Thanks to Chuck and Bruce for more information. I shall have to cogitate whether to re-do all of the details, as the Max Gray has the [rather crude] K brake cylinder, and I have a pair of archbars ready to go on it. By the N5, I assume Chuck means the QC photoetched brass and whitemetal kit for the N5c; I turned one up and have been slowly rebuilding it (the previous owner had not done so good a job as I would have liked) and was not very happy when I compared the kit cupola castings with prototype photos. When I am done, I shall have find a set of the Walthers decals prepared for it, as the ones on the kit car will not have survived. I also acquired one of the Max Gray N5c's, but that will probably stay pretty much the way it is, as I hesitate to diminish the re-sale value, not being sure whether I want to keep it.
The inspiration for all of this is an old, not very sharp, Max Miller print of an N6b at Rochester NY; no date, as I recall.

Jace Kahn, General Manager
Ceres and Canisteo RR Co.


May 10

Subject: Re: PRR N6b

Anything as old as the QC kit line has to suspect in terms of accuracy! I
know because I was truning out crummy drawings for model railraod
magazines.....which then showed up later in kit form or brass. Standards and knowledge
simply weren't much advanced back then. We simply didn't know any better and the
mfgrs generally took data from the mags or cycs.

My all time favorite is the brass model of a diesel that the Japanes mafgr
made using just a post card of the real thing!

I still have a QC N5 built up. I threw away the cupola castings and built a
new one from sytrene, figuring it was less work than trying to clean up and fit
those crude castings.

Chuck Yungkurth
Boulder CO

And Bruce alludes to something that
reminds me of the response when I asked about trucks for this car a
while
ago, that apparently the hand rails were changed when the cars were
rebuilt
and most received the distinctive PRR single coil-spring trucks at
the same
time. The views on the PRR railfan site also suggest there was
more than
just the one modification, perhaps as the brake wheel arrangements
were
updated.

Jace,

According to Bob Johnson, the modifications occurred as follows:
November 1943
- AB brakes
- cast side frame trucks

May 1944
- power hand brakes

July 1944 (note in my first post I said 1946, which was information
from Jack Consoli)
- high end railings

Cars having the original equipment still around in 1949 or later.
Bob's information was truly illuminating as it impacts directly on my
1944 time frame, where a good number of these cars will retain
archbar trucks, K-brakes and low end railings.

Regards
Bruce

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