WW 2 train set

I found this photos in pictures my father brought back from the war in Europe. The photo is faded in time, but the lettering on the cars reads "Allied Forces"

If you click on them, they come up larger. 

I'd like to see properly done tank cars. When I say "tank car" I'm not talking oil but rather a flat car with a tank on it. MTH and others have done these though they always screw up the details. The model tanks are wildly out of scale, have machine guns mounted (you remove them for transport) and barrels pointed in the wrong direction instead of being in travel lock.

Have to say the most anxiety inducing thing I ever did in the Army was load Abrams tanks and M109 howitzers onto flat cars. The tanks are actually wider than the deck of the flat car and if go even a few inches too far to the side you can cause the whole thing to flip over!

I agree that hardly anyone makes an accurate military load (I was an Army officer and did my share of rail loading as I was heavy mech for most of the time), but Shermans and Stuart tanks were often rail loaded with their turrets pointing forward. Period photos substantially bear that out.

They did make a set using the Junior Hudson.  Came with freight and passenger cars combined, than a series of additional Army cars to add on.  I have them all.  G

I'd like to see a major manufacturer make some flat cars with WWII military loads other than Sherman tanks. MTH has made flat cars with one or two Shermans, but where are the M3 tanks, tank destroyers, half tracks, Jeeps, deuce and a halfs, DUKW's, etc.? JD-Train's post above shows some nice examples. Corgi and Solido have made a decent assortment of military vehicles. I've accumulated a dozen or so, and when I have time I will set them up on flat cars. 

If we are going to do WWII era realistically, it would also help to have flat cars of an earlier design than the postwar PS-4 cars made by both Lionel and MTH. Those cars would be correct for the Korean war, but if you want to be a rivet counter about it, they didn't carry loads to ports to embark for Europe or the South Pacific. 

Interesting graffiti on the sides of the cars.

Thanks Lee,

The DUKW is a Solido model, the landing craft is a Hobby Boss 1:48 plastic model kit.

Solido has a nice Dodge 2 1/2 ton truck, but I've been hesitant because they don't appear to have mirrors.  May have to get them anyway and make my own mirrors.

Jim

Solido's military vehicles often have some of the detail parts in a bag under the display base, to be added by the buyer if desired. I don't have a deuce and a half, but I know a lot of the small parts for the half tracks are packed that way. If you are looking at eBay sales, they may well have the mirrors still in the bag. You can always ask the seller to check.

Thanks,  I didn't know that. 

I was very pleased with the detail on the DUKW.

Jim

We must remember that this,"train of memories"would be done for our benefit. The remaining members of the, "greatest generation" would benefit from it very little or not at all. The maker of this train set would be the ONLY ONE who would benefit from it.

It is my suggestion that each one of who so desire, create their own, "train of memories". Then donate the sizable amount that the maker WOULD HAVE MADE to their local VFW Post, American Legion Post or Red Cross. By doing this the remaining members of the, "greatest generation" would truly benefit. Not only would they benefit but all other veterans of conflicts would do the same.

Jim

I hear you on the mirror thing. I have three of the Solido GCCWs and none of them came with mirrors. I decided to leave them off after looking at some photos of them in use by RR operating units stateside, I found a photo of several with the mirrors gone.

I made the unit markings myself and found old decal sets for early war vehicles, using the factory-applied blue hood numbers, and the white non-surround star on the doors and tailgates (the surround star was never used stateside).

As for the DUKW, yeah, you're limited for options there. Look at what this guy did with one of them, made a truly good looking model out of it:

My Dad served on an LST in the Pacific. I believe LST's had a rail system for loading operations? Is anyone familiar with the operation and has it ever been duplicated in the model train markets?

I enlarged the original 300 dpi scans until they lost focus, and I couldn't read a word of it.

What does it say? 

JD;

That is an awesome set of Military cars. Well Done Sir.

I'm building up an ARMY Train even tho I'm retired USAF.

The AF didn't use trains much 

I have 9 Shermans on flats now, and some jeeps and 2 6 X 6's (Tamiya kits w metal chassis). I also have some gondolas w crates and a tank car of fuel for the tanks. I want a few of the others you have but I'm trying to stick to 1/48 and that makes it tougher. TBH my MTH Shermans may be off scale but they look good.

I'm working on eliminating the plastic pieces holding the Tanks in place and using wood and chain in place of them. I do Run them with machine guns and such in a crate on the flatbed.

Glad to hear many Shermans were loaded barrel forward as That is how I run mine.

If anyone badly needs to know how equipment was supposed to be loaded onto flats, I have all the Army tech manuals for RR ops in WW2. I could probably scan the images showing blocking and tie downs if needed...

The MTH cars with either one or two Sherman tanks are scale if you are talking Premire not Railking. The tanks are made by Hobby Masters and are 1/48. Corgi Shermans are 1/50 and they are close enough. Solido Shermans are also supposed to be 1/50 but they do look a tiny bit bigger than Corgi, maybe they are 1/48. Solido also makes a Tank Destroyer M10 and a Priest 105mm Howitzer both are nice. Corgi makes half tracks and 2 1/2 trucks as well as Sollido.

JohnB

Finding, saving, and restoring WWII War Birds is big doings these days. Just witness Reading's WWII Weekend, complete with re-inactments and air show. I took my 85yr old mother to it for the first time this year. She absolutely loved it!

Anyway, here is my tribute: my Classic Aircraft Restoration and Remanufacturing facility. The aircraft, with the exception of the F6F H***cat are K-Line.

Chris

LVHR

It looks like GI's were just writing all sorts of things.  Where they're from, slogans, pictures, whatever they felt like.  Apparently no officers were present.  

I couldn't make out more than bits & pieces, but that is what it looked like to me.  I"ll bet that there was a "Kilroy was here" somewhere on there.

I have an "Army" train but it looks a little cartoonish. Still, it is fun.

P51

Lee

Since I "play " with military type trains and live in Erwin, TN I visited you're  web-site and enjoyed reading the Layout Concept you have. It will be sorta of a military history lesson for me watching you're progress on the layout. Nice work..

Larry

Thanks, Larry, I appreciate that (and it's nice to know someone's reading the thing).

My layout concept is for a light Army participation on a 3-foot line in the South during WW2. The only Army rolling stock will be a Whitcomb switcher (a Backwoods miniatures kit which drove me nuts trying to build it, 'drop right onto the frame' my eye, you have to re-engineer the entire kit and the donor running gear to make it fit together!) and a single Army-marked boxcar. I had an extra Bachmann box lying around and I decided to make Army decals for it from blank decal stock. I made the build date from WW1 and painted it grey (a common color back then for the Army) with the instruction block of, "when empty, return to Army control - Camp Eustis, Virginia". I didn't want to go nuts and have all-Army trains, tempting as that is. I'll have some Jeeps on flatcars and 55-gallon drum and jerry can loads for some gons, stuff like that. I also have a couple of dozen GI figures all painted up, including several who will be huddled around a card game behind a depot.

I 'play' with 1:1 scale Army stuff often, but all WW2 now. I had fun with 'army stuff' on active duty when I was an officer in the late 90s-early 2000s...

This weekend, I'll be displaying stuff at a local airshow, my WW2 display group always puts on a good show there:

I'd like to see someone make the Ferdinand Magellan, FDR's car.  Weaver does or did make troop sleepers, kitchen and hospital cars. 

Probably one of the more interesting WWII trains is one not many people would want on their layout, the Fuhrer's/Hitler's command train.   The two steam engines were streamlined and camouflaged

Special Train (Führersonderzug)[edit]

The Führer's Austria, during the Balkans Campaign in early 1941. The train was ironically named Führersonderzug "Amerika" in 1940, and later Führersonderzug "Brandenburg". After the Balkans Campaign the train was not used as a Führer Headquarters, but Hitler used it throughout the war when he travelled between Berlin, Berchtesgaden, Munich and other headquarters.

The exact consist of the train is not known, but some details were revealed by the departure information "Bln 2009", when the train departed the Anhalter Bahnhof in Berlin on 23 June 1941, arriving at Wolfsschanze on 24 June 1941;

The individual 17 components (locomotives and cars) in order were:^[4]

• Two BR52 Class locomotives
• a special Flakwagen armoured anti-aircraft train flatbed car with two anti-aircraft guns, most often a pair of Flakvierling cannon batteries, one at each end of the car
• a baggage car
• the Führerwagen, which Hitler used
• a Befehlswagen (command car), including a conference room and a communications center
• a Begleitkommandowagen, for the accompanying Reichssicherheitsdienst
• a dining car
• two cars for guests
• a Badewagen (bathing car)
• another dining car
• two sleeping cars for personnel
• a Pressewagen
• another baggage car
• another Flakwagen

Or you could recreate the German landscape and model the planned uber-broad gauge double-decker Breitspurbahn trains. If memory serves, the rails would over 9 feet apart and the trains over twice the height of anything rolling through Europe at the time...

Of course your concept would have to allow for a Third Reich that either held on well into the late 40s or won the war totally.