Guys,
When I was up at school in Montana I would see these Boeing Fuselages come by once in a while. LBF makes the parts cars, but no one that I know of makes the setup for the fuselages or the fuselage itself. Am I wrong? Has anyone tried to model this car setup and plane, and if so how did you do so? I’m trying to model it in HO.
Modeling the 737 would be tough. The flat car could probably be done with a modified Accurail 89" flat car.
The 737 Best bet would probably be to find a 1/72 scale model. and cut it down every part in length width and hight to get it into the right scale. My dad did that with an old Revell 1/64 X-15 to mount under his NB52 with X-15 Combo (1/72 scake) he kitbashed. Took him 18 months to get it all right. This was done about 8 years before Monogram came out with the combination in 1/72scale.
James
The only thing I can think of is seeing little pre built jet models at the airport. Things that Boeing would put out to be sold in the gift shops. Some of these may be smaller than 1/72. I’ve seen small die cast planes at Wally world that where very close to HO, but they where things like F-16’s and Stealth fighters.
As a Boeing security officer I am surrounded by the trains all the time that come into the Boeing plants. Especially the containers that haul 747, 767 and 777 piecest to Everett. These containers are oversize and the two engines that are used as power on these trains are specially configured to handle the steep grade (steepest in the US im told). Boeing has a very rich railroad industry, especially in the early days that would make for some great modeling. I think the model in the picture would be easy to create. Simply convert a “metal” flatcar, not plywood, and find a model plane of suitibal size to modify. One word of caution that I must say, do not even think of standing outside Boeing property to take photos of the trains. This is frowned upon and your pics confescated all thanks to the stupid terrorists. Boeing.com does have several pics on its website that may be helpful. Maybe one of the companies will see that there is a market for Boeing rail cars and start producing them (hint hint Walthers, Atheren) I mean there are models of the Seattle Sounder commuter train, why not the Boeing cars?
In South Wichita, KS - At the SPIRIT plant, formely Boeing; The cars are hauled out pretty quick and dropped off at the small BNSF yard in Wichita where they are put into trains headed to WA.
Just get a wooden dowel about the right diameter, and carve out a fueselage.
See how easy I made that sound.[;)]
I’ve read an article about this in the past couple of months (living on the Seattle East Side, I’ve seen a couple of them as well, unloaded-only unfortunately).
I’m THINKING, but can’t confirm right now (darn cubicle at office… no room for fun books), that the article was in the NMRA book, “Modelling Open Loads” (go about half-way down the homepage at http://www.nmra.org/).
I can check when I get home, if someone reminds me… 
Brian Pickering
Check out the July 2005 NMRA Scale Rails, if you can. The author simply used a 1/144 scale 707 fuselage.
Nick
Well, I was half right! It is an NMRA publication…
Brian
Aviation sites would have 737 fuselage specs as to diameter and length. Then use the tube styrene for the cylinder shape and some wood for the tail and nose sections. I do remember reading in Popular Mechanics when the 777 came out that one of it’s engines had the same diameter as a 737 fuselage.
Check SQUADRON.com , I’d have to look myself but they have models of all sorts of planes. Did a check most are 144 scale. There are some military models kc-135 etc in 1/72.
I became interested in building one of these cars while living in Seattle several years ago. I seem to recall seeing one near Golden Gardens park there.
I found a website where someone built one using a 1/100th scale 737 model, which is only a bit undersized, which would be a good thing for model curves. The website is:
http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~keay/planedoc.html
As for finding 1/100th scale 737s, Nitto or Doyusha used to make one, and a Canadian company M & B repackaged these for Canadian airlines. These show up periodically on the auction site. There are also several makers of desktop airliner models in 1/100th scale, such as:
http://www.flightminiatures.com/models.html (which will sell the fuselages separately).
[(-D][(-D][(-D]
Reminds me of the cheap brass locomotive kit from year ago. It was a bar of brass and the instructions said to carve away all the pieces that were not part of the locomotive.
Enjoy
Paul
You know I did read an article form some guy that used a Doyusha for his and it came out great I’m posting the picture of his without his permission, so if you see your picture, don’t get too mad at me.
I just can’t remember who he was and where I came across his website.
See:
Aircraft Parts Cars for the Boeing 747
Mainline Modeler, April 1991 page 69
( BOEING, DRAWING, FLATCAR, “KINKAID, JAMES”, NMRA-4.19, TBCX, FREIGHTCAR, PROTOTYPE, MM )
http://www.boeing.com/assocproducts/aircompat/3d_view.html has some 3d cad drawings. Fred
Here is a pic of the prototype.
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=137092
Mike in Tulsa
BNSF Cherokee Sub
There are some 1/100 scale airliner models out there but I’m not sure whether a 737 was ever done. If there is a 707 or 727 they could be cut to the right length as they shared a common diameter.
The door, stubwing, and empenage on the 707 and 727 are completely different, the three aircraft do share the same section 41 (nose/cockpit). Aft of there they are three different aircraft.
Mike in Tulsa
BNSF Cherokee Sub
Now I have seen more than 737s on the trains that run through Montana on their way to Seattle, but then again, they could have been different series: like 737-800 or 737-600. Am I right to say that the 737 has different sizes? In the airliner magazines on the planes when it shows in the back pictures of the fleets, they show different size of 737s. But does the railroad ship other airplanes besides the 737?