QRL&PCo Hoppers

[sailormatlac]

A long long time ago, I used to take inside shots for modelling purpose. I've got gondolas and woodchip cars. However, no hoppers in my area since a while. From what I see, hopper's inside doesn't differ that much from gondolas.

BTW, Wayne, do you have picture of CN gondolas when they were painted in black in the 30's. I ask because a friend has 2 of them and wants me to weather them. I don't think a lot survived in the 50's in black, but we like to fudge things a little bit. THey are from Walthers, built date is 1936. After 20 years in service and not repainted, I feel like they would have turned quite badly.

Matt

[doctorwayne]

......do you have picture of CN gondolas when they were painted in black in the 30's. I ask because a friend has 2 of them and wants me to weather them. I don't think a lot survived in the 50's in black, but we like to fudge things a little bit. THey are from Walthers, built date is 1936. After 20 years in service and not repainted, I feel like they would have turned quite badly.

No prototype photos, Matt, but the lettering would have been as shown on the Westerfield car below, lettered with the correct decals from Westerfield. These 48'6" cars were built in several orders between 1933 and 1943 and the later ones were among the first new ones to be painted brown/red.



The first gondolas in boxcar red/mineral brown had the roadname spelled out on one line, in slightly larger letters. I used C-D-S set #5 part(a), meant for these first red/brown cars, but split and stacked the words to use them on this black Athearn gondola.


In 1958, CN went to even larger letters on gondolas, with "CANADIAN NATIONAL" on either one line or two, depending on the length of the car. Set #5(b) (comes as set #5, with versions (a) and (b) included) does the two-line version (on a red/brown car, of course), while set #556 is for the one-line version on longer cars.
For drop-bottom GS-style gondolas, C-D-S set #559 includes parts a, b, c, and d and will do the large or small letters for both 36' and 40' cars.

Wayne

[doctorwayne]

Matt, here's a photo which you might enjoy. I scanned it from an old book owned by a friend.




The book dates from 1916, although the BLT date on the car appears to be 1911. While the B&O version of the car offered several important improvements, kinda makes you wonder from where they got the idea.

Wayne

[sailormatlac]

Thanks Wayne,

The Walthers cars are the small letter version, just like you first picture. Just finished adding wire grabs and weathering them. I must admit I really like the brown gondolas with large CN letters. Probably a future painting project. And still 6 other boxcars in line... There's no end to this major freight car overhaul program

Wow! That would be a really nice project to undertake for someone modelling earlier CP... Was it a one-of-a-kind or many were built?

Matt

[doctorwayne]

Thanks Wayne,

....Was it a one-of-a-kind or many were built?

Matt

One-of-a-kind, as far as I know.

Wayne

[sailormatlac]

It reminds me of Canadian National first experiments with diesel locomotives... looks like a tank.

Here are few pictures of the completed gondolas. Not that much satisfied with the wood floor, but I will wait to know what is there final assignment before redoing it better.







Matt

[doctorwayne]

That Walthers USRA gondola is a great stand-in for the CNR car, Matt, and I'd never noticed the similarities before seeing your photo. I think that it turned out really well.
My Westerfield kit cost less than my Walthers USRA gondolas, though: only ten bucks, as the instructions were missing.

The NYC, another of my favourites, was also one of the roads whose early open cars were black, then, during or after the war, switched to freight car red. I bought a pair reasonably cheaply, because of them being in the older paint scheme, I suspect.



Wayne

[sailormatlac]

Freshly repainted and decalled QRL&PCo 40' gondola (using an Accurail undecorated kit). I didn't bother to replace grabirons with wire. Stirrups are Aline though. The paint scheme is protofreelanced from pictures of hoppers in the 50s (second known paint scheme). Hoppers were black, but I don't know about later all steel gondolas. Early gondolas were in wood and likely painted brown. It was easier to go black with my black laser printer.

Company name lettering is made from different fonts vectorized and altered to fit prototype pictures... A real paint, but worth the effort as they will serve on many other cars.



Matt

[doctorwayne]

Looks great, Matt: nothing flashy, just a nice basic freight car. As I suspected, that Accurail car "looks right" in eras other than those for which it's intended.

Wayne

[sailormatlac]

Looks great, Matt: nothing flashy, just a nice basic freight car. As I suspected, that Accurail car "looks right" in eras other than those for which it's intended.

Wayne

I've ordered a few recent offerings by Accurail and their tooling is better than ever. The new 7 panel OSB are improved version of their earlier releases featuring thin running boards. Definitely a great source of material for earlier eras.

Matt

[Tyson Rayles]

Nice gons Matt!

[sailormatlac]

No pictures at this moment, but 4 more Accurail QRL&PCo gondolas are on their way... and the 36' boxcars and 34' hoppers are nearer to completion than ever. At this rate, I'll have over 15 custom cars by the end of spring. I like how it gives a local flavour to the CNR layout and it's a good way to fudge older prototypes into the 1950s.

Now, if I could just find undecorated Red Caboose all-steel Drop Bottom Gondolas at good price, it would make my day!

Matt