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

But STMFC is a place where experts can feel comfortable! After all,

they

need a home too. :-)

Tim O'Connor

Tim,
If we on this list are former perts I want to know what a pert is
before I claim to be a former one.

Jared Harper
Athens, GA

I am not going to pick on Charlie personally (I've never met him, and it is also contrary to list rules), but if anyone (speaking generally) showed such blatant ignorance of HO or N scale, modellers in those scales would be quite put out. There were other O scale manufacturers in the late 1930's, among them Lobaugh, that were just starting to produce better quality locomotives and rolling stock berfore the war sidelined all development. The post-war kits were as good or better than comparable HO kits in technology, and continued to develop along parallel lines, including the major effect of Japanese (and later Korean) imports.
As a scale with a smaller sales base than HO or N, O scale has generally not had the same broad selection of items as they have, but it is invariably as good or better in terms of quality of product--and this is no recent phenomenon.
And I doubt you will find many O scalers who consider Williams among the premier lines, nor do we consider Lionel (even the scale-proportioned cars) or Atlas really state of the art. We prefer Intermountain and Red Caboose cars in styrene, and a number of good-quality resin kits (and that is not even getting into brass products). Some O scalers use P48 for exact track gage--as some HO modelers use P87, so I don't take your point about the inch and a quarter.
Even allowing for hyperbole, the only way I can account for Charlie's being sixty years out of date is that he relies on Kalmbach periodicals for his information. I can recommend O Scale Trains (honesty compels me to note that I write a column for that publication) and O Scale News to anyone who thinks the choices in O scale are three-rail semi-toys or primitive antiques.
Jace Kahn, General Manager
Ceres and Canisteo RR Co.

Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2005 18:51:46 -0600
From: "Charlie Vlk" <cvlk@...>
Subject: Re: The Dark Ages of Scale Model Railroading

Pat-
ScaleCraft was a special case, although I think they made some less than
perfect stuff as well. The company
was run by Elliot Donnelly, who was connected with the Donnelly Company that
published telephone books,
the Sears catalog, etc...
Until he was dragged out of the Model Railroad Industry by the demands of
the family business he was able to
play trains with a great deal of success. He built a brand new state of the
art factory for his company in
Libertyville, Illinois. He built locomotives and cars in both O Scale and
OO.
Research for manufactures was a little easier then... you could go out and
photograph almost everything you
might want to make..... and the railroad mechanical departments and the
builders were a great deal more
cooperative than, say, a certain railroad with the initials UP is today....
While you may find examples of great modeling from the 1930's, I would not
draw any broad conclusions.
The march of progress has been, in general upward; O and HO through the
1950s had very few accurate
models. O Gauge operated (and still does) on 5'-0" wide track and back then
had outside third rail current collection.
A lot of locomotives were Lionel conversions or scratch built from tin cans.
O Scale is just now coming out
of the Anvil and Bronze Sand Casting era (look at the scale stuff that
Atlas, Lionel, Williams, et al are doing...
wow!!!).
Charlie Vlk



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--- In STMFC@..., "Thomas Baker" <bakert@a...> wrote:

Doug,

Have you seen any photos of TOBIN COMPANY meat cars? Their cars and those of
MORRIS RIFKIN & SONS might make some interesting models. They would certainly add
variety to the freight-car consist.

I've just loaded a Morris Rifkin Meat Reefer as well. See URTX 5100.

Pat Wider

Hello,

This email message is a notification to let you know that
a file has been uploaded to the Files area of the STMFC
group.

File : /URTX5100.jpg
Uploaded by : patrickwider <pwider@...>
Description : URTX 5100 Morris Rifkin Meat Reefer

You can access this file at the URL:
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patrickwider <pwider@...>

--- In STMFC@..., "Thomas Baker" <bakert@a...> wrote:

Doug,

Have you seen any photos of TOBIN COMPANY meat cars? Their cars and those of

MORRIS RIFKIN & SONS might make some interesting models. They would certainly add
variety to the freight-car consist.

Tom

I just posted one. Check the files section for GARX 1624. See message 49634.

Pat Wider

Can someone refresh my memory as to the phone number of Bob Lillestrand (sp)? Please respond off list so that i can pick it up while I am away (I "No EMail" all the Yahoo! Lists).

Thanks so much!

Denny
--
Denny S. Anspach, MD
Sacramento, California

Doug,

Have you seen any photos of TOBIN COMPANY meat cars? Their cars and those of MORRIS RIFKIN & SONS might make some interesting models. They would certainly add variety to the freight-car consist.

Tom

I tend to give the older model manufacturers and (especially) the modelers a lot of slack. So many of them richly deserve our respect, not our condescension.

I greatly enjoy the models- and the kits- from the very early HO years. They are a constant revelation, always interesting, and never boring. Some of them can be startling in their representations of prototype accuracy, and in some instances life is turned on its head when a printed kit side originally produced from a photo of the real thing from the '30s turns out to be the only extant current clue as to how the prototype might actually have been painted!

Although many manufacturers did produce relatively crude products (IMHO even by the standards of the day), a few others did quite well considering the poor access to the plethora of information and quick technology that we are so used to today. The challenge to the modeler was pretty great, and when one reviews ancient issues of Model Railroader and Model Craftsman, a great deal of the work depicted, and skills exercised and written about in those days can be truly humbling. Relative to what we are used to currently, if we begin at ground zero, many of these crafts modelers with far fewer resources reach the levels of our current average realized potentials or even beyond, while beginning at some minus level to which we are currently utter strangers.

Now, back to packing my sunblock and Polarized shades. H-mmm. Should I pack my Speedo?
Denny



--
Denny S. Anspach, MD
Sacramento, California

I recall going to the St. Paul Union Depot from the time I was seven until I was in my early twenties to marvel at the O-gauge layout there. Although every car was correctly proportioned, and some modelers did create absolute marvels of accuracy, not all was well in the modeling world. Yes, Ray Norton produced a beautiful model of the first Hiawatha, and another modeler made an absolutely gorgeous C&NW Hudson, other trains required considerable imagination: I recall a SOO LINE "Hudson" made over from a Lionel scale 4-6-4. Most refrigerator cars had the raised roof hatches commonly seen on PFE and SFRD wood cars, but not usually--if at all--on C&NW refrigerator cars and not--at least not many--on SWIFT refrigerator cars. Then there were the ALL_NATION freight car kits. Did the company distinguish between a 10' 0" car and a 10' 6" IH car? And the list goes on.

Tom

Pat-
That was made before the move to Libertyville.
The Hudson rivaled the Lionel Scale Hudson....IIRC Lionel used some Scalecraft parts to finish their advertising sample for catalog photos.
O Scale from the early days was something to behold. I remember a layout called the Burlington Junior in the basement of a funeral home in
Cicero.... the funeral director apparently had a daughter or son that married into the family of a mechanical officer of the Burlington... they had
blueprints of new stuff before it hit the rails. I remember the workbench where several timplate cans had been flattened out to be made into
locomotives or cars.
I do recall that they did have some scratchbuilt CB&Q SM16 stockcars that were (at least to my 10 year old eyes) pretty decent representations
of the prototype. But on the whole the layout in its entirety was pretty crude... the detail parts and level of expectation was not what we see today
with such craftsmen as Tom Mix spinning scale replicas out of brass..... but the smell of the Ozone from those K&D #5 motors (about the size of
a motor on a Milwaukee brand professional grade 1/2" electric drill) storming around at full speed with about 30 pounds of tin, bronze and wood
trailing...is forever burned into my nostrils!!!
You do have a point though.... there are some striking examples of models...some of the Athearn metal boxcars in HO and O, the All-Nation O Scale boxcars,
and others....remind us that as much as we advance in knowledge, technique, materials, technology....we stand on the shoulders of giants.
Charlie Vlk

Thanks to all who replied and pointed out transition era freight cars
in N scale. Seems there's more variety than I suspected.

I'm flirting with a scale change half to make my layout room larger and
half to have wider aisles. My chief financial officer (aka wife) seems
to have some reservations. But I can dream, can't I?

Gene Green
Out in the west Texas town of El Paso where the houses have no
basements.

--- In STMFC@..., Denny Anspach <danspach@m...> wrote:

Tobin Packing Company, a single example of an important regional
packing center that it is not unreasonable to believe would have
received anywhere from one carload of livestock a week, or 50 cars
per day. It is beside the point.

The plant may have been actually in nearby Schenectady.

Denny S. Anspach, MD
Sacramento

Denny - I've just loaded a photo of a Tobin Packing Co. meat reefer (GARX 1624)

Pat Wider

Hello,

This email message is a notification to let you know that
a file has been uploaded to the Files area of the STMFC
group.

File : /GARX1624.jpg
Uploaded by : patrickwider <pwider@...>
Description : GARX 1624 Tobin Packing Co. Meat Reefer

You can access this file at the URL:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/STMFC/files/GARX1624.jpg

To learn more about file sharing for your group, please visit:
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Regards,

patrickwider <pwider@...>

saw the new mill gons and PS covered hopper at my dealer today. None of the
mill gons interested me, but I was intrigued by the N&W covered hoppers
since they fit my era.

What commodities did the N&W haul in the hoppers?

Thanks
Brian J Carlson P.E.
Cheektowaga NY

It's been a while since I took a hard look at the PCL Photos
section, but IIRC it was running over 90% of capacity. It's now 30%,
and I have the feeling that the revision involved stripping out any
photos that weren't in folders. At any rate, everything that's there
now (19 items) is in folders. Something to keep an eye on when the
STMFC Photos section gets upgraded. That's now at 80% of capacity
and contains 72 items.

Tom Madden

The photo section has indeed been revised and the larger images

are now

available to PCL members. It will be even more useful for photos

that are

more tightly composed or cropped. One of the better Photo Albums

is the

one for Cascade Lane.

Best regards,

David Jobe, Sr.

--- In STMFC@..., "Charlie Vlk" <cvlk@c...> wrote:

Pat-
ScaleCraft was a special case, although I think they made some less than
perfect stuff as well. The company
was run by Elliot Donnelly, who was connected with the Donnelly Company that
published telephone books,
the Sears catalog, etc...
Until he was dragged out of the Model Railroad Industry by the demands of
the family business he was able to
play trains with a great deal of success. He built a brand new state of the
art factory for his company in
Libertyville, Illinois. He built locomotives and cars in both O Scale and
OO.
Research for manufactures was a little easier then... you could go out and
photograph almost everything you
might want to make..... and the railroad mechanical departments and the
builders were a great deal more
cooperative than, say, a certain railroad with the initials UP is today....
While you may find examples of great modeling from the 1930's, I would not
draw any broad conclusions.
The march of progress has been, in general upward; O and HO through the
1950s had very few accurate
models. O Gauge operated (and still does) on 5'-0" wide track and back then
had outside third rail current collection.
A lot of locomotives were Lionel conversions or scratch built from tin cans.
O Scale is just now coming out
of the Anvil and Bronze Sand Casting era (look at the scale stuff that
Atlas, Lionel, Williams, et al are doing...
wow!!!).
Charlie Vlk

Charlie - thanks for the education. I also have a Scale Craft New York Central Hudson that
my father built that has a bronze (?) sand cast boiler. Believe me, there is no need for an
internal lead or tungsten weight. It's a hog! It has shoes for an outside third rail. It's a bit
crude compared to the freight cars but it appears to be scale in it's overall dimensions.
The assembly instructions to one of the freight cars is patterned after engineering
drawings. The address on it is: Scale Models Inc., 1516 S. Wabash Ave., Chicago Ill. It's
dated 9/1/38.

Pat Wider

--- In STMFC@..., "jerryglow2" <jerryglow@c...> wrote:

The Passenger Car list seems to have the changes. The folder are the
notebooks, and the pics are available in 2 sizes.

Jerry Glow

--- In STMFC@..., "pullmanboss" <tgmadden@w...> wrote:

The Photos section of the passenger car list shows the folders as
spiral notebooks. Maybe I'm seeing those because I'm the owner, but
maybe someone else can take a look and let me know if that's how

they

see 'em too.

Tom Madden

The citrus modelers group (http://ph.groups.yahoo.com/group/citrusmodeling/photos)
has the update as well. We must be a hind tit on the dog!

Pat Wider

Pat-
ScaleCraft was a special case, although I think they made some less than perfect stuff as well. The company
was run by Elliot Donnelly, who was connected with the Donnelly Company that published telephone books,
the Sears catalog, etc...
Until he was dragged out of the Model Railroad Industry by the demands of the family business he was able to
play trains with a great deal of success. He built a brand new state of the art factory for his company in
Libertyville, Illinois. He built locomotives and cars in both O Scale and OO.
Research for manufactures was a little easier then... you could go out and photograph almost everything you
might want to make..... and the railroad mechanical departments and the builders were a great deal more
cooperative than, say, a certain railroad with the initials UP is today....
While you may find examples of great modeling from the 1930's, I would not draw any broad conclusions.
The march of progress has been, in general upward; O and HO through the 1950s had very few accurate
models. O Gauge operated (and still does) on 5'-0" wide track and back then had outside third rail current collection.
A lot of locomotives were Lionel conversions or scratch built from tin cans. O Scale is just now coming out
of the Anvil and Bronze Sand Casting era (look at the scale stuff that Atlas, Lionel, Williams, et al are doing...
wow!!!).
Charlie Vlk

Oh my, Gene Green, I don't know where to begin!

The 1937 AAR 40 foot boxcar is made by InterMountain.

Forty foot single sheathed boxcars are made by Atlas and Micro-Trains. Micro-Trains makes both single and door and a half versions, with both vertical and power brake wheels. I haven't started on the 36 footers available.

Athearn, Micro-Trains, and Walthers make 50 foot and 53'6" flats, in several varieties, with straight or fishbelly sides and with and without bulkheads. A craftsman kit in wood and pewter of a PRR F30 has just been issued as well.

InterMountain makes an 8K tank car and Micro-trains makes a 10K tank car. Atlas makes an 11K pressurized tank car from the late transition era (1949+).

Micro-Trains makes a 40 foot stock car and Athearn makes a 36 foot stock car. There are other, trainset quality, cars as well.

Both Atlas and Micro-Trains make 40 foot wood reefers. The Atlas cars will "knock your socks off", with working hinges on the ice hatch braces and truly fine printing in multiple colors. Athearn and Fine-N-Scale make 36 footers. The Fine-N-Scale are resin kits.

Athearn makes 36 foot truss rod boxcars and reefers, Fine-N-Scale makes resin kits for same. Fine-N-Scale also makes a 38 foot trussrod flatcar kit.

That;s only the very beginning and in direct answer to your questions. You can see some of these cars (mostly ones I have reworked) at http://www.railimages.com/gallery/greggmahlkov

I'll have some of these at Mike Brock's "do" next week.

Gregg Mahlkov
Florida's Forgotten Coast.

Tom,

The photo section has indeed been revised and the larger images are now available to PCL members. It will be even more useful for photos that are more tightly composed or cropped. One of the better Photo Albums is the one for Cascade Lane.

Best regards,

David Jobe, Sr.
St. Ann, Missouri