BL-2: My strange fascination

Image: Contemplative Imaging

I have a strange fascination... when I was a kid I had a friend that lived about 2 miles away. On weekends either my mom would take me to his house or his mom would bring him to our house to play. We both had HO scale trains. Mine were for "real" railroads - Santa Fe and Southern Pacific. His were Pennsylvania Railroad (whatever the heck that is) and other eastern lines. He also had weird tastes in locomotives - his prized possession was a BL-2. Really. The ugliest American diesel locomotive ever made. He moved away in 3rd or 4th grade and I never saw him or a BL-2 again. Until this year. I didn't see my long lost friend, but I saw a BL-2 at a blowout price from Trainworld.It was painted in factory demo colors and it didn't look half bad. Besides, who can resist a brand new O Gauge locomotive for only $100, even if it IS a BL-2? Certainly not me... so I went ahead and ordered one. When it arrived it looked just as good as it did in that flyer. Maybe not the best looking diesel in the world, but also not as ugly as I remembered. So I put it on my oval of Fastrack... and a funny thing happened. I actually started to LIKE the thing. Sure it runs too fast, but that's how Williams engines roll:) Then last week Trainworld sent out another flyer. This time they had Rock Island BL-s on sale at blowout prices. So I ordered one. Along with an EF-4 painted for the Virginian. BL-2s??? Electrics??? Eastern roads??? SOmething is happening to me and I don't know what...

Customer service - above and beyond.

One of my pet peeves is vendors who list an item online but don't really have it in stock. Sometimes it's a bait-and-switch, other times just an honest mistake, but it ALWAYS aggravates the heck out of me - especially when it's something I've been searching for a long time or it's being offered at a really great price. Usually the vendor issues a refund. If they're nice, sometimes the refund comes with an apologetic explanation. If they're trying to make sure I never do business with them again, the refund may not be issued until I 'remind" them. In any case, no harm no foul because I got my money back so the vendor is freed from the obligation to deliver the product.

When I ordered my BL-2, it was listed at a really great price - about half what most vendors were charging for it - as part of a blow out sale at Hobby Station. A couple days after placing my order I recieved an email stating it would be shipped the next day and that they'd send me a tracking number. Well, I didn't recieve a tracking number but I wasn't too worried about it, sometimes things fall through the cracks and based on the email I figured they had shipped it but forgot to notify me. Then about a week after the email saying they were shipping I got another email from them with the dreaded "Product Name" in the subject line. Now I knew what happened - they were out of stock, "gee, sorry for the inconvenience" and informing me of a refund. When I opened the email though I was surprised in a very good way...

Dear Ken,

I apologize for the delay on shipping your order. We actually ran out of the ones we had on special and I've been trying to get another one for you.

I will email your ups tracking on Wed or Thurs and I do hope you will come back to us again in the future.

Thank you for your business.

Instead of taking the easy way out and just giving me a refund, they took the time to find a locomotive for me - one that I really wanted - and were even willing to take a loss on it to fulfill the order. I believe them on the price - all the vendors showing this locomotive in stock are asking $165 or more. So to Hobby Station - a heartfelt Thank You and my hat's off to you for customer service above and beyond.

I hope to have some time to run it this weekend and write up a review of the BL-2.

Still waiting on the BL-2

I really hoped I'd have the BL-2 by now. Called the vendor yesterday, no phone answer so I left a message. Never had any luck with that style of customer "service" before so wasn't expecting much. Well, they responded via email and said it will be shipped today and they'll email me a tracking number this afternoon. We'll see:) I'm really looking forward to getting this. I think it'll be the last of my O Gauge locomotive purchases for awhile. I need to start building my freight car roster, and I'd really like to find O Gauge versions of the MDC 34' Overton passenger cars. And of course there's the SP Castro roundhouse kit from banta Modelworks that I "need"...

The Ugly Duckling

OK, I couldn't resist... To me, the BL-2 is just about the ugliest diesel locomotive ever made. For some reason though I have a strange fascination with it. I never thought I'd actually buy one, but just about every toy train dealer on the Internet is having a blowout sale on Williams by Bachmann locomotives, and Hobby Station has had the BL-2 for only $89.00 + shipping. At that price I couldn't resist... even though I have no use for a BL-2, none ever ran on the roads I like (Santa Fe, Southern Pacific, Western Pacific), and it's fugly. I bought mine in the GM Demo paint scheme which at least isn't as ugly as some of the RR paint jobs. If Hobby Station runs out, Pat's Trains has them for $99.95 plus shipping - still a good price.

(Update: the day after I ordered mine, the listed price for the demo paint went to $164 at Hobby Station and Pat's Trains now shows it as Out Of Stock)

Related Links:
Hobby Station
Pat's Trains