Thanks to all who kindly responded about the use of vertical brake staffs on boxcars. Based on the responses, it seems safe to say that they were still in use in the era I model, 1952/53.

If I see correctly one of the gons numbers in the foreground with the shovellers is numbeed 172722 if that is correct then it is a Caswell Ga-7 in series 172000 172499 which were commonly used for

Scott, I was sure I'd written about them somewhere, and it turns out to have been in Prototype Modeler in 1984, almost thirty years ago. To my surprise, I found that article reproduced on the

Yeah, well, not quite. Unless you want a specific model of THAT particular car. I’ve looked into this and the scanning guy noted that any (and I mean ANY) imperfection in the car to be scanned

I feel the opposite--with so much new stuff being produced, more and more kitbashing opportunities arise. As older stuff becomes less attractive(e.g. Revell flatcar) newer stuff is creating

I'm with you, Bill! It seems that kitbashing is something of a dying art these days with the plethora of RTR and resin kits of exact or close to exact prototype matches. I, like a lot of others, have

I extend sympathy to the Lofton family. Thanks to all who shared there experience's with Martin. Never met this fine family but always drooled over the offerings at Sunshine. Have a few of the kits

Mike Brock wrote: The cars built new or rebuilt as R-40-4 did NOT have the metal strip above the door. But SOME, not all, did get it in later years, as did other older rebuilds. Whether you add

Some of these cars became sand cars at engine terminals in later life.They were painted red.A.Premo

I noticed these on the "Sprue Brothers" website. They are available in .4mm, .6mm, .8mm, and 1.00mm. They might have application for us as some type of hose. Here is a link also to Michigan Toy

Guys, the photo at Needles was taken from the sand house (where sand was dried before being used in locomotives), the GS gondola was one of the Santa Fe's many Caswell drop bottom gons, and the

Bill, I didn't say that. You are not a typical modeler, and I've seen you turn "Tyco Toss" materials into museum quality models. I agree with Greg Martin that working with older kits can be fun -- I

In the not so distant future: - Scan surviving 1:1 prototype freight car at 0.02mm accuracy... - Select scale... and material... - Hit

Take a look in Culotta and Kline's Post War Freight Car Fleet. In it is a photo of a R-40-4 with sheet metal over the door. I asked Dick Harley about it, and IIRC his reply was that the cars

I note that the Tichy model [ the box calls it an R-40-4 ] of a PFE wood reefer has a metal [ I assume metal...no boards anyhow ] strip above the door. Photos of the R-40-4 in the PFE book show

One of them appears to be this: https://id18538.securedata.net/westerfieldmodels.com/merchantmanager/index.p hp?cPath=67 Thanks! -- Brian Ehni From: Bill Daniels <billinsf@...> Reply-To:

Gene Green wrote: Yes, there are trestles that are ground-level track over a DEPRESSED area for dumping. Is that an ELEVATED trestle? BTW, there are lots of photos of men shoveling out gondolas,

So the ruling is the Revell/Con-Cor flat will not yield an good model of a CB&Q flat car? I remember being quite happy with mine after the modifications I made. Bill Welch

Sure looks like they are unloading sand. If so, it will be taken to a dryer before it can be loaded into the dome. Before seeing this I was under the (apparently mistaken) thought that all of the

Good morning Gene and Group, Just for the record… I have seen a similar operation… in fact, I have been one of the shovelers. In this case the sand was shoveled to the open drop bottom hatch -- most