I was invited to visit an HO club layout last weekend and we spotted several goodies, including a V&T Ventilated Boxcar!
Among the lot was this very interesting piece. It instantly made the “I must have one!” list. It appears to be an offset Bay-Window Caboose/Baggage/Boxcar.
Has anyone ever seen such a thing? I’m searching for any info I can find on it, whether there’s a real prototype, or just some crazy (hey, aren’t we all) guy’s Frankenstein concoction.
Here are two other, yet similar photos:
Isn’t that just one of the coolest looking things!
I believe Silver Streak made that car originally - it was a wood kit with metal ends and bays. Train Miniature later made an all-plastic version, I think.
That is a really interesting car. I think it lends credence to the oft quoted phrase that “there is a prototype for everything”. It certainly has my kitbashing juices going![(-D]
That looks like a refugee from my layout, except that mine has a one-bay hopper instead of a boxcar body…
Seriously, it looks like something that would bring up the end of a trainload of rail and ties. The box body would protect the kegs of spikes and the wired-together bundles of tie plates.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - with some improbable kitbashes)
Gidday, On first glance I thought that’s a “Train Miniatures” 42 ft Baywindow Supply Caboose that someone has removed the plastic cast-on detailing and fitted individual grab rails etc, but on closer inspection there appears to be a veranda, and I hope I’ve got the right terminology, at both ends, and the roof walk is different.
As for prototype, I have no definite answer, had a quickish search on the Model Railroader 75 Year CDs and Google images and while I didn’t manage to find either your pictured caboose or the “Train Miniatures” one, when you see what was built over the years,1:1, I think it would be an extremely brave or extremely knowledgeable person to tell you "its NOT prototypical!!
Yeah it is a cool looking bit of kit and I can visualize a scatchbuilt 38 ft version at the rear of a consist behind that 4-4-0 of yours. [:D]
I have one of those cabooses, also. Mine was Santa Fe, too, I believe. While this caboose looks good in the photos of it at the engine facility, above. I always felt it was out of scale (slightly big for HO scale). It sorta looked out of place on the end of a train. Never took a scale to it to check it out; but, I always wondered if it wasn’t actually OO scale?
I don’t know where; or, when I got it, probably back in the 1960-70s when I was collecting HO models now and then for a “someday” layout. Since I felt it was out of scale “too Tall” for an actual caboose, I removed the trucks and turned it into a Yard Office on my layout.
It was not a Silver streak kit (had one of those also) as it was plastic. Mine must be a Train Miniatures kit, per the photos above. Although my roof looks more like the model first shown, it does not have a platform on the box car end.
If you’re looking for an interesting prototype, here’s one which I last saw in New Castle Pennsylvania. The photo is from my collection, and is used with permission:
I still haven’t been able to find any prototype info on it, but I think I have enough info and reference on the model to begin a scratch-build in N. I kinda like a single veranda version as that’s rarely seen for a caboose.
Walthers also made that car as one of their “Work Train” sets (they had two different ones, in multiple RR’s, including MOW), which came later than the Silver Streak and Tru-Scale set - made in plastic. I just got one of the sets off deBay a few months back (in the MOW grey set). I doubt that (in theory) they were used on a regular freight train - more likely (for the few such critters that may have really existed) that they would be on a work train where the RR was laying a new area of track (or doing major repairs, say after a big train wreck knocked out some track in the process).
Interesting topic, thanks to everyone for their input, nice pictures & info!
Isn’t the Walthers one set to be re-released? I thought I saw something on that a while back, & it caught my eye, but I can’t remember if it had the end platforms?
Gidday, I gather that Walthers purchased Train Miniatures in 1985 and that Walthers rehashed the Train Miniatures Work train set, shown by Mark in one of his earlier posts, because the same “supply caboose” is part of Walthers Work Train #2 set of six cars I bought some years ago.
Mark, I was slightly tongue in cheek when I said I could visualize a scratchbuilt version behind your 4-4-0, having viewed your scratchbulit box cars i wasn’t doubting your abilities, just blown away with the speed and efficiency of your work shop!! [bow]
Well I had a set back with the bay window. Once I brought everything together I realized the bays stuck out about 4 feet on each side! It looked like Dumbo, if ever a railcar could. Thankfully the fix wasn’t difficult at all.
Here are all the sides separate with the door details complete (perhaps you can see how much the bays extrude here).
And here’s the body assembled with fixed doors.
After I fixed the bays, then the doors stuck out too much! (Notice how thick they are?). So, rubbed the doors on sand paper to thin them up then glued thin strip styrene in an L and made OPERATING DOORS!
Here’s the last two of the night on the layout (Posing next my beloved Nebraska Belt Line boxcar! ).
With luck, this might be complete by tomorrow night.
Great to see someone who likes to build models!! I was under the impression building models was frowned on, today (You know, man, why would I build it when I can buy one for $40.00, ready to plop on the track and go!!) [Y]
It’s partially obscured, but it’s in the back row of this family photo.
I remember saving for and finally buying this whole set when I was a teenager. They came in gray, as most of them I’ve seen, but also in a bright “safety orange” that looked downright unnatural.
