At 10:44 PM 9/21/2005 -0500, Brian wrote:
"Not entirely useless. Chateau Martin owned at least one Pfaudler steel 40'
car, which I shot in Pine Bluff, AK. #CMWX 1008

Sadly, the date falls outside the range of this discussion group (Jan 75)."
--

Brian Ehni
======================
Brian,

I wish that I had known you were in Alaska photographing wine cars. I
would have shown you a few other oddities that your camera may have
liked. Many of those would have fit the time frame of this list, even in
1975. I would have had a great deal of trouble finding Pine Bluff,
though. I don't think we have a town by that name here.

Paul Eaton
The Old Sourdough
Ruksakinmakiak, Alaska, US of A

At 11:38 PM 9/21/05, you wrote: If we can get injection-molded styrene

"conversation pieces" like Pfaudler milk reefers, which are entirely
useless to modelers of southern, southwestern, and western RRs, why not
six compartment wine tank cars? - Richard Hendrickson

Richard,
Thank you for your excellent response! I have no problem with the production of models of any car. I also now better understand that the car fits well into more areas than I thought it would. Maybe not into Canada but definitely into the areas you mention.

I know that each area can claim cars that would never fit into a lot of areas. Before the local Canadian Pacific line to Owen Sound was abandoned we had "L" cars used for transporting glass. These assigned service cars were mostly MP cars, 6 MP and 1 CP car if I remember correctly. These cars were all modified bulk end flat cars. I doubt if this one has been modelled often.

Outside of these cars, about the only conversation piece in our area was a vinegar car.

I guess it all comes down to if someone is willing to produce a car, even if it fits on to only one line, someone will buy it. Being a hobby we can be as prototypical or off the wall as we want to be. What is obscure to one is common to another. One of the many things that makes this hobby so interesting!

Peter Bowers


--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.344 / Virus Database: 267.11.4/109 - Release Date: 9/21/05

Not entirely useless. Chateau Martin owned at least one Pfaudler steel 40'
car, which I shot in Pine Bluff, AK. #CMWX 1008

Sadly, the date falls outside the range of this discussion group (Jan 75).
--

Brian Ehni

Thanks to all of you who've expressed support of my delving into O scale
std. gauge resin kits and your interest in purchasing one or more of the
upcoming Southern 41' flat and 41' composite gon kits. I have just
completed the last of the details and started pouring production molds
tonight. I already have 30 of the flat car underframes done and all
other parts are in-house, including decals. Shipping will start in
1.5-2 weeks, following completion of instructions.

The flat car pilot model will be done next week; the gon the week after.
Pix of both will be posted to my web site at that time; currently there
are prototype pix of the cars to give you an idea of what's coming.

Kits include steel weight, Grandt AB brakes and steps, Tichy grabs and
miscellaneous custom-cast or injection molded parts (like the stake
pockets). New artwork was created to accurately portray Southern's "RR
Roman" style, then printed via ALPS process. Decking is laser cut
basswood with nail holes. The underframe, stake pockets, stakes,
T-braces and many other parts were all created in 3D CAD then built
using rapid prototyping technology. Only an injection molded kit can
compare with the detail and accuracy. Ya gotta see it to believe it!

I am now accepting paid orders from individuals. Kit prices are as
follows:

#48-F1 ... Flat w/ Red Caboose trucks & metal wheels + Kadee 805
couplers + ALPS decals ... $99
#48-F1x .. same as above less trucks and couplers ... $85

#48-G1 ... Composite gon w/ RC trucks & metal wheels + 805s + ALPS
decals ... $109
#48-G1x .. same as above less trucks and couplers ... $95

Shipping = $8 per order for USPS Priority.

Checks, money orders, Visa/MC and PayPal accepted. Go to my web page
for mailing address and other ordering info.

Following these kits will be a Southern 1945 PS low side steel gon with
Dreadnaught end, a B&O M53 wagontop box, Southern radio control car
(mid-train slave control) and a slatted-end wood rack made from the SR
41' flat ... circa 1941-early 60s.

I'll post another note to this list when pilot model pix are on my web
site.

Jim King
Smoky Mountain Model Works, Inc.
http://www.smokymountainmodelworks.com

On Sep 21, 2005, at 4:50 PM, PBowers wrote:

While the wine car might be an interesting conversation piece, I would
expect it was operated over few routes. Unless your modelled railway has a
winery or bottling facility, or is on the route in between is it a logical
car to have? For interst sake, how many routes would these cars be found on?

It's true that glass-lined wine tank cars were not numerous. However, there were single, three, and four compartment wine tank cars as well as six compartment cars, and the total of all types added up to hundreds of cars. General American, Shippers Car Line, and North American all owned them and leased them to a variety of wine shippers. In addition to a sizable number of California vintners, lessees of wine tank cars included, for example, Ambrose of Kansas City; Pirrone & Sons of Garfield, NJ; and K. Arekelian of Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York, who shipped wine east in bulk for local bottling. Taylor and other upstate New York wine producers had California wines shipped east (in unmarked cars) to be blended with the local product because the growing season was too short there to bring up the sugar to desirable levels, and I've been told (though I've seen no direct evidence) that the same practice was followed by wineries in Virginia and other eastern states as well.

Wine tank cars would certainly not have been seen on branch lines in places like Kansas or Georgia. But there is abundant photographic evidence of them in the trains of the major transcontinental carriers that served California such as the Santa Fe, Union Pacific/C&NW, and Southern Pacific/Rock Island/T&NO/SSW, sometimes several of them at one time, en route to widely scattered destinations. Indeed, in some parts of California wine tank cars, like helium tank cars, were more commonly seen than coal hoppers, and much more commonly than milk reefers (which were, in fact, non-existent in the far west), difficult as that may be for easterners to imagine. If we can get injection-molded styrene "conversation pieces" like Pfaudler milk reefers, which are entirely useless to modelers of southern, southwestern, and western RRs, why not six compartment wine tank cars?

Richard Hendrickson

The original F&C/RPI MEC gondola kit had no interior detail either.
I know cause I have one... If you want one like that, get the ERTL
gondola for 5 bucks. It was patterned after the RPI kit. I don't know
if Steve improved the current kit but he has done so for most other
re-releases.

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, "Fred in Vt." <pennsy@s...> wrote:

Guyz,

In this topic, does anyone recall a soon to be finished

book on FGE, that was explained as being the size & scope of the PFE
research volume by Thompson, Church, and Jones??

Fred Freitas

Fred - A while ago, Pat O'Boyle of Pacific Limited was contemplating
such a volume. He had a LOT of info about FGEX and a lot of photos
too. He imported an excellent FGEX/PRR R-7 in "O" scale about 20
years ago. Pat has had a lot of problems with his import business and
may now turn to publishing his books. A.T. Kott

Tim,I wholeheartily agree with you with the exception of Rule #1.I am
glad I have brass milk cars.Nothing around in plastic.Armand Premo

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, Anthony Thompson <thompson@s...> wrote:

Jim Scott wrote:

I agree that the 6-Dome wine car would sell very well.
If I remember correctly, wasn't there a Roma Wine
6-Dome car made in the 60s or 70s that was metal. i
always wanted one of them but never got around to
buying one.

Jim, you must be thinking of the Thomas HO car of the 1950s, a
dimensionally accurate model which can occasionally be found at swap
meets. The AHM abomination unfortunately makes many modelers think they
already have a wine car, but to an extent which makes Athearn tank cars
look modest, it is "inflated" with air pressure or something to almost
double its correct diameter and dome size. AFAIK, it does not resemble
ANY prototype car, not even close.

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@s...
Publishers of books on railroad history

Jim & Tony,

Wasn't there also one by MDC in plastic? Maybe back in the early
1960's? I remember something in plastic, painted what I thought at
the time had to be a much to wine-colored wine-color, and even then I
knew enough to stay away from AHM.

Walter M. Clark
Time stopped in November 1941
Riverside, California

Got milk?Yes we do like milk cars ,but they should be accurate
representations,not just paint scemes.Armand Premo

The wine cars may have had few origination points but many termination points.

While the wine car might be an interesting conversation piece, I would expect it was operated over few routes. Unless your modelled railway has a winery or bottling facility, or is on the route in between is it a logical car to have? For interst sake, how many routes would these cars be found on?

(Why do I whine about wine cars?? Whine not??)

Peter Bowers


--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.344 / Virus Database: 267.11.4/109 - Release Date: 9/21/05

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, "Jon Miller" <atsf@i...> wrote:

<snip> even one or two gons.
There was a really nice gon (SP kit by DA) but it didn't sell very

> well. <snip>

Jon Miller
AT&SF
For me time has stopped in 1941
Digitrax, Chief/Zephyr systems, JMRI user
NMRA Life member #2623
Member SFRH&MS

Jon,
I've heard several people say that the reason the DA SP GS gon (a
string of letters only an STMFC nut, like me, could both understand
and love) didn't sell enough to even recoup DA's investment, much less
cause them to keep in in production (darn it) was it's light weight
when finished and no easy way to add weight that didn't show except
through a load, which raises the c/g quite a bit. I have one,
assembled, and I wish I had several more because my abilities have
increased quite a bit and I know I'd do a better job now. The funny
thing is that the DA SP GS gon is one of the few kits to be light
enough that you could run a prototypically long string of cars behind
a brass steam engine (of course, this would have to be a dedicated
train because adding any other cars (except at the front of the train
right behind the engine) would cause a disaster on the first curve.

Walter M. Clark
Time stopped in November 1941
Riverside, California

Larry Jackman asked:
"There are two kits of MEC steel gondola on Ebay and they want 35 dollars for the two. Your opinion please."

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=6000459254

I'd pass. The kits in the eBay lot are cast in Funaro's old yellow resin - no workability problems, but the quality of his work has dramatically increased since these kits were introduced in the early 1990s. The opening bid of $35 is too high, especially as these are available new from Funaro for $35.99.
http://www.fandckits.com/HOFreight/6330.html


Ben Hom

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, "rwitt_2000" <rmwitt@i...> wrote:
<snip>

Bill,

<snip>It is a stencil with the painting information: such as the

manufacturer use, the date, etc. <snip>

I possibly have the raw material to make decals as I have copied
this information from probably over 100 cars, mostly box cars, from
my field observations made in the 1960s. I have examples for cars
last painted in 1955 and 1956. <snip>

Just last evening I was looking at some Xerox copies of M-55 boxcars
someone kindly sent me and it looks like there may be a start date
just after WWI when the B&O actually began to apply this stencil.
<snip>

It would be a nice addition for lettering B&O cars for the 1950s
<snip>.

I hope this helps.

Regards,

Bob Witt

Bob, did you mean to say the lettering started just after WWI or WWII?
Your comment that "(i)t would be a nice addition for lettering B&O
cars for the 1950s" leads me to think WWII, but since I have one of
these cars and am modeling before WWII I need clarification.

Thanks,

Walter M. Clark
Time stopped in November 1941
Riverside, California

There are two kits of MEC steel gondola on Ebay and they want 35 dollars for the two. Your opinion please
On Sep 21, 2005, at 2:16 PM, Bruce Smith wrote:

On Sep 21, 2005, at 12:53 PM, ljack70117@adelphia.net wrote:

Can any one tell me about Rensselaer resin Gondola kits?
Thank you
Larry Jackman

Larry,

What did you want to know? If you are asking about NEB&W (the Renssalear Club's RR) kits, these were cast by Steve Funaro for the most part, and almost all are available through F&C at this point. Is there any kit in particular that you are interested in?

Regards
Bruce

Bruce F. Smith
Auburn, AL
http://www.vetmed.auburn.edu/~smithbf/

"Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy" - Benjamin Franklin
__
/ &#92;
__<+--+>________________&#92;__/___ ________________________________
|- ______/ O O &#92;_______ -| | __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ |
| / 4999 PENNSYLVANIA 4999 &#92; | ||__||__||__||__||__||__||__||__||
|/_____________________________&#92;|_|________________________________|
| O--O &#92;0 0 0 0/ O--O | 0-0-0 0-0-0

Thank you
Larry Jackman
ljack70117@adelphia.net
You can't have everything. Where would you put it?

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, timboconnor@c... wrote:

Pat, although the physics of moving freight cars is real and had real
operational consequences (e.g. more fuel, more power) I don't think
the Return On Investment for lighter cars was ever as compelling as
say, increased car capacity, or roller bearings, or cushion underframes,
and so on. So while railroads dabbled in lighter car designs I think the
primary focus was on overall operating cost reduction. Nowadays (if I
may be permitted) considerable sums have been spent on lighter coal
cars, but it has to be pointed out that due to wind resistance, empty
coal cars going back to Wyoming require almost as much power & fuel
as the loaded coal cars! Railroads once again have discovered that
greater capacity (to 286,000 lbs) has a faster payoff than worrying
about fine-tuning the tare-to-weight ratio.

Tim O'Connor

Uncle!!! Darn it. I've let myself get trapped into a discussion that most subscibers to this
list couldn't care less about (am I right guys?) even though it is about freight cars (well sort
of). When I originally listed the desireable characteristics of a freight car roof, one that I
listed was lightness. That's all I said. I still stand by that simple concept. SRE also thought
it was a selling point (I'll now leave Wonder Bras and advertising out of my discussion -
they're not in my area of expertise nor do they concern freight cars and Mike is watching).
Heavy roofs, all else being equal, don't make sense. Lightness is desireable, especially
where it may lower the vertical cg of a car and improve its rolling dynamics. Of course,
additional friction snubbers in the spring groups may help here. When taken to extremes,
such as the experimental lightweight box cars, it had adverse repercussions. Absolument!

I do agree that weight has little impact on the rolling friction of a freight car. I was more
concerned with the component of the gravity vector (weight) aligned with the pulling faces
of the couplers when the car is being pulled upgrade {it's just the sine of the (grade) angle
times the weight of the car}.

Pat, signing off on this one before the thread is 20, 30, or 40 e-mails long and when I
finally agree that heavy freight car roofs are good. All in all, I think Mr Spock would agree
with me that that statement would be "most illogical."

Pat Wider

On Sep 21, 2005, at 2:30 PM, Gatwood, Elden wrote:

.... does anyone have either the outside dimensions to one of the Type
30 GATC cars, or alternatively be willing to measure one of the WA Drake
cars to see what the frame length, tank length, tank diameter, and dome
diameter are?

Except for dome diameter, these dimensions are given in the 1931 and 1937 Car Builders' Cyclopedias: U/F length 36'8-1/2", width 9'3", 8K gal. tank 78" ID X 31'3-1/4" IL, 10K gal. tank 87-1/2" ID X 30'9-1/4" IL. FWIW, tank dimensions were identical with AC&F Type 27 and U/F dimensions were quite close.

Richard Hendrickson

Tim O'C. wrote:

Larry, the F&C War Emergency gons are still available, and the steel-side
rebuilds are good for SP (and probably Wabash as well). I've seen many
photos of the ex-T&NO cars all over the SP well into the 1970's... They
were a major car group on the SP in the 50's and 60's. Some lost their
wood sheathing and were used as log gondolas.

The steel-siding came during 1959-1961 and was only done to about half the cars. Some lost sheathing to be pipe gons, originally (for more on both points, see my Vol. 1).

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@signaturepress.com
Publishers of books on railroad history

Tom, I do not remember what exactly is wrong with the Sunshine under frame, but it is substantially wrong, as best I recall. I haven't done one of these in awhile, but the simplest thing to do is to cut the floor out of a Proto 2000 undec. Mather stock or box car kit and use it along with the under frame piece. It is my understanding that they are correct. I also use the roof and roof walk out of the donor as they are far superior to the resin pieces. These changes turn these early Sunshine kits into pretty nice models. I still have not figured out a really good material and a good way to add the "legs" to the reinforcing channels on the sides. In my opinion, these channel legs not being part of the side castings is the real shortcoming of these kits. I hope you are doing one of the "tall" cars that can't be done with the LL kit.
Paul Lyons
Laguna Niguel, CA