Car Identification Please

I think I should have mentioned the car is S scale and looks great with AF.

Jim Mcc

Looks like an Ace under-frame and trucks with a Gilbert body.

So I guess it's a mutt but it still looks good. Thanks to all who responded.

Jim Mcc

Jim:

Could it be custom paint job with decals?  If not could it be a Kris Model Trains (not Kusan) S-gauge car painted for and sold by Hobby Surplus Sales?  Here’s a link to more info on the Kris S-gauge cars: http://myflyertrains.org/kris/

Note that they used postwar AF diecast trucks with operating knuckle couplers while your car appears to have Pikemaster-style dummy couplers attached to those trucks.

Bill

This is a home-brew.  A Flyer body on an Ace underframe and trucks.  The trucks are sprung, Gilbert never had sprung trucks.  The dummy coupler is also probably by Ace.  Ace offered conversion parts for Flyer cars for either scale or hirail operation.  Their underframes were available in plastic or metal. 

Lettering is most likely Clover House dry transfers.

Rusty

Many thanks to those responding. There are certainly any number of possibilities. I shall continue to run it.

Jim McC

It looked familiar to me in the sense that I had done similar "upgrades" of American Flyer cars which I acquired as "parts". Here are some pictures of the same type of Flyer reefer upgraded with ACE frame and scale bogies and lettering with decals from Enhorning Industries. Brush painted with Floquil. Al more than 30 years ago! Note also the under-frame "details".

I still wonder how all this ACE S gauge parts, Flyer bodies and decals and some S gauge trains, which I bought in one package somewhere in the eighties, ever came to Netherlands where I live.

Regards

Fred

Here's a "scalified" Flyer reefer with an Ace underframe , AM trucks and Kadee's, lettered for a friend's private road:

Rusty

I have the exact same Swift reefer car which I purchased directly from DOWNS.  In the 1970's- 1980's DOWNS offered many cars with ACE underframes and trucks attached to repainted Gilbert boxcar or Reefer shells.  I also have a Boston & Maine Reefer from DOWNS.  You could  get a Gilbert operating coupler or an ACE dummy coupler attached to the bolted on ACE adapter or you could get a kadee coupler attached to the underframe with scale wheels on the trucks. 

DOWNS also offered a line of cars labeled "Rusti/Downs" including  painted and decaled REX lowside gondolas and REX flatcars, repainted and decaled PRS 50 foot Boxcars and a line of tank cars of various sizes.

Unless you bought these cars at a train show, you chose from a list of road names in an ad in S Gaugian or NASG Dispatch without knowing what the car would actually look like when you received them.  

Back in the dark days after Gilbert closed down, and before American Models and the relaunch of American Flyer by Lionel, Downs was one of the few places where one could buy "new" rolling stock.  Otherwise there were just a few firms making "craftsman kits".

LittleTommy

Wow! Little did I know. Thanks to all who added to my knowledge base. The Ace under frame is a dead ringer only mine is missing the air reservoir and brake valve. The things one finds when least expected.

Jim McC

LittleTommy's description is correct. This car is listed on page 84 of "Greenberg's Guide to American Flyer S Gauge - Vol II" as catalog number RG-93 from Downs Model Railroad Company.