Up Up and Away...Variation saturation
By Anonymous Member

I used to laugh a little at the Postwar Lionel #3470 Target Launcher or "balloon car" as I call it. Then I visited a friends Christmas layout a number of years ago where 8 of these cars were operated in a unit train and it was just plain fun to see those 8 balloons travel around the loops of track, always floating above their cars just as Lionel meant them to do. I started to take an interest in these cars and now consider them an important part of my Lionel collection.

The dark blue cars seem to be the most common and are easy to find, very often with the original box and sometimes even with the original balloon! A person could amass an entire train of these will ease.

The aqua marine flat is a bit harder to find but still turns up often enough to be considered easy to acquire.

The light blue flat however, can be difficult to find and I have seen only a handful in my 30 years of interest in Lionel.

Lionel used far more red and black flat cars in their freight car line and it is hard to believe that only a few color samples of the #3470 have turned up on red or black flats. These two cars have the further uniqueness of having matching red or black balloon baskets that adds a little something extra to their oddity.

Finally, I was able to add an olive drab car to my collection and it fits perfectly with all the other military items done in this color.

Many toy train collectors wonder why "variations" seem to generate so much interest and sometimes huge amounts of money. I think there is an extra thrill to the hobby and in future articles I hope to share additional "variation saturations”.