Boxcar Sunday, Let's see your boxcars.

@pennsyfan posted:

When I first saw the New Haven State of Maine boxcar, I thought it might be a fantasy car and I wasn’t sure if I should order it. I did some digging and here’s what I found out.

In 1950 the Banger and Aroostook ordered 300 insulated and heated plugged door boxcars for potato service. The cars were equipped with ventilators and charcoal stoves. Another order was placed for an additional 150 cars. The New Haven RR piggybacked on that second order for 100 cars. The factory decorated the cars in the State of Maine scheme which saved the New Haven some money.

Rather than just show the one car, I thought that I’d show all my State of Maine cars.

My first car is a paper and wood model made by my Dad about 70 years ago.

My favorite, too!

Inspired by "Professor @Don McErlean" I thought I'd go into the earliest history of Lionel's MPC-era boxcars. Here's a 1970 IC boxcar, #9200:

1970 was the first year of Lionel's production as a division of Model Products Corporation which, in turn, was a division of General Mills. Like many PW cars before it, this car was molded in color with all graphics heat stamped. Note the MPC "flag" logo beneath "Lionel" on the car. The doors and tracks also remained essentially unchanged from PW cars.

The trucks, however, were conceptually redesigned. While the sideframes, bolster and coupler were injection-molded from delrin plastic as one piece like later PW AAR trucks, for the first time fixed-wheel wheelsets with steel needlepoint axles and "fast-angle" wheel design were employed:

The needlepoint axles allowed the wheelsets to spin more freely while the "fast-angle" wheel design allowed the wheelsets to shift outward to provide "differential action" for negotiating curves. The overall result was an easier-rolling car that did not require wheel-to-axle lubrication. In contrast to today's sintered iron wheels, these early MPC cars employed die-cast zinc wheels pressed onto the knurled axles. Unfortunately, some of the zinc wheels have suffered from zinc pest to varying degrees though the pictured car is largely zinc pest-free.

Finally, overall car weight was reduced considerably compared to PW cars, not only due to the plastic trucks but also to the fact that the stamped steel floor was only about half as thick as that in a PW car. Although this weight reduction was marketed as allowing longer trains to be pulled by the same locomotive, cost-savings was almost certainly the primary goal.

Hi, boxcar fans. Here is a MTH Chicago North Western.

Here is mine...part of a Holiday "Boxcar Challenge". There are a lot of boxcars.

Donald

Some NYC Boxcars on Boxcar Sunday

@3rail posted:

Here is mine...part of a Holiday "Boxcar Challenge". There are a lot of boxcars.

Donald

Pretty awesome Don!

FRH

Go Ravens!

7

Happy Boxcar Sunday !

Airco boxcar

During the past week, I ran Maine Central 2-8-0 steam locomotive #501 (Weaver) on my 12’-by-8’ layout with a freight train including Bangor & Aroostook “State of Maine” #4035 (MTH), BAR #1407 (Weaver/CMP), and Maine Central #36123 (Atlas O).

MELGAR

My only contribution this week…MTH car, detailed and repainted. Mullet River decals…

Tom

This week brought another PA round roof boxcar.

LOL, I sold last weeks’s to a Forum member!

So, here’s the current new one:

Western Maryland boxcar by Weaver.   How i so miss Weaver!  

I picked up a couple more MTH 50' Hi Cube boxcars last week, still need to get trucks under the Quebec Central though.

John

Well Bill Swatos thanks for the mention. Although I can't claim to have officially been awarded the rank of "Professor" I am on the faculty (part time) of Baylor University so I guess I can continue with my "LOOOOOONG Explanations" .  @stangtrain was posting his new round roof box car, I thought I might add to the line and post mine...this one a tinplate car from Karl Bub in the 1950's and it has a full round roof.  (full disclosure this is HO).

Now back to my normal Lionel posting's.  This is a #114 boxcar and was available from 1912 - 1926.  It was nominally orange in color but this one was "redecorated" likely by a then young enthusiast with a coat of red kitchen enamel.  Even more importantly, the bottom of the car is stamped "Lionel Mfg Company" which dates it prior to 1918 when Lionel incorporated to become Lionel Corp.  This one has a special place to me as it was a gift from a colleague from NASA and I always loved the idea that it was a gift from the space agency that dated to the time of the Wright Brothers and the fragile fabric and wood aircraft of WW I.

Here you can see the "Lionel Mfg. Co" stamp that dates this car prior to 1918 hence it would have been made between 1912 and 1918 or some 106 to 112 years old!

Best wishes to everyone

Don

Something a little different from me.  A restored AF wide gauge boxcar.

My pair of Eastwood boxcars that I purchased a few years ago.

Hi boxcar fans, for this week here is an Atlas 50-foot C&EI.

I’ve been wanting to get some boxcars with customized lettering for quite some time. I’ve also been impressed with boxcars posted on Sundays by forum member @Krieglok (Tom), so I contacted him a few weeks ago and he agreed to do two custom cars and renumber a locomotive for me. We discussed paint colors, types of cars, lettering styles, railroad names, road numbers, and then Tom went to work. The two cars pictured below and the renumbered locomotive were soon on my layout. Tom’s workmanship is meticulous. The paint, alignment and spacing of letters is perfect, and the decal work on the ends of the cars is outstanding. They are the most realistic boxcars on my railroad. And the project was completed promptly at low cost.

MELGAR

K-Lionel

@MELGAR posted:

I’ve been wanting to get some boxcars with customized lettering for quite some time. I’ve also been impressed with boxcars posted on Sundays by forum member @Krieglok (Tom), so I contacted him a few weeks ago and he agreed to do two custom cars and renumber a locomotive for me. We discussed paint colors, types of cars, lettering styles, railroad names, road numbers, and then Tom went to work. The two cars pictured below and the renumbered locomotive were soon on my layout. Tom’s workmanship is meticulous. The paint, alignment and spacing of letters is perfect, and the decal work on the ends of the cars is outstanding. They are the most realistic boxcars on my railroad. And the project was completed promptly at low cost.

MELGAR

Very cool Mel, Tom's work is always above board, and he does so many unique railroads. These fit your era and area of modeling perfectly, so I was excited to see your photos today.

PRR Lover

On homemade shelfs that might need a little stainning.....

A string of PW Lionel 6464 and modern Lionel 6464 boxcars being pulled by Williams Wabash F unit AA.

I have a couple dozen 9800s boxcars that suffered a bit of staining or paint damage during their 30+ year storage. Because they're only worth a dozen dollars, I've been experimenting with repaints and water decals of railroads that hold some connection/affection for me. For a couple of these I have used the Tru-Color rattle cans, the others are various brands of 'red primer' with krylon matte finish. The Pennsy and Rock Island are OEM for reference

EDIT: i swapped out pics that were more in focus and with an angle that the light make my decal edges 'talk'. i need to visit my optometrist

@Sitka posted:

A string of PW Lionel 6464 and modern Lionel 6464 boxcars being pulled by Williams Wabash F unit AA.

Nice video, I need to get back to running my trains. I was trying to get a closer look at this maybe damaged boxcar. Is it an operating boxcar?

@woodsyT posted:

I have a couple dozen 9800s boxcars that suffered a bit of staining or paint damage during their 30+ year storage. I've been experimenting with repaints and water decals. For a couple of these I have used the Tru-Color rattle cans, the others are various brands of 'red primer' with Krylon matte finish. The Pennsy and Rock Island are OEM for reference.

Nice work Woodsy!

@MELGAR posted:

I’ve been wanting to get some boxcars with customized lettering for quite some time. I’ve also been impressed with boxcars posted on Sundays by forum member @Krieglok (Tom), so I contacted him a few weeks ago and he agreed to do two custom cars and renumber a locomotive for me. We discussed paint colors, types of cars, lettering styles, railroad names, road numbers, and then Tom went to work. The two cars pictured below and the renumbered locomotive were soon on my layout. Tom’s workmanship is meticulous. The paint, alignment and spacing of letters is perfect, and the decal work on the ends of the cars is outstanding. They are the most realistic boxcars on my railroad. And the project was completed promptly at low cost.

MELGAR

Thanks for showing these cars. They look wonderful on your layout. Great photos!

Tom

@Dave Ripp. posted:

Nice video, I need to get back to running my trains. I was trying to get a closer look at this maybe damaged boxcar. Is it an operating boxcar?

That Dave is a Lionel 16258 Lehigh Valley non-op. boxcar I added the figures. I bought with my daughter we cleaned it and let it dry against the electric base boards and forgot about it. It melted so since the melt job it's been on the rails for over twenty years never been off the rail except for a cleaning, that's us going for a ride LOL. By the way nice thread Mark

Hi guys its been a while since I checked in, all I can say is you all have some beautiful cars there! Plus some really nice layouts to show them off!

  A couple of new to me.

KMT on atlas cement flex track

Atlas/Austria on atlas brown flex track.

@Brad J : Great looking cars, loved the Canadian Pacific had never seen the single pine tree logo before.  Your last photo is also interesting and not sure what you meant by the notation Atlas/Austria..."Ferrocarril Del Pacifico" is RR of the Pacific in Spanish, likely this RR is Mexican.  Neat looking car in any case.

@MELGAR - I agree with you Tom's craftsmanship is superb.  He did 2 Raritan River Railway cars for me and I just love them.

@Mark V. Spadaro-Love that C&O car, not seen by me before...really neat.

OK here is my contribution for today.  These are old (like me), American Flyer (Chicago Flyer) boxcars,  available in 8 wheel from 1919-1929.  Like much of American Flyer in this period, the numbering system was sort of whatever was handy!  Theoretically 8 wheel cars were supposed to be 1115 and 4 wheel were supposed to be 1112 however, in fact, the number was used interchangeably as you can see in the pictures below.  In this case, although I do not have exact dates, the orange car with black lettering is one of the early configurations while the red/white car is one of the later.  I really love the "Flying Locomotive - Fast Freight" logo on the cars.

Since I mentioned them in the text, here is on of my Raritan River RR cars that Tom made for me.  I went to College in New Brunswick, NJ and the RR was right in the neighborhood.  You can see his craftsmanship is top notch.

Hope everyone has a great week.  Enjoy the rest of the weekend.

Best Wishes

Don

MTH Premier CNW auto transport

At a train show in Mobile last year or so - I was "inspecting" this fine piece when the vendor noticed me. "Fifty cents", she said. Well, two nice-shape PW Lionel trucks/couplers, which I do use in rolling stock projects when they fit in, for 50 cents? Sure. Of course, the thing is so strangely appealing that I have yet to take the trucks off of it.

I wonder if this was what Jean-Luc Picard went into after he retired from Star Fleet?

@D500- Well you could restore that fine example of a boxcar...as Captain Picard would say..."Make it so!"

Best wishes

Don

Reminds me of one I made from a Velveeta box when I was about 7 yrs old.

Great looking cars and layouts everyone! I was only able to “buy” a decorated car this week, as Melgar had me slaving away in the car shop with his new boxcars! lol.

Here is my new Weaver 40’ boxcar. It was NOS and all I had to do was swap out the plastic trucks for a set of friction bearing diecast trucks and couplers…

Tom

@Dave Ripp. posted:

Nice work Woodsy!

👍🤘 thank you.

All it took was some light sanding with 600 or 1000 (depending on what I had near me) to knock down the original silk screened logo and then two light coats with the red primer(s) and then the shells were generally well covered and looked pretty good. A few needed tiny touch-ups under the catwalks. I did those with a little spray into a solo cup and small brush. I really like the decals from k4decals. They were very tolerant of my poor beginners technique. A few other decals that I tried from other companies seemed to be more prone to getting torn/ripped or edges that "talked" I also used solvaset, whatever the 'magic butter' is that's in that solution, it works. The boxcars are imperfect when you see them up close in your hand, but a couple feet away from you they look purdy good

This is Custom. Lionel  was going to make the 2 years ago. They canceled it.

A history of Soo Line boxcar livery brought to you by our friend Tom @Krieglok and narrated by yours truly. This first car is from 1888, the year the Canadian Pacific, Canada's first transcontinental railway, arranged and partially financed a merger of various financially-struggling regional railways into the "Minneapolis, St. Paul and Sault St. Marie." The nickname "Soo Line," from the pronunciation of "Sault," caught on almost immediately and the Soo Line was born:

This next car, repainted in 1948, displays the Soo "Dollar Sign" herald in updated form :

A bolder statement of the road name was applied to this car in 1952:

Finally, at the close of 1960, after formally acquiring the Wisconsin Central (the Soo had had a cooperative agreement with WC since 1908), the "New Soo" was born. The then public relations director, Wallace W. Abbey, developed a bold new livery, applied to this car by the manufacturer, Pullman-Standard, in 1961:

Used through the mid-eighties, I believe this was the last livery "update" applied to freight cars by the Soo. In the late 1980's, locomotives were liveried in "candy apple red" with slanted "SOO" in white on the sides and long hood end with connecting "speed stripes," but I don't think any freight cars ever carried this livery.

Nice presentation Bill! Thanks for the mention…

Tom