Crown Model Products

If you like the Weaver cars, you will like the Crown.  I think CMP did some great road names.  Like the Weaver cars, some could use added weight especially for long trains.

Harold

I think most if not all Crown cars are Weaver. Not sure if Crown did the finish work or just had Weaver decorate the cars for Crown to sell. Similar business model to Buffalo Creek Graphics, AMhobbies, Peterson Supply.

Pete

Weaver bought CMP several years ago.  Once acquired, Weaver offered the REA cars in at least three new road numbers with both white and gold lettering. The trucks were either bought from Weaver or made to Weaver specs, they are interchangable.  John

CMP is basically Weaver

These cars were old time style, small ARA types. Outside braced and wood side - steel end ice reefers all with Bettendorf trucks. Also, an ARA Steel side box car was offered. Buffalo Creek Graphics did the printing at one time.

All the ones I sold, I retrofitted with proper Andrews Atlas O die-cast Trucks/couplers.

I have it in the back of my head (along with so much....stuff, so this may be pure fantasy) that the acronym "CMP" originally stood for "Crown Metal Products", and that their business evolved or expanded to include models.

Probably an Urban Tale, known only to me. Haven't researched it.

CMP made similar cars in O gauge as well as S gauge. Weaver continued making the O gauge cars, but it's not clear to me what happened to the S gauge molds.

The CMP cars are scale sized models of smaller prototypes. I have a couple and they're nice cars.

As stated by others Weaver bought out CMP and continued to make and sell their O-scale cars.  After the buy-out the cars came in Weaver Boxes, Prior to that Crown had their own boxes.  What it did in essence was expand the car types available from Weaver.  The level of detail and "quality" are about the same.  All cars from both are true 1:48 scale.  They were offered in both 2R and 3R versions.  When shopping for these cars many sellers don't know this, so advertise based on the boxes they are in.

What started as CMP cars versus Weavers have CMP molded into the underside of the cars.  The WOOD Outside braced boxcars are all CMP cars.  As are the other types previously mentioned by others.

BTW while CMP/Weaver trucks are interchangeable the Boxcar Frames/Floors are not!

Great history information on Weaver & Crown Model Products .

Thanks to all posters !!!

CB&Q Bill

I have a few CMP cars, and they are nice.  I've noticed more CMP stuff coming onto the secondary market lately, and there are a few items still on my want list.

The TCA Western Division has a short history of CMP on their web site, along with quite a few other manufacturers.  Here is their Crown Model Products page.

Andy

@D500 posted:

I have it in the back of my head (along with so much....stuff, so this may be pure fantasy) that the acronym "CMP" originally stood for "Crown Metal Products", and that their business evolved or expanded to include models.

Probably an Urban Tale, known only to me. Haven't researched it.

There was a company with that name that made amusement park trains:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_Metal_Products

I always thought Crown bought undecorated cars from Weaver and customed painted them. However, just now reading about them online, apparently, they did make their own cars using Weaver trucks. They are listed under Crown Model Products.

This Crown/Weaver box car is one I got a few years ago. I\it is painted and lettered for a local Tulsa OK area traction company that also hauled freight as well as trolley passenger service into Tulsa.  That line is still working freight today, with diesel power, connecting with the BNSF.  the car number appears to be accurate I have some doubts about that color and the slogan lettering on the doors.

S. Islander (in OK since 2002).

Here's what the original Crown Packaging looked like and here's one of their cars

@S. Islander posted:

This Crown/Weaver box car is one I got a few years ago. I\it is painted and lettered for a local Tulsa OK area traction company that also hauled freight as well as trolley passenger service into Tulsa.  That line is still working freight today, with diesel power, connecting with the BNSF.  the car number appears to be accurate I have some doubts about that color and the slogan lettering on the doors.

S. Islander (in OK since 2002).

I have two of those, #120 & #126. Crown usually offered thee road numbers.

EDIT: CMP also did some custom runs as I have three different ones label as commemorative or done for a hobby shop.

Were these cars successor's to those sold in white boxes under the Frank's Roundhouse name in the late eighties-early nineties era?

Thanks John.

In early October, 1994, my wife and I flew into Boston on a two week trip to behold the legendary fall colors. Next day, we headed to Waldon Pond, passing through Waltham, Mass. Recalling that CMP was there, I found their shop, seemingly a couple rooms in a huge multi-story brick building, once a thriving textile factory, now largely vacant. A worker was applying the art work to a box car run – Southern Pacific – my favorite west coast line! What a coincidence. They wouldn’t sell me any, but I ordered a bunch when I returned home to California.

I think that the Crown cars were pretty nice for their day.  I have a few of them still.  They were a very nice model prior to Atlas coming along.

Norm

There were a couple people involved in the development of these cars. One was Don Stubbs the owner of Northeast Trains in Peabody Ma.. I went to a pretty much 2 rail show in Stamford Connecticut. Don had been talking these cars up and had a couple of unpainted models to display.  The reason the Reefer and ARA boxcar were produced was more for marketing. They were full scale cars. As Matt mentioned they are prototypical but smaller in size. The goal was to appeal to 2 groups of buyers. The toy crowd and the scale 2 rail runners. RTR for I believe $30.00. Back then they came with only plastic trucks. They were close in size to a 6464 boxcar which back then sold for a hefty price. These cars were something different at the time and were the forerunners for operators looking into moving more towards hi-rail.

Talking with Don. There were many growing pains producing these cars. Most related to getting quality help. Younger guys that weren’t modelers. Just looking for a job. There were many miscues I’m guessing with painting and printing graphics. They produced a nice car back in the day and were kind of one of the fore runners for the scale movement. I bought a number of them as I just couldn’t pay collector prices for something to run.

Dave C - Yup - the price tag on the box above is $32.95

@rattler21 posted:

  Franks were '6464' size while CMP are close to scale size John

Not exactly. Frank's cars were from the later editions of the molds originally created by AMT = American Model Toys, after much of the side rivet detail had been smoothed out or removed.

These are the molds used later by Williams.

They are larger than 6464 size cars.

@rattler21 Not sure what you mean by Franks being metal.  I have a large collection of Franks box cars, reefers and stock cars, which do have metal trucks and floors but the bodies are plastic.  These cars are larger than the 6464 series cars.

As mentioned by RoyBoy, Franks cars were from the AMT molds and eventually did end up with Jerry Williams.  Between AMT and Williams they are also used by Kusan and Andy Kriswalus (Kris Model Trains) and even Wbb produced boxcars with these molds.  The TCA Western Division website has articles about these.   www.tacwestern.org

RoyBoy and bw14 are correct about Frank’s Roundhouse cars. They had stamped metal floors, but the bodies were plastic.  I used to hang out at Frank’s shop when I was a teenager and would often watch his son, Jack, assemble and then box up these great cars.  Here’s a nice thread about Frank’s products from earlier this year.

Now back to CMP cars…I owned quite a few at one time.  I can remember seeing Weaver and CMP cars and being attracted to their awesome paint schemes and realistic appearance, especially when compared to Lionel “traditional” sized cars of that time.  They were partially responsible for my interest turning to scale-sized “O” gauge trains in prototypical paint schemes.

I eventually sold them all after Lionel, Atlas, K-Line and MTH started to offer scale-sized rolling stock with separately-applied details and die-cast trucks/couplers.

Many years ago I made some extra money on Saturdays working for CMP owner Mike McCormack, assembling and boxing cars in the old watch factory where CMP was located. Mike was a great guy to work for, and very knowledgeable about both model trains and the process of building them. And occasionally he'd send me home at the end of the day with a free car.

Hello All, Northeast Trains is, perhaps, my nearest model railroad shop and I bought most of the stuff that makes up my model railroad from them. Our casual rrienbership goes back many years. When Crown Model Products was formed, I bought several of their original line of freight cars that were for New England railroads and companies.

An employee of the store told me that Don and two other men created CMP and as time expired, they had some disagreements that caused the break-up and the sale to a couple of other companies and, I think, that Weaver was the largest of them.

Here's the size comparison

@Robert S. Butler posted:

Here's the size comparison

Thanks.

How about a picture from the top, please?

Also, everyone should be aware that these are models of three different prototypes of cars.

Here you go ... since there was some concern about different car types I did what I could to make all of them steel sided boxcars.  The issue is with Atlas - the only steel sided Atlas models I have are the X-29's

Front

Top

...and, since there have been comments about ladder attachments and such -

End

I may have missed it reading this thread, but what years were CMP cars in production?  I have several in my collection.

@GG1 4877 posted:

I may have missed it reading this thread, but what years were CMP cars in production?  I have several in my collection.

The TCA website seems to indicate 1993-2000

FYI. Public Delivery Track still has new in box Crown Models.

This is a really great thread! 😜😜😜

Picked up my first Crown Model car two weeks ago at a train show.    Outside brace wood sided box car - $10.    Showed some ware, was missing a corner stirrup and had a chipped roof-walk board but it's a perfect canvas to add detail and repaint!    It's all fixed and primed!    I'm impressed with the scale size and original detail of this model.  

I am always looking for something to do on the "cheep"!

Cheer, Dave

I like the fact they did a lot of obscure roads.

Picked this up a few weeks ago for 13 bucks and it came with diecast trucks.

Pete

Photos show Crown Model Products New Haven steel boxcar #35238 and New Haven Dairy wood sided refrigerator car GICX 300. Both have CMP molded into the plastic floor and were sold to me in Weaver boxes at train shows in Connecticut and Massachusetts.

The trucks and couplers are metal. The length of the bodies is 10 inches. Grab irons, ladders and doors are molded-in. The walkways are separate pieces that are pressed onto tabs on the tops of the bodies.

The cars look realistic and are light but have always run without any problems on my layouts.

MELGAR

Were CMP and Weaver connected somehow?  I always equated the two.  Did CMP decorate Weaver products?  Did Weaver acquire CMP?

@coach joe posted:

Were CMP and Weaver connected somehow?  I always equated the two.  Did CMP decorate Weaver products?  Did Weaver acquire CMP?

I believe Weaver acquired CMP.

Pete

We sold them. I always liked their cars.

@PRRMP54 posted:

I have two of those, #120 & #126. Crown usually offered thee road numbers.

EDIT: CMP also did some custom runs as I have three different ones label as commemorative or done for a hobby shop.

I would love to see the Pacific Electric car. Thank you for sharing.