I was just looking at the Kato website, and the HO Budd Business car caught my eye. I was even more interested to see it comes in Northern Pacific.
Then I noticed the picture of the car looked kind of strange, the lighter green part of the paint looked the completely wrong color. Also the car looked shorter than it should. Does anyone know how prototypical these cars are?
Also is there an N scale version, or is there projected to be one? I also model N and an NP business car would fit my layout well.
Finally do the cars come undecorated? The car look like it could be modified into a nice model of SP&S 99, is that possible?
I believe the closest prototype for the model was a custom car built by the CHICAGO BURLINGTON & QUINCY.
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There was an undecorated car offered in N scale years ago. I don’t know about current releases. The STRATTON AND GILLETTE had one back when it was an N scale railroad, so it must be an older model. I do not know if an undecorated version was ever offered in HO.
I painted mine to look like the PRR 1000 which was built by Wabash as the Adolphus for Anheuser-Busch. PRR bought the car in 1965 for use by Stuart T. Saunders.
The Kato car is a good representation. I could measure it for you but it is pretty close to the usual 82-85 feet for a car of this type. There is a lighting kit that installs easily. Details are good but just a bit thick, as is the standard for Kato.
The car is decorated in HO and not N in which you wanted information on. Plus you forgot to mention the painted Baltimore and Ohio car that is listed with the Northern Pacific. Kato didn’t paint the schemes for both scales.
Try to find a business car and customize it in the NP.
I believe the green colors used on the NP car match the other NP equipment Kato has produced. If there is/was an N-scale version of the car, it most certainly would match Kato’s NP F-units. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean their colors will match other NP cars made by other manufacturers.
The bigger issue is that the car isn’t like anything NP ever owned, the only fluted-side cars they had were the Slumbercoaches, and those were left in stainless-steel silver.
One is correctly painted and letter for CB&Q, the prototytpe for the model.
The other is Northern Paciifc, and yes, the green colors are not correct. When I operate this car, I couple it with a Walthers Budd Slumber Coach (Stainless steel car) between it and other NP green cars.
I had the HO NP car and I sold it because it didn’t match any of my Walthers or the ones that I painted. The light green was yellowish and the dark green was more like Pullman Green. It could have been shorter as well.
[*-)] If I didn’t know any better that looks a lot like by dad. He was born in 1906 and when he was about 21 traveled to the West Coast trying to make it in Hollywood. It looks similar to a picture my uncle took of him when he left Jersey around 1926 or so. He made it there but ended up joining the army and fought in WWII.
The prototype of the Kato car is the CB&Q Burlington. It is a duplicate of the Santa Fe’s Santa Fe, but reportedly cost $5 more. It is also Budd built, and the fluting is quite different than a PS or SLC car.
