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Williams manufactured a nice line of electric toy trains, most of them being updated reproductions of Lionel models. They included can-motors rather than the open-frame motors of Lionel's post-war period, so they were extremely reliable and smooth running, at least in my experience. The primary complaint was (1) weak smoke-units made by Seuthe, and (2) the generic sound board (True-Blast) was not the best. They were relatively inexpensive.

A few years ago Bachmann acquired the line from Williams and made a few changes. They've upgraded the sound, introduced a few new models and paint schemes...they've also upgraded the price. I haven't purchased any of the Williams-by-Bachmann trains (yet), so I can't opine on this new generation.

Here's a Williams GP-38 I acquired second-hand at a meet a number of years ago:



Extremely powerful with its dual motors, I don't have enough freight cars on the shelf to slow this thing down. If I ever get around to trying my hand at weathering a piece, this might be the one.

Paul II

Always liked Williams, was sorry they shut down. At least Bachmann still makes trains.

Williams manufactured a number of GG-1 reproductions, as well as scale-sized versions. Here's a pic of one of the reproductions of the Lionel GG-1 (manufactured fifteen or so years ago):



Five-striped Brunswick green, it has dual can motors with traction-tires...it could probably pull twenty aluminum cars (at least). Just a lovely thing.

Paul II

As a PRR guy, the GG-1 was always one of my favorites. But the Large Scale versions of the thing were prohibitively expensive.

VERY NICE!

Somewhere along the way I acquired a number of Williams freight cars. The nice thing about these is that, if you're into railroad modeling, these are true O-scale (1/48). They don't mate well with the Lionel 6464 series or other O-27 sized equipment, but scale equipment matches up appropriatly.\

Here's a Lehigh Valley boxcar from the series:



The prototype of this car was a promotion scheme developed by the LH. The graphics were on one side only, or so I've been told. The Williams version has the graphics on both sides. Whatever, it's pretty neat.

I enjoy looking at this size---gauge to be accurate!

Pulled the Williams NW2 down off the shelf for a spin around the mainline:



This is a pre-Bachmann locomotive from Williams featuring dual motors, True-Blast II horn, bell, and nice graphics (even if the Western Maryland never rostered an NW2). A nice quiet runner...

I found this Williams boxcar in a lot I recently purchased at a local estate sale. A B&O "Time Saver" boxcar (#WAL-41), likely a custom run for the Baltimore Packaging Company:



Williams cars are close to 1/48-scale, unlike a lot of the stuff Lionel makes. It's a very nice car, one I think I'll hang onto.