Feeling bad , it appears I missed the boat to get some of the BLMA Cell towers, Signal bridges etc. Has Atlas decided to discontinue these products? A pity, if so. Any replacements from other manufacturers? Been looking for some reasonable priced signal gantries in plastic.
AFAIK, Atlas plans to re-release them as part of their product line. Craig Martyn now works as a special consultant to Atlas to ensure the BLMA legacy lives on under the Atlas brand, and that was part of the purchase deal. The loco detail parts have been confirmed to be the first BLMA legacy product to be re-run. Now, as far as when that will happen...<shrugs>?
If you scour various online hobby shops, especially the less-popular ones, they might have these old BLMA products still in stock. I've seen a few of these around both online and in brick-and-mortar shops. Also try eBay.
It appears to be somewhat of a lesser-known fact that Atlas already carries a pretty good catalog of BLMA parts and accessories... http://shop.atlasrr.com/search.aspx?SearchTerm=blma&EntityType=p&sort=0&ppagenum=1
I noticed that the air horns are not listed on that list. I sure hope they plan to re-run those as that is what I have bought the most of from BLMA over the years.
We found three upcoming Atlas releases that will utilize BLMA toolings...something we pieced together after visiting the Atlas booth at January's Amherst Train Show. You might find our blog, which we just posted in the Railfanning Discussions section, a worthwhile read. Here is the link: http://www.trainboard.com/highball/...-live-on-with-upcoming-atlas-releases.102908/
Thanks for the info, I have been hunting for grab irons. Found this page: http://shop.atlasrr.com/c-1405-blma-n-parts.aspx
We have been working to get the BLMA products back into stock. There are about 15 items that should be available again within the next month or so. We also have a bunch of items that were previously out of stock that are once again available. We do intend to keep the BLMA stuff coming, but there are a couple of items that Craig recommended we drop and re-engineer - that will come in due time. We did have to move some tooling from Craig's suppliers to ours, as well as create relationships with suppliers we previously didn't work with.
Thanks to all for your replies. I will certainly keep my eyes open for Atlas's rerelease of those excellent BLMA products. I'm also looking at the possibility of trying some scratch building. Thought about buying from some of the USA internet sites but that is tough; with the CDN $ and shipping, the costs skyrocket.
I ran into Craig Martyn at the World's Greatest Hobby show in Pomona, CA today. He was the sole person staffing the Atlas booth. He said the plan was to have Atlas carry the entire BLMA line eventually. Yes, even the People Mooning figures
The mooners are currently available...Atlas has done well, they have a lot of the stuff available already.
3-unit or 5-unit? I saw a few 3-units at a train show recently. If you're looking for the 5-units, yeah, they're pretty much gone. I hardly even see them on eBay. Since they were good sellers, I'm quite sure Atlas has them on their re-run list. It's not a matter of "if," but "when."
