Any thoughts on making them? The ones that come with the walthers tank car kits don’t appear too steady and only cover a small part of the tank car. I thought to put in handrails that go across the entire top. Is using floral wire too flimsy? If so, what gauge of brass wire to use instead?
Thanks!
Ive used guitar string before (steel wire, shapeable). These come in alot of different diameters. They tend to also be very cheap compared to buying handrails.
Use non wound (higher strings like E,B, and G) for railings, use wound strings (E, A, and D) for steam locomotive piping. The wound wire has the effect of looking “wrapped”. Like its insulated.
Guitar wire is way more durable than most other steel wires or brass wires sold in the hobby.
Regards,
PM Railfan
I have used 0.020” music wire for the hand rail and 0 .020” brass wire for the ladders, grab irons and stirrups on this kit bash.
I’m not sure what the 1:1 dimensions are for handrails but 0.020” = 1.74 HO scale inches.
I bought the music wire to see how it was like to work with and to be perfectly honest once I have used it all, I will most likely stay with brass wire as I find it easier to work with
Good recs from the Bear.
If you get fancy and REALLY like ease of soldering, Tichy makes phosphor-bronze wire in several diameters, including .010" and .020". It’s also a dream to bend and holds a set like brass does. In addition to handrails, I like the .010" in particular for making electrical wipers for trucks to do on-board lighting, etc, because of it’s springiness. Comes in a small tube, dozen 6" pieces for $2.50 (price may be dated, but it’s pretty cheap for good stuff.)
I recently got some of this 0.022" wire on Ebay and it’s still available there. It does not say what is made of, but I found it easy enough to make some missing handrails for a SW7 calf (it had 0.0225 handrails) that I acquired. It arrived quickly.
Thanks everyone for the help! I have some 24g flower wire for earlier projects from Michaels which makes a perfect handrail.
Which cars? How to improve a given kit depends on which one you’re building. Plano has some improved walkways, ladders and railings for some of the kits http://www.planomodelproducts.com/htankcar_scq.html .
The Walthers “modern” tank car kits shared a lot of parts, including railings and stanchions. The stanchions around the top were oversized and poorly designed, so they were prone to damage. I replace them with Athearn blue box handrail stanchions. The same stanchions can be used for the safety bar and end railing brackets, which Walthers didn’t supply at all. I drill holes into the tank for all of these; those around the platform should be drilled after you glue the platforms in place.
By referring to the “entire top” of the car, do you mean the propane/anhydrous ammonia car? Depending on the prototype, some of these had full length railings and others had only the small grabs at the ends and the railings around the center platforms.
This car from http://rr-fallenflags.org/utlx/utlx.html has an arrangement similar to the kit.
Floral wire is too soft and easily deformed. Brass or steel wire works much better. Something around .015" should be fine, although I’m not sure if the wire in the original kits was that size or a bit larger.</
Rob is right about floral wire - it’s too soft for handrails, especially if the car is to be handled even infrequently.
Half-hard brass wire was once readily available, but most of what I see nowadays is softer, like that from Detail Associates. It’s easy to form (and re-form if your first attempt wasn’t quite what you wanted), and works well for grabirons and handrails which won’t be subject to much handling.
Phosphor bronze wire (available, as mentioned, from Tichy) is harder, but still bends easily and will withstand some re-bending. It’s definitely more resilient than soft brass wire, and, like brass, is easily soldered.
Music wire, often called piano wire, is steel, and very durable once in place. It can be soldered, but not as readily as the others mentioned. Forming it into shapes needs to be done carefully, as the bending process quickly work-hardens the steel at the bends, making re-bending iffy at best and resulting in breakage in many cases. It is otherwise very springy, making it a good choice for handrails - that’s what Athearn used on their Blue Box diesels.
Stainless steel wire, in various thicknesses, is available from Detail Associates. It’s properties are similar to those of music wire, but it can’t, as far as I’m aware, be soldered.
I’m not a fan of plastic grab irons or railings, so usually replace those parts with metal ones. Tichy offers a couple sizes of straight- and drop-style pre-formed grabirons in phosphor bronze, along with roofwalk corner grabs and curved caboose grabs and Detail Associates has some in stainless steel - mostly intended for cabooses and passenger cars.
For unusual shapes or sizes, you can bend your own using whichever type of wire best suits your needs and abilities.
Tichy supplies phosphor bronze wire parts with their kits, as on this tank car:
[IMG]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b399/doctorwayne/Freight%20Cars%20-%20Part%20II/Modifie