details – Page 4 – Notes on Designing, Building, and Operating Model Railroads

Coal hopper details – pt 2

Let’s dive into more hopper upgrade ideas. Part one in the previous blog post covered end post replacement, and grab iron and hand hold replacements. Are you ready for more?

The last blog post covered upgrading hopper brake hardware from AB to KD brake components. The example was an HO scale plastic Bowser GLa class hopper. Let’s take a look at more upgrades you can make to hopper models.

Installing KD brake hardware on hoppers

A few steel hopper models have been progressing on my workbench. Each of them requires KD brake components. As I worked on these, I realized it’s been a while since a step-by-step illustration of the process has been published. This post will summarize the three methods I’m using on these models.

Shawmut coal gondolas

Perry Squier has added several coal gondolas to his HO scale Shawmut layout. Perry sent the following photos and notes.

A distinctive freight car missing from my layout were the 6001-6500 series drop bottom gondolas bought by the Pittsburg Shawmut & Northern in 1907. These 50-ton capacity, 40-foot gondolas had steel centersills and wood sides. They also had a 4-foot, 8.5-inch interior height with six drop doors. These were big cars on the Shawmut.

Shawmut Boxcars, part 2

Perry Squier has been pushing forward batch building Shawmut boxcars for his HO scale layout. The first part was an earlier blog feature. We have continued discussing details and Perry has sent additional notes.

After building the basic car bodies and detailing the ends, it was time to tackle the doors, car sides, and roofs. Several prototype images were used to guide the detail work. Not everything was perfect but these are close enough.