Hi,
I have several heavy weight passenger cars (70’ Athearn) with clerestory roof, but i would like to modify e few of them to represent Harriman’s type of rounded roofs passenger cars like the ones used on SP or IC (“turtleback” roofs).
As I collect IC steam epoque , those would be really typical and are missing in my roster.
Does someone sell those as a detailing part? Or has someone tried to make them out of a balsa wood block?
Thank you for any suggestions or idea
sebastiano
Smattei, Wm. K. Walthers makes a part called “air conditioning strips.” You may use the glue of your choice to place these “strips” over the inset from the top of the monitor roof to the top of the car side. No doubt, some sanding will be required and painting after you apply sanding sealer to the wood inserts. Also, if memory serves, the Athern cars have “caste on” air ventilators. You may wi***o file these off the roof casting or compensate with properly spaced “notches” in the “a/c strip.” There may be an easier method but for now, this is the only thing I can come-up with. One more item, didn’t the harriman coaches have air vents located along the center top of the roof? If so, Walthers also has various styles of air vents as well. Check out the Catalog at any hobby shop. Good luck Sebastiano.
Athearn also makes the coach in a round roof variation…it is not currently on production, but you may be ableto find them in a LHS. The former MDC Roundhouse line also made 60’ ‘Harriman’ cars - same status at Athearn…
Jim Bernier
Sebastiano…
The March 2005 issue of Model Railroader magizine has an article ‘Passenger Cars from Core Kits’ that describes and details a number of possibities similar to what your asking about.
Branchline and Bethlehem Car Works do offer individual pieces or kits to ‘scavage’ from so that you can model the ‘rounded roof’ of a harriman style coach. However, it will require alot of diligence and crafting on your part to make it work.
I wi***here were more 60 and 70 foot passenger cars out there; especially undecorated. With 4 wheel trucks, that size of car runs and looks better on 18" and 22" curves.
Hope this Helps…& Good luck!
Mark
MDC/Roundhouse made Harriman style passenger cars with the roof design you want. You can buy those kits, cut off the roof and put it on the cars with the window spacing you want if the existing kits don’t match your cars.
Dave H.
And don’t forget to change those Athearn six-wheel trucks out to four-wheel trucks, since they were standard on the Harriman type cars. It’ll take some new styrene bolsters and a little drilling, but the result will be super-cool. Also, check around the hobby shops, I bet SOMEONE has the older Athearn round-roof coaches.
Tom[^]
The IC had hundreds of celestory roof cars that they used right up to the end of passenger operations, so you don’t NEED to have Harriman roofed cars to accurately represent an IC passenger train. While their chocolate and orange streamliners got all the attention, the IC ran more shorter passenger trains, most of which featured dark green heavyweights. The Fallen Flags site has several photos of IC celestory roof heavies.
If you want “real” Harriman cars, you’ll have to do a lot of craftsman kit building, as indicated above. If you want to just represent the IC’s Harriman fleet, use either the Roundhouse Harriman shorties or kitbash a bunch of the Athearn round roof cars (cut the roof off a few coaches and add them to full baggages and RPOs). There’s a rumor out that Walthers is planning a line of Harriman commuter cars, so you might want to wait awhile before you invest heavily in kitbash bait!
It’s actually easier to build IC heavies in N scale. JnJ Trains has a large line of photoetched brass and resin Harriman cars, most of which are useable for the IC.
I may be showing my ignorance here but thought a word of caution might be in order. There are two types of arch roofs, “high” and “low” arch. Northeastern Wood Pdcts. used to carry the “high” arch but I think its discontinued now. The other “talking point” is the window arrangement. If I’m not mistaken, the Athearn day coach, R.P.O. and baggage may be appropriate but the foreshortened 12 section pullman “style” window arrangement isn’t likely to be prototypical. Best of luck Sebastiano.