TRAIN TIME / CIRCUS TIME: Lionel Set #6-11716 Lionelville Circus Special Train (1990)

Back in March I ran this set on my Edge of Town micro-layout and just had a blast with it. The boxcar sat on the siding and was replaced with a K-Line flat with circus wagons for the run

 

CIRCUS TIME: Lionel Set #71-1770-250 Sears Circus Set (1989)

Still got 'circus' flowing through the veins! LOL While I don't have a lot of circus train sets it might be nice to go go over the couple I do have. As I was hot-&-heavy into running circus trains earlier in the year you can guess that there were a lot of photos taken - however, it got so busy here on the blog posting wagons, and tents, and other miscellany that the train sets were virtually ignored. Okay, fine, let's do that thing now :-) 

The first set we'll cover is one that gave me a bit of frustration because I couldn't find it out in The Cave and I had wanted to run it so bad. All the while I was looking for a brightly decorated box with colorful graphics, I had totally forgotten that this box was a plain brown affair! DOH! This was apparently a special set made for Sears by Lionel and may have been mail-order only. Sets sold in stores would have had the colorful boxes I was so busy looking for. Enjoy! Opa Fritz

Lionel Set #71-1770-250 Sears Circus Set in plain cardboard shipping box

Slide out the tray and the set reveals itself

Lots of lionel guys claim the Hudson is Lionel's workhorse. I respectfully disagree. The 4-4-2 Atlantic was found in more sets and was more widely available than the Hudson - mostly because, as a smaller engine, it would have been more affordable and withing reach of more people's budgets.

The set is very basic including gondola with canisters, and operating stockcar, and caboose

The horses heads bob in-&-out as the train rolls down the track - no actuator required

Here's a short video showing the train on my WIP layout

CIRCUS TIME, TRAIN TIME: April 1st 2022 Circus Parade in Deer Crest on the Edge of Town Layout - Another Look

 Got a few more photos to share of this year's circus set-up on my Edge of Town layout. Enjoy! Opa Fritz

Below is a good shot showing the placement of the repo Coca-Cola cut-out circus in the upper left corner. This illustrates that you don't need a lot of toy train real estate to at least suggest a circus!

Calliope music. I bought a cheap blue-tooth speaker from Wal-Mart. The advantage to the speaker was that it had accommodations for a USB hook-up and I was able to plug in a flash drive with calliope music on it. The speaker itself was placed underneath the layout and the sound appeared to be all around me

Just Grazin' in The Grass

CIRCUS TIME, TRAIN TIME: The Wagons Roll Into Deer Crest for World Circus Day 5 Apr 2022

Circus advertising trains, circus passenger trains, now finally a circus train full of flat cars loaded with wagons as the Lionel General was again pressed into service to haul this short string of flats. This whole parade thing was done back in March thru May when I had w-a-y more wagons than I did flat cars to haul them on. Since then, I've been able to grow the fleet of flat cars enough such that a much longer consist can be run once my larger layout is up and running again. As a bonus, while I was messing with all these circus toys, World Circus Day fell on the 5 of April, just about in the middle of this time frame. Enjoy! Opa Fritz

CIRCUS TIME, TRAIN TIME: The Circus is Coming to Deer Crest on The Edge of Town Layout

 It's about time that Deer Crest hosted a circus - after all it's seen numerous other celebrations over the years. Today's post is all about the Lionelville Circus Special rolling through town. Enjoy!