Hi fellows, a question for you all. I picked up an Athern F59PHI in the Road Railer scheme and am wanting to get the passenger cars to go with it. A new run is coming out in September and Athearn has them on their website for pre-order. I have never dealt with this before, so walk me through this. Do I pay when ordering? If so, how much? How close are delivery time estimates? Etc, ad nauseum... Thanks, Kevin
That's really hard to answer......I've never preordered direct from Athearn. The place I preorder most of my stuff from only charges me $.01 to place a preorder, with the balance due before shipment. I've seen 50% before. I've also seen 100% due when you order. Delivery times are just as random, but usually they are a bit optimistic. It's pretty rare that they hit the mark. I've seen from a couple of months off to a couple of years off. Because of this I refuse to order from anyone that wants full payment up front........I don't mind a small holding fee, or giving a card number as a sign of good faith, but I don't want the full amount tied up for months or years.
I tried to preorder from Athearn but it takes you to the distributor and I had to grab what I was after from an online vendor. I would forget ordering it direct from Athearn and go the hobby shop / online vendor route (you should get a better price anyway)
I have ordered from Horizon hobby in the past and it was ok. I found they are not the best in prices. I just ordered my Rail Runner sets from Factory Direct Hobbies, and I also ordered a set from PNP Trains. Yes, I’m getting 2 sets as I have 2 Kato F59PHI’s from their KOBO shops that have been waiting like 5 years for their cars.
Sorry I did not see this sooner but as the Athearn Brand Manager, let me help you out. Typically, the last Friday of each month we announce new items available for pre-order. You have roughly 30 days to pre-order the items you want through your preferred Athearn dealer or direct at Athearn or Horizon Hobby. I will always recommend you pre-order through your preferred dealer as both Athearn and Horizon Hobby sell at full retail. There are many on-line shops that are Athearn dealers if you do not have a local shop. Also, typically most shops do not require the money up front although some do require a deposit. Now to address your second question. In regard to the passenger cars, we have due in September. The website still says pre-order but that is misleading and a constant battle between me and the Horizon Hobby Web team. Technically the pre-order window is closed, however, at this moment I don't believe they are in production. With that said, you can pre-order with the Athearn dealer of your choice, and they can contact their sales rep and put in the request. Many shops will pre-order for both customers and add a multiplier for in store and online stock. Trainworld, one of our biggest accounts will do this. I hope this information is useful to you.
Thank you Sir! Yes, it was quite helpful, and they are already on pre-order with Trainworld. Looking forward to seeing this consist running together.
