Well, consider me to be inspired by my own column. When I did the scale comparison between the two EBT box cars, I decided that I actually had to build the “newer” box car in 1:20.3, if only to really illustrate the size difference between the 1870s equipment and the later 1910 era equipment.
All told, the box car took me around 40 hours or so to complete. It’s built using the same techniques used to build the freight cars shown in the pull-out plans. I built a basic frame for the bottom using long sill beams and a deck, then built a sub-form for the walls out of 1/8" masonite.
I stained the interior a darker color partly to mask the fact that the interior wasn’t really modeled. You can see the masonite on the interior, and the 1/32" scribed wood I used for the siding. (Midwest Products–available at most hobby shops.) The roof is covered with aluminum tape, commonly used to repair gutters and air ducts.
This is the car prior to being painted. The grab-irons are bent up from steel wire, and pinned in place using Atlas track spikes. The roof walk was left off until after painting, as it was bare wood on the prototype. In hindsight, I could have left off the handrails until after painting as well.
Here are some of the end details. The interesting thing about this car is the ladders, and the fact that the end brace rod goes through the ladder sides. I had to put the corner braces in place first, then attach the ladder sides, then drill them out so the rod could pass through.
Nice, really Nice work, really illustrates the car changes over time .
One thing about the EBT maybe the reason they didnt build there newer car wider was the experiences other had (and I beleive EBT also) when they tried using NG trucks on standard gauge cars. Instead of tranfering freight from car to car, they tried lifting the cars and switching out the trucks, only to find out that the NG trucks made the standard guage cars as stable as a drunken cow and many accidents when the top heavy cars would fall over.
Acually, Vic, the EBT was incredibly successful when it came to swapping trucks out from under standard gauge cars. Their famed “Timber Transfer”–originally built to transload shipments of lumber from narrow gauge flat cars to standard gauge ones–lived on 30 years after the lumber industry died out along the railroad solely because of its continued use in swapping out trucks. The cars were surprisingly stable. It should be noted that the EBT maintained their track to standard gauge practices, so it was (at the time) very smooth with plenty of clearance.
When the PA Turnpike was being constructed in the 30s, the EBT’s Shade Gap branch was the closest railhead to the stretch of highway east of Breezewood, PA. The PRR would deliver countless covered hoppers full of cement, as well as cars with myriad other supplies and equipment to Mt. Union, where the EBT would lift the cars up one end at a time, roll out the standard gauge trucks, roll back in narrow gauge trucks, and with the help of a cast aluminum coupler adaptor, couple up to them and pull them the 20 miles or so to the end of tracks at Neeleyton. The crews at Mt. Union could swap trucks under a car in under 30 minutes.
There are reports of standard gauge cars being moved on narrow gauge trucks over the EBT as early as 20s as well. Old timers recall loading lumber directly from the logging line in Blacklog Narrows (12 miles south of Mt. Union) onto standard PRR flat cars. Could it have been quicker to swap out the trucks than to swap out the load of lumber?
Now, that practice didn’t begin until 10 - 20 years after these cars were built, so earlier experiences of other roads may have played a roll in their design. It should be noted that the “colorado” cars were at the large end of the size spectrum for narrow gauge rolling stock. Very few lines had equipment that approached the dimensions of the D&RGW’s stock. Most “eastern” narrow gauge lines’ equipment was less than 8’ wide. It could very well just have been a decis
Kevin, After looking the W &W R.R. cars were no more than 8 ft over end sills in width, and that was only on their stock cars. All the others no more than 7ft 6 inches. Must be an east cost thing as you said.
I got my info from Hiltons “American Narrow Guage Railroads” book and while EBT had success with it, others failed miserably. Most due to poor track maintanence. theres a great picture of a string of standard gauge cars lying on their sidewith the narrow gauge trucks still on the tracks. DOnt know if that pic is in Hiltons book but it was an east coast RR I do remember that.[8D]
Yes… track condition has everything to do with stability. An excerpt from Tommy Varner’s Red Rooster which just happens to be open on my desk (I was looking up something completely different)…
“…Although the [Tuscarora Valley Railroad] has installed over 10 miles of sixty-pound relay rail, the remaining sections are still [the original] thirty- and forty-pound track, light even by narrow-gauge shortline standards. The net result is a rather bouncy, jerky ride, but who cares? The railroad still beats a horse and buggy… Sure the railroad has had the usual small derailments, but no passengers have ever been injured, let alone killed.”
Looking at the conditions of some tracks, it’s amazing the trains stay on the rails at all–regardless of gauge!
