Modeling a Transfer caboose

I built this model of a Penn Central N9 transfer caboose a couple of years ago.  I used a Lionel PS-1 boxcar for the chassis.  I liked the undercarriage details on the PS-1.  I used Plastruct sheet for the body and chassis sides.  The railings, steps and gas bottles were fabricated from brass.  The roof is kitbashed from an Atlas O extended vision caboose roof.

I was fortunate to have access to a former PC transfer caboose owned by a local business to get measurements and detail photos.  The June 1974 Railroad Model Craftsman has an article about kitbashing a PC transfer caboose.  I was able to get quite a bit of info there, also.

The best advice I can give is to do your research.  Find out how the specific railroads built theirs and copy it.

Tom

 Very nice model

If you look in the May/June issue of O Scale Trains, you'll an article on building a transfer caboose,

Over time, I have seen a number of prototype photos of transfer cabooses, but always

wonder why it was worth it to build a special caboose, when a standard road caboose

was probably handy at no additional cost, and ready to be pressed into service?   The

Rock Island one above is most appealing to me.  The road names seem to go with

changes in style for different periods.  And, I wonder if those Santa Fe cabooses made

from boxcars during WWII, that had seats on their roofs, qualify as "transfer cabooses", as one description of their uses would seem to imply that.

A series? Of different types? Repeated prototypes? Non proto ideas that might "look right"? Personal, or a real production series? 

Either way I see the transfer cabooses as Frankenstein Monsters of the rail world. Some purpose built (to keep crews off of the can). But many got built on dying cars, all while using basically only what was readily available from other dead, or dying things. I'm not "dissin' them. I like "real" hot rods too(Rat rods) I'm saying I feel they offer a better chance to build a believable non-proto using more "artistic license" than many other projects can afford. "Easy to look "right".  Just flat platform areas, safety rails galore, and shelter (or the welded shut remains of one, like on some "push platforms"). Feeling creative yet? How about a 2 door body from a Fairmont putt putt rail speeder mounted on a short cabooses chassis and flooring?...Safety railed too of course. Too small? Too tame? A monorail car, trolley, short bus, intermodal "stacker", or a semi truck body for shelters. "One off" frames? Timbering, heavy girder plate frame, or a side dump car. Roof only, or shelterless catwalks on scaffolding push platforms? If you get ugly looks from the rivet counters, claim they were once short line, or business owned shover, then wait for the double take to start grinning.

 If you want prototypical models, research is really the only way.         

Makes me wonder why there has been little interest in manufacturers in making a transfer caboose. I know Lionel has produced some, but I'd like a good detailed scale version. 

I remember seeing the SCL/L&N Family Lines transfer caboose.

BN 11474 pictured is an ex-GN transfer caboose built on the frame of a Baldwin VO-1000 switcher, not a flat car. (Look closely at the frame and trucks.)

Brother Love here on the forum wrote a thread about building one of these; perhaps it is still available via a forum search.  He later offered it for sale, I wish I had bought it!

For what it's worth, the Mopac short bay window caboose is not a transfer caboose.  It's a late generation road caboose built in numbers (400 built in Mopac shops).  It's frequently mistaken for a transfer caboose based on it's short length.

I believe the Family Lines versions are also road cabooses, in the same vein as the Mopac versions.

Versions of the Mopac caboose have been offered in the past in O scale brass (and other scales as well) by Overland.  Currently Bluford Shops is making plastic HO and N scale versions of the Mopac and CSXT predecessor road versions.  If nothing else, perhaps one of these could be used for reference.

I've had a long-standing obsession with the Mopac cabooses.  When I looked at kitbashing/scratching one, I was going to start with an Atlas wide vision caboose.  The mopac versions were originally going to be built by International Car Company, but ended up being built by Mopac themselves.  The roof profiles are very similar for the wide vision roofs and the Mopac/Family Lines versions.  I figured on sheet styrene for the bay, and some sort of screen or mesh for the platforms.

Brother Love also built a copy or several of the Mopac cabooses, fairly recently.  A search should yield results about that project as well as the GN caboose on the vo-1000 frame.

Jim