You've got it right although I am guessing that you think the DESPATCH end (with very squarish looking ribs) is an SRE dreadnaught end, which it isn't. The 'no darts' version was an attempt to model t

That is sad news. I never met him, but I traded with him, and deeply admired his work. As far as I know he wrote no articles, but he posted many construction photos as he progressed. Tim O'Connor

I didn't notice because Mike's 2014 message is saved in Eudora and I was forced out of using Eudora by Comcast a year or so ago... We do seem to revisit things after everyone has had time to forget th

https://shop.bachmanntrains.com/images/HO_Scale/74802.jpg My first reaction was "50 foot 6 inch" ?? With drop ends ? That has to be pretty unusual! BUT, it turns out that the B&O O-41 gondolas built i

This just arrived today and I thought I'd re-share since photos of DL&W refrigerator cars seem to be fairly scarce. :-) Tim O'

Dave There was a large smelter in upstate New York on Lake Ontario for about a CENTURY. There is a LOT of hydropower in the area, and a great deal of it is now being consumed by "Bitcoin miners". I th

One torn, one intact, seen from the interior - with steel banding holding it in place.

That's right. We onlu give out "RPM participation awards" ! :-D

I recall that the first Proto 2000 50 foot rectangular panel (aka Murphy, aka SRE) roofs were actually incorrect - they had too few or too many panels! (I forget which.) This was later corrected. So m

Charlie Shop date 1954 ! Has AB brakes and vertical brake staff.

Sometimes cars were seen with open doors and grain doors in various conditions. But mostly I think you'd see them at grain elevators. Tim

Perfect !!

Clearly not to scale! :-D No wonder some thought they were 50 foot cars.

Andy I don't agree. The C&BT has the correct ends and roof and the doors are a problem regardless of whose kits you start with. I'd say for the *effort* (unless you are a Santa Fe perfectionist modele

I thought the attraction of the Signode doors was they were disposable?

A few resin kits have been outdone in plastic, but not many of them. A number have been done with lower overall quality (e.g. omission of details) such as the Red Caboose PFE wood reefers (when compar

Years ago this was discussed - probably still in the message archive. I'm not sure about rollers - unsold cargo - but there were single waybills in some cases that included a stopover at a large grain

Urp. One of the cars has wood sides!

In the business world we used to call this a "price umbrella" - Means the competition is setting prices so high that it's easy to sell at lower asking prices that are still reasonable. I must be doing

My Dad had a funny plaque up over his work bench in the basement - I don't recall the exact words but it was something like "Don't start vast projects with half vast ideas." I inherited my Dad's abili