Notes on Designing, Building, and Operating Model Railroads
A hobby adventure
This sounds pretty simple, right? I mean, you just turn the screw until it’s tight and then turn it back a quarter or a half turn so the truck pivots and rocks side to side. Sure, that is the way I had installed freight car trucks for years until a truck wouldn’t pivot well or I stripped out the threads in the hole.
Readers may have noticed most of my freight cars go through a few phases as they progress from parts in a kit box to layout use with a weathered patina. These construction phases are common for many prototype modelers as we customize basic freight car kits, or ready-to-run models (RTR), in order to reflect a specific prototype or era. Let’s take a look at these phases.
Some of my projects are long term affairs but they eventually move forward. Here’s a peek at one of those projects. This freight car started about five years ago when Accurail released their very nice 41-foot steel gondola. Except for the ends and a couple of small details, the model is a close match to a Wheeling & Lake Erie prototype. 2000 of those gondolas were built in 1921.
I found another unfinished model last week and I can’t recall when I started on this build. I’m pretty certain it’s only been sitting for a year and I remember why it was put away. I stopped this build because of the non-standard sill steps that needed to be bent from a flat piece of brass shimstock. I did one and put the model away. But it’s back and I finished it this past week.
It has been about a year since I described the last resin freight car kit builds. A number of other layout tasks have commanded my attention, including a recent operating session. But there have been a few kit completions in the last few months, including a wonderful resin box car kit that includes etched metal and laser cut wood detail parts. Yarmouth Model Work introduced this kit earlier in 2014 and I scooped one up as it fits my 1926 era. Era appropriate decals even came with the kit! The completed model can be seen in the image above. Click on any image here to review a larger size.