Lionel prewar scale freight cars

Paper:  I don't think that any of the pre-war Lionel scale cars were plastic, except for the body on the #714 boxcar.  And that was bakelite or phenolic.  The #716 Hopper car always had a die-cast body.  Sounds like someone forged a copy.  Hope you didn't pay too much for it.

Welcome to the forum, by the way.

Paul Fischer

It may be that the trucks  on your car are plastic and not metal    I have found that some my older Lionel is  a bit different from the Lionel  I buy now  but it is all Lionel 

not forged    my 1959 set  is original  ye the stuff I have added  is  different

Just like the accessories they changed over the years .  You do have to be careful on e bay however   especailly with the cost ofshipping to  Canada  things can get  very expensive   I have given up do this you should be able to find a few train shows where there are other selling older Lionel   there you can get a better deal

Not truly an expert, but I own them all, plus a couple of Williams repros.  The 700-series freights all had die cast trucks.  All but the caboose were sprung with realistic coil springs held in place with steel pins.  The hoppers were die cast.  If a charlatan were to try to pass off a repro, the best place to start would be K-Line die cast.

These things go for multiple hundreds of dollars, and a repro is almost always under fifty bucks.  Nobody has ever made scale trucks quite as good as the 700 trucks. The couplers are also better than most scale couplers.  They work!

You can tell the 700s - they are marked!  The trucks are also marked.  Snip the couplers off the truck, and the car drops from $400-$1000 down to $25.

All opinion.

    Fred Kraemer, in NJ, made plastic reproductions of the prewar "700" scale freight cars at least 25+ yrs. ago; they look great & the lettering is very crisp - but they're much lighter than the original Lionel cars made from 1940 - 42. 

    Back in '93 Williams made excellent reproductions of the same "700" cars; they were priced at $139 each, were die cast brass & were heavier than FK's series. Hope this helps. 

Thank you everyone for your input.  In the case of my hopper, the trucks appear to be original in that they are realistic coil springs and are all metal.  The frame underneath has the number 717-(?) and the the name Lionel etc molded in.  It looks to be original (in that there is no difference from my 2956 hopper which is cast metal) other than it is plastic (the body and from what I can tell...the frame)  My 2956 frame is cold to the touch.  I would have thought that reproductions would not copy the lionel numbers and trademarks as well...would they???

To finish the story...yes I got ripped off on this one...cost me $300...but on a lighter note I managed to pick up a couple of semi-scales about a month prior for under $40 each, so all is well....and I have learned something!