also had a desk so the conductor could fill out paperwork. As mentioned, the cupola was so the crew could watch over the train for hot bearings or stuck brake shoes, or a break-in-two. Some cabooses had bay windows instead of a cupola. Some of the really small cabooses had naught but a desk; even a British Brake Van would have been more spacious! 😀 These “bobber” cabooses often ran on really rough track behind a train of logs, or small ore cars in a quarry. Such trains may have been pulled by a “geared” steam locomotive, like a Shay, Heisler, or Climax if steep grades were par for the course. Nowadays, you don’t see cabooses on North American rails, except for certain situations such as having to make a lengthy run in reverse (caboose leading, locomotives pushing at the rear). These “transfer cabooses” had a horn or whistle the brakeman can blow at grade crossings for safety. They were usually longer than a standard caboose, with an expanded “patio” at each end. Another common situation is transporting extremely heavy or wide/long loads, such as depressed-center flatcars (similar to, but much more sturdy than, a Loriat-Y wagon) carrying a heavy electrical transformer, or several flatcars carrying long sections of pipe, or a reactor vessel for a petroleum distillation plant. These almost always had a caboose or passenger car for the team from the factory that made the load, from what I’ve learned from other Railfan videos. 😊

Conrail was one of the railroads I watched as a child and is the primary railroad I model now, so this thumbnail put a smile on my face. I have both the Bachmann and Rapido models of this caboose. The Rapido is of course much better detailed, with an interior and railroad-specific details, but also much more expensive. The B-mann caboose is alright for what it is, it looks the part and rolls along fine. I plan to weather it at some point.

Sam, there's actually a suprising amount of trivia on cabooses. One such tidbit is the caboose and engine always belonged to the same company. After WW1 the freight cars could travel on other lines along their way but the caboose never did so, it always stayed on its home line. Considering the role of the caboose as an office and place of rest for the crew employed by the company, this does make sense.

"Press here for pick up a car" 🤣 Sam, I was laughing so hard at that. This is an awesome piece.These We're owned by a lot of the original North East Corridor railroads and eventually would all be repainted in the conrail livery when consolidated rail was formed. And eventually by the late 80s, completely faded out of service.

Sam, the reason for the bogies (trucks) being set the way Bachmann did (one loose, the other only able to pivot) is to help the caboose stay on the tracks without wobbling, yet not derailing. The setting acts as a three-point suspension. Like a three-legged stool which won't wobble, a three-point suspension acts the same way.

The Reading Railroad first developed this steel caboose design in the early 1920s based on a 1920 USRA design for wooden cabooses. Between July of 1924 and April of 1948, the new steel design was built by the Reading for or copied by several other railroads throughout the Northeast, including the Western Maryland (1936), Lehigh & New England (1937), Lehigh Valley (1939), Pittsburgh & West Virginia (1940), Central Railroad of New Jersey (1942), and Lehigh & Hudson River (1942). Due to its popularity, this design would come to be referred to as a "standard" caboose by railroaders or a "Northeastern" caboose by railfans, and several hundred were produced and used from the 1920s through the 1980s. Some of the Northeastern cabooses produced during World War II were produced with wooden sides to conserve steel for the war effort.

Press here for pick up a car! You should see the prices of Precision Scale Co. rolling stock. It made of brass with sprung bogies to the highest quality standards, but 100s of dollars for a boxcar or a caboose is just pulling my leg! Thanks as always Sam.

Every time I see that caboose, I swear that I can hear someone or something say “Press Here to pick up a car”. I get chills.

I love break vans and cabooses, they’re like little houses on the back of trains. I love them!

The rule of thumb when it comes to liveries for cabooses is that they match the railroad on the locomotive. The color of the caboose doesn't really matter, so long as it is the same railroad as the locomotive. (In most cases, that is). So for instance, your blue caboose is a Conrail caboose.. You would want to pair it with a Conrail locomotive at the front of the train. Of course, this is model railroading, which means that you get to run your railroad anyway that you want to! You ought to look into all the different types of cabooses... Some cabooses have different cupola's... Some have bay windows... Some are really long and have room for cattle drivers (Drover's caboose.)

US modellers often have one stiff and one loose bogie. Stiff keeps it stable not rolling. Loose gives flexibility for track unevenness. Weight may be the NMRA standard requirement.

Ah, my final Sam’s trains video of my UK holiday. Been very interesting looking at what the prices of goods are like around here. (Honestly, I think the Lego prices are kinda ridiculous here, of all I’ve seen)

Cabooses are still used today, but not in large volumes or for their original intended purpose. Many are simply referred to as "Shoving Platforms," which doesn't always mean its a caboose, but commonly are. By rule, railroads have to provide a safe place for crews to ride reverse moves over long distances and crossings, which a caboose can provide. A couple railroads in Pennsylvania, like the Reading & Northern RR and the Union Railroad, have some jobs that regularly still have one on the rear of the train, due to longer shove moves needed on some runs.

If you ever happen to get a Conrail locomotive, you could easily pair it up with this caboose for a fairly prototypical mixed freight train. Unless it's part of some kind of a unit train, like the coal and grain cars CSX has for their coal trains and grain trains, mixed freights tend to have a good mix of road names, reporting marks, and paint schemes. I've even seen a good few cars still painted in the paint schemes of the "fallen flags" that once owned them on these mixed freights even.

There are still used cabooses particular with high/wide loads, anything that needs to reverse, cranes, anything that could go bang. some 'secret' loads. Most, if not all, American models have a piece of steel plate as a weight some times not treated so will rust and if using magnets as control switches will be activated by each wagon.

I had one in Lehigh Valley colors. Nice, nicer with interior details added to it. It is rather good taking the manufacturer into account. It isn’t top rank, but it’s not too bad, so when I upgraded it, I went really all the way.

Amazing review of the caboose sam

Sam,to technically correct,you could have run several locomotives with it,and been in protype! Alco's- RS3,RS11,C420,C424,C425,and assorted C-C's,EMD's GP7,9,20,30,35,both as built,and rebuilt,and last,but not least GE,U-boats,25,30,36,both B,and C types,liveries of above,take your choice! As to the caboose proper,there should be a roster out there,and if memory serves,that 18,000 series was either a Reading,or Lehigh Valley unit! Great show,and nice that American rolling stock gets on your layout! Thank you 😇 😊!

Sam, I highly recommend Walthers G2 caboose. It's a charming little wood caboose with the cupola towards one end. I have one in the Pere Marquette livery and it's very nicely detailed with fine quality handrails and paint finish. Edit: Just looked and Trainworld has them in several liveries on SALE for $39.99.

The Northeast caboose design has one very interesting feature, the slope sided cupola. This was done for clearance on some of the Eastern railroads where the tunnels lacked some clearances. The “standard” steel caboose of similar design will have a cupola with a more traditional square appearance. The “low gloss” on the caboose is to represent a car that has been in service for a while. It is very rare to find US models with a gloss finish. A little bit of trivia for you The Pennsylvania Railroad referred to their caboose as a “cabin car” and they had their own designs, some. Had porthole windows. Nice review.

Quite a lot of American models recently Sam. I honestly wasn't expecting it from you. A welcome surprise.

a few caboose's have remained in service for use on trains that need to be shoved a fair distance with the locomotive at the rear, pushing. The caboose gives the "flagger" somewhere safe to stand as he keeps watch.

Bachmann has announced, what appears to be a “Rogers” 4-6-0 that is to be released sometime in late December. It appears to be similar to Sierra railroad’s #3, this locomotive was the “star” in several tv shows, most notably “Petty coat Junction”, “ Iron Horse” and quit a few movies as well.

You can sort of think of Conrail as a regional version of BR, a semi-nationalized company cobbled together from the corpses of the old northeastern railroads. Like BR, it worked better than the privatized companies that replaced it.

Good job again, Sam! I've actually got one of these very Bachmann cabooses myself, but in the Union Pacific livery! And as a British train hobbyist, I have to say I enjoy my UP caboose so much more than my UK brake vans. Like all American rolling stock, their design just looks somehow cooler than the UK alternative. Many regards! Owen

If you want to see the cream of the crop for US caboose models, Tangent Scale Models makes cabooses with fully painted and detailed interiors as well as lights. They're fairly expensive, but in my mind they're some of the best pieces of rolling stock in the entire hobby.

Actually I like a bit of friction in the running of a brake van/caboose. It helps to keep the couplings taught and prevents the wagons from hunting at slow speeds.

Wow, this wasn’t one I expected you to review!

Hi Sam Love your reviews, the humour, the attention to detail and the lack of bias all of which help the potential buyer I have always been intrigued by your scoring system which throws up numbers to 2 decimal points when there are 20 stars to allocate, down to 0.5 of a star occasionally. So, with too much time in my hands I set out to solve the simultaneous equations which pretty easily show that the difference between a 5 Detail and a 4 Detail is 0.7 of a point, a drop from 4 Performance to 3 is 0.2 of a point and a drop in value from 5 to 4.5 is 0.31. These values plugged into the other ratings gives a rating of 4 star quality varying from 1.91 to 1.94 but in another showing that a drop from 4Q to 3Q is 0.62, which were the stars linear would make 4 star quality 2.48. I completely agree with different weightings for the attributes you have selected for rating, that is excellent, but are you prepared to shed light on the factors, or shall I wait until the wife is out again to do more calculations?😂😂😂😂

Awesome video sam! Not a wagon id personally buy because im a british modeller - pretty strictly! However, i can appreciate the looks and running of this caboose! Awesome video sam :)

I'll look forward to your "Press here for pick up a car" t-shirts!

Awesome video today Sam really nice looking wagon

Plastic Models of Northeast Cabooses have been made by a couple different manufacturers over the years, but all have their quirks. For detail, quality, and price, I recommend the Proto 2000 (sold under the LifeLike and Walthers brands) "Gray Box" cabooses (Box color is important here). They have a good amount of separate detailing and an interior. The old brown box releases, while they have lighting, do not roll well due to the power pickups. Walthers retooled these and added them to the "MainLine" (Blue Box) line, but the car lost nearly all of its factory applied details, and left dimples drill and add your own (Sold separately). Like the Bachmanns, the Proto 2000 variants are essentially the same tooling for every road, so accuracy can vary. Proto 2000 did offer cars with or without windows in the ends, but that was the only variation. Rapido released these not long ago, and while they are much more specific in detailing, they're inconsistent with thick and thin parts, and trucks are very stiff to turn due to wiring for lights. At $99.95, the Rapidos should be perfect but unfortunately are not.

As a long time resident of Altoona PA, specifically the part of town where on Sunday's my friends and I would use the PennCentral and then CONRAIL railyard as our "Playground". This episode makes me happy. A few years before the demise of CONRAIL, they were selling off excess Cabooses.... so of course I attempted to buy one. They were not very good with replying to my messages and eventually i received a letter from them telling me to leave them alone, the Cabooses were all gone.😁

Blue is my second favourite colour. I like the blue caboose it's nicer looking and brighter than the one I've got. Don't let Thomas the Tank Engine see it, he might get jealous, lol.

I've got a few of Micro Trains Cabooses in N Scale form, one of them in the "cascade green" Burlington Northern livery.

I have this, but in Erie Lackawanna colors. The blue certainly does look nice on this one.

Purchased a Walthers blue Conrail loco last October along with some Walthers box cars. The box cars were awful, too light and often un- coupling. However I did manage to get the Bachmann caboose as reviewed for £29. I noticed how much heavier the caboose was than the Walthers box cars. Excellent value and it ran well matching up with the loco.

Sam, I would like to recommend trying out an old Proto 2000 (Life-Like brand before being bought by Walthers) caboose after this video! It has a detailed interior, separately-applied railing, and the original run (that came partially assembled vs later fully assembled) cabooses came with working interior lights (with a very noticeable drawback in performance). Walthers also sells cabooses with full interiors if you buy either a current Walthers Proto model or an older Walthers Platinum Line (what became Proto) model. I own a small fleet of their Platinum cabooses (all of them are bay windows) and they're, hands down, one of the better deals in terms of detail per dollar, especially if you can find them used but intact. The newer Walthers Proto cabooses are getting too expensive to the point that, for an extra $20 or so, you can buy either a Rapido (US) or Tangent caboose with full interior AND multi-function lights!

hi Sam i have Triang Railways caboose with bogies, they also did version similar to the one shown in your video but red,

All of the spare time you mentioned was more often than not spent doing the paperwork for the train. The caboose was an office for the conductor. If you want more cabooses, look for some of the ones by athearn genesis, or rapido. Bowser has a PRR N8 cabin car that's also nice and closer to the price of the bachmann one

I've actually ridden in one of these on the Virginia City to Silverton Mine train (Diesel as the Steamer was in for maintenance). The seats were hard with uncomfortable, vertical backs. I suppose they weren't really used for paying passengers but more for the railway workers and guards etc. Very roomy inside with plenty of storage for tools and materials.

Sam if you are looking for a caboose to review i can highly recommend the walthers trainline caboose Ive had one for a little while now and Ive had zero issues! Great video as usual!

Decent review overall, interesting livery on this caboose. Got myself one of the new black 5s yesterday, it’s the BR late crest one named The Glasgow Highlander and it is excellent, haven’t experienced any issues with it and performance is also excellent, also today receive the components to fit sound to one of my Accurascale Deltics.

Awesome video Sam's trains

Hay Sam if you’re ever in the Essex area you might want to check out Mangapps museum railway as the have a Canadian caboose that you can have a look at as well as other items of interest and if you’re lucky enough you could also get a ride on it they have much more features than our brake vans such as beds heater cookers toilets power points as well

Still waiting for you to try something from Scaletrains, the only time I've ever had an experience with them that could be counted as poor was when I got an N scale CSX engine that had a production-wide defect, and they replaced every single model completely free of charge.

If you're looking for some more caboose recommendations, there ought to be a few on the market. Bachmann has made a "bobber" caboose, which is a 2 axle one meant for things like logging, similarish to how the UK does it. But more standardly, Athearn has made wooden and metal sided "standard cupola" cabeese, along with "bay window" and "extended vision" variants, Rapido has a few canadian exclusive types, Atlas, Walthers, and Scaletrains and so on all have various versions of the same aforementioned caboosen, and so on and so forth. I don't think there's a "bad" caboose that is currently on the market, as it would happen, as most of them are of similar quality or higher than that conrail one you reviewed here, so take your pick and have fun. Perhaps try finding one for an engine of the same roadname, though, if decision paralysis gets to you.

Good stuff Sam

Love the rivet detail! Data plate is good, too. Does that make me a rivet-counter?

I imagine Bachmann does not have a budget for English translating thus, "Press Here for Pick Up a Car", That probably meant, "Press here and pick up the car". It is disappointing that the paint is failing, and this cuts the value in half of the suggested retail price in my opinion. You presented a very fair review of something we here in the States hold dear, the caboose. Great video, Jersey Bill

Since I live in the Texas panhandle, I model two freight railroads from the 1950s era, the Burlington and the Santa Fe... Notice I model also model one railroad from the present era, the Burlington Northern Santa Fe... Therefore two cabooses are required, a silver Burlington and a brown Santa Fe caboose for the 1950s, there is no need for a present BNSF caboose... With passenger trains from the 1950s era, I model the Burlington Texas Zephyr with a rare E-6 diesel locomotives for passengers, and a Burlington E-8 locomotive for freight, and a Santa Fe E-8 diesel locomotives for passengers, the West Texas Express, and freight... I model a BNSF Dash-8 locomotives for the present era for freight...

Another caboose you may want to consider for the future is the Athearn genesis icc caboose, they are awesome and worth every penny 👌

Wow! I recommend reviewing a caboose on the video about the USRA 2-8-2, guess you were already ahead of me!

I will give Bachmann this, their silver series rolling stock rolls pretty great in my experience, idk if it's specifically the caboose that does it, but my freight cars don't seem to have that problem. Now if you REALLY want a good roller, Walthers rolling stock will start rolling if you breathe on it too hard.

The American term for siding is, surprise surprise, siding.

With that RRP, it should have Kadee metal, sprung trucks/bogies!!

Sam have you reviewed the New ish Hornby freight master yet would love to see it also great video as always 🇬🇧👍

Nice to see that your getting more into American rolling stock are going more American freight cars or passenger cars

In America, Bachmann is equivalent to Hornby in England. It's average quality, not bad, but not exceptional, either, though they do occasionally make a winner. A lot of us Americans model 1980 and earlier because we like cabooses. Oh, and we call "points" a "turnout." A "switch" is an electrical lever or button you press by hand to turn a light on and off. Though some British terms are making it to America. And we call a siding a siding 🙂

Still no interior, no separate handrails, no "taillights"; the only improvement I noticed compared to my old 20+ year old "silver series" caboose is the glazing, and the chimney, and i have a hit that the body mold is even older.

Hi Sam I just wanted to give you a small update on my GER P43 project. I've completely finished with the model, and now I'll be working on the chassis. I'll keep you up to date on what happens next :) Cheers Jasper & Willow

A repost of the Question, only with the corrected name, "Hi Sam, I keep meaning to ask, what is the gradient of GORDON's Hill? Thanks, interesting review (just like normal)." & again another interesting review. Thanks.

Funny story Sam I actually have 2 of these in my collection, although I don't have this blue version. I might have to pick one up, that is If I can find it for a good price. Cheers Jasper & Willow

If it was a little less expensive, i think it’d be a great budget caboose. Certainly has striking colors though!

One truck or "bogey" Should be a kind of tight while the other truck should be loose.This allows the car to triangulate suspension to go over uneven track. But that one seemed a bit too tight.

That caboose has a pretty cool livery ngl.

Walthers Proto train cars tend to be of great quality with the odd minor issue showing up rarely.

🇬🇧samstrains turning into 🇺🇸uncle sam’s locomotives and freight cars.

N-5G is the actual type of Caboose that Conrail Caboose is. Nice's American Caboose ever made are the old PRR N5C class Caboose. The FRED ( For Rearend Device ) or EOTD ( End Of Train Device ) took over the job of rear brakeman Cabooses in early 1990's. I worked for Conrail starting day one up to retirement in 1998 a Total of 38yrs I worked Railroading out of Enola Yard Harrisburg PA

I can't believe you didn't have a card to order the Bachmann & Williams 324-page Full Colour Catalogue Digest Size, but the "press here for pull up a car" made up for it

I’m going to have that saying (“Press here…”) running through my head all evening now!! Your subliminal messaging skills are superb! Still prefer me a brake van I think!

Please review the new bachmann thomas sam thank you

I’ve seen a narrow gauge American caboose at Brecon Mountain Railway. Let’s hope this caboose doesn’t go on the loose.

Sam you should get a bobber caboose

I'm getting a couple of those in N scale eventually. One for my PRR branch, one for my primary branch, & modern branch. I'm moderling the Southern Pacific primarily, so this caboose has no reason to be in my collection except for what today would be Norfolk Southern interchange trains, even though I'll have interchanges with the BN, CNW, D&RGW and ATSF primarily.

i like the caboose and this one is nice with its blue and white color livery. in sweden we had cabooses behinde the loco but those was for parcels and bags plus express mail. 👍👍👍👍🇸🇪🇸🇪🇸🇪🇸🇪

hope you review a FGW Hornby HST someday

If you ever want to try reviewing a somewhat odd piece of rollingstock athern and some other small companies make very highly detailed cabooses, occasionally with DCC and sound (although very expensive)

PRESS HERE FOR PICK UP A CAR!!!!! In all seriousness this doesn’t look too bad because of how well painted it is, but the detail isn’t fantastic since it relies so much on molded detail, but as expected it works fairly well (other than it not being too free-rolling)!! Overall, not too bad, but not good ether… not something I’m thinking of picking up despite being in market for a caboose since I have a few American locos, it just seems to expensive for what you get, I feel like this would be better if it was around £20

At least in my experience, most Model Railroad equipment in America isn’t Die-cast. Putting weights in the cars themselves is more popular. It also makes kitbashing easier. I personally like plastic bodies with weights inside. But to each their own.

I assure you, the flaking paint is VERY accurate for conrail rolling stock lol

That American caboose looks alright I guess by the way good review as always Sam

press here for pick up a car 2:27 4:04 10:12

Yessssss, we will bring you to the dark side with the rest of the galaxy Sam... (HO scale). That said, I feel like I really REALLY need to get a resin 3d printer to print out details for the insides of some of these trains. Do you have any recommendations on a cheaper one? Looking at AnyCubic brand I'm not quite sure what the difference is between a $179 model and a $749 model, is it just size?

The trucks are close to how they're supposed to be. Maybe loosen the stiff one a bit but there should be a truck that's tightened to a point it doesn't rock up or down, this way the trucks form kind of a tripod that helps the car go through uneven track

I remember when most silver series cars were like $10.00 each inflation is wonderful isnt it?

Bachmann silver series is actually fairly good stuff.

Does the US have an era system similar to the British one?

Finally Conrail stuff

Does the press-here-to-pickup-a-car have nem pockets? I don't remember hearing one way or the other.

Further to the history section. As an alternative to the traditional caboose, there was an obscure diesel locomotive built in 1978 by General Electric with a cab large enough to accommodate the whole train crew. The locomotive was designated as 'BQ23-7', and only ten of them were built. As for 'press here for pick up a car', that line is so bizarre that it's bound to get memed.

So that is probably an "interpretation" of an Pennsylvania Railroad N5 Cabin Car. They would have been built in the 20s to the 50s. They were inherited by the Penn Central in 1968 with the merging of the New York Central and the Pennsy. They after that, were inherited by Conrail after the failure of the Penn Central. The Pennsy N5 class were quite ubiquitous found from Chicago to NYC, the most common of the Cabin Cars, as the Pennsy called their cabooses.

Sam: *presses packaging* "Where's my for-pick-up-a-car?" 😂

Those railings on the end are probably Delrin; it’s more flexible and durable than Styrene in thin sections, but painting it is a real challenge, especially white or yellow! It’s almost as bad as Teflon.

The caboose looks like an old fashioned train station on wheels. Complete with chimney for a wood stove.

Bluford Shops make some very nice Cabooses .