I bought some old Train Miniatures/Walthers Boxcars, and some bare bodies were thrown in:

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They look to be Double Sheath Wood cars. Would a fishbelly frame be correct for these cars? I tried an Accurail frame in one of the bodies. It was long, but I think I could shorten it a bit. I could also try a Tichy frame. Also, were brake wheels really that big?

Gary

Hey Gary, nice find. They would have fishbelly frames. The hand wheel is a little large

The Train Miniature cars are among my favourites, and are great for kitbashing or modifying.

This one started the same as your doublesheathed cars, but I sanded the sidesills flush with the wood siding and scribed them to match the siding. I then used strip styrene to add a new sidesill, recessed, as it should be:



This is another, done in a similar manner to match a photo of a real car:



...and an under-construction photo of it, with its Accurail fishbelly underframe:



This one is similar, but not quite as high...



As this photo shows, the NYC/MC car got new ends (Tichy), while the Santa Fe car retained the stock ones:



Before Accurail offered their USRA doublesheathed boxcars, I built three of these using the Train Miniature cars. The underframes were scratchbuilt from styrene.





Most of the other Train Miniature house cars offer similar modelling possibilities.

Wayne

Thanks for the advice, gentlemen. Very impressive work, Doctorwayne. It looks like every car has different trucks, too. The WP car I got seems to have arch bar trucks with real springs, and it looks like some of yours do, too.

I'm looking to get some cheap, '30s era rolling stock, so I will get some Accurail fishbellies and start there. These cars have wood ends and wood doors. I'm not certain if these cars are accurate or not, but they look ok, other than the claw on the door. I suppose I could replace the doors easily enough.

I have several of the Accurail USRA DS cars as well as some of the Ertl cars, so I'm covered there.

Gary

Many of the TM cars, especially the all-steel ones wouldn't have had fishbelly underframes, as the body itself was part of the support structure. Likewise for the single sheathed cars (sometimes erroneously called outside braced). The steel bracing helped to support the car and carry the weight of the lading.
The double sheathed cars mostly represent cars of the '20s (which often lasted well into the '50s), and most of them had an internal framework of steel, too, so a fishbelly underframe wouldn't have been necessary. An exception might be a car with double doors or a door-and-a-half car, where the wider door opening becomes a weak point in the car's structure.
The other exception that might call for a fishbelly underframe is if the railroad ordering the car specified its use - old habits associated with all-wood construction died hard.

Wayne

doctorwayne Wrote:Many of the TM cars, especially the all-steel ones wouldn't have had fishbelly underframes, as the body itself was part of the support structure. Likewise for the single sheathed cars (sometimes erroneously called outside braced). The steel bracing helped to support the car and carry the weight of the lading.
The double sheathed cars mostly represent cars of the '20s (which often lasted well into the '50s), and most of them had an internal framework of steel, too, so a fishbelly underframe wouldn't have been necessary. An exception might be a car with double doors or a door-and-a-half car, where the wider door opening becomes a weak point in the car's structure.
The other exception that might call for a fishbelly underframe is if the railroad ordering the car specified its use - old habits associated with all-wood construction died hard.

Wayne

Same applies to Accurail wood cars, for that matter.

gna Wrote:Same applies to Accurail wood cars, for that matter.

Yes, many of them could have straight frames...Accurail's 9 panel single sheathed car was supposedly based on a CNR prototype, but there were a lot of very similar cars built with straight rather than fishbelly underframes. The Tichy kit is a good example of the latter.

The USRA doublesheathed cars were, as far as I'm aware, all equipped with fishbelly underframes, but there were similar cars that had straight underframes. Great Northern had lots of USRA double sheathed boxcars, but between 1937-42, they purchased 8,000 very similar-looking cars which followed the 1925 ARA design, which was for a steel car. The difference in the GN cars was that they were double sheathed wood and similar in height to the 1937 AAR boxcar design. At first glance, they appear to be USRA cars, but lack the fishbelly underframe.

Most of the Train Miniature house cars are based on 1923 or 1925 ARA recommended designs, which used a straight (or very shallow fishbelly) underframe. Such cars could be steel, or single or double sheathed wood (many roads still preferred wood because it was with what their shop forces were most familiar).

The Michigan Central car which I posted earlier was a 1916 design, built at the same time that the New York Central (MC's parent company) was building USRA-design all-steel automobile boxcars, also with fishbelly underframes. From 1935 to 1937, the wood cars were rebuilt as steel cars, retaining their original underframes.
In the '20s, the NYC was buying tens of thousands of USRA-design steel boxcars, a fairly low car like the TM steel boxcars and very similar to Pennsy's X-29s (also offered by TM). Some of these had a shallow fishbelly underframe (similar to that in the TM kits) while others had straight frames.

All these variations are reasons why I find the TM cars so useful for kitbashing. Their X-29 was what first interested me, though, and I bought several, modifying them to more accurate versions of the real ones:



...and later picked up a bunch of the Red Caboose X-29s, too:



If You're interested in older freight cars, check out "Steam Era Freight Cars Reference Manual, Volume One: Box & Automobile Cars", by Ted Culotta, and also the "Focus on Freight Cars" series, by Richard Hendrickson and Ted Culotta

Wayne

doctorwayne Wrote:If You're interested in older freight cars, check out "Steam Era Freight Cars Reference Manual, Volume One: Box & Automobile Cars", by Ted Culotta, and also the "Focus on Freight Cars" series, by Richard Hendrickson and Ted Culotta

Wayne

I don't have those books, but I have Ted Culotta's Steam Era Freight Cars bookmarked: http://steamerafreightcars.com/

I tried a Tichy Reefer Fishbelly underframe, and got Tichy Andrews trucks and a K-brake set:

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I had lots of trouble dropping (and losing) small parts, getting the brake wire in place, and then I can barely see it

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I was going to try the USRA SS underframe on the other car, but it's a bit narrow. I'll see if I can make it work.

gna Wrote:Same applies to Accurail wood cars, for that matter.

Here's what I do with some Accurail wood cars:

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I use channel or styrene strips for the sills. I prefer .015 wire, as thinner wire seems to be too fragile.

This is an MDC boxcar, which I converted to represent a Southern Su-class boxcar. The prototype had truss rods and a steel underframe:



I usually don't bother with most of the brake piping unless it will be seen in eye-level views, as I seldom have derailments involving roll-overs, where observers might see why the brakes failed. For the brake rods, I use .012" brass wire, but route it so that truck-ends of the wire terminate in or very close to the centre frame member - this keeps them from restricting the swing of the trucks. While it's not prototypical, it appears correct when viewed from trackside (although they're not all that visible here):



These TM underframes show it better, and, as you can see, I carve away only the portion of the former AB brake system which would otherwise be visible beneath the car:



If you get rid of the TM door claws, you may as well redo the door tracks, too: The top one is oversize to accommodate the working door, as is the bottom one, and the latter is also positioned higher than what would be the car's inside floor height.

This door was made by splicing parts from two Athearn doors to get the correct height:



Same with this one, possibly from a Front Range car:



Tichy wood doors, narrowed slightly, work well for most TM wooden cars:



...and you can use Tichy ends for TM cars, too, although they'll need to be modified for most of the lower cars. This one, in the centre, uses a Tichy 5-5-5 Youngstown end re-worked into a 5-5-4:



Here's a link to some re-worked TM cars, which also includes some Athearn stuff

...and some LifeLike (Proto-No-Thousand) cars...

...and some Tyco reefers....

Wayne

doctorwayne Wrote:Here's a link to some re-worked TM cars, which also includes some Athearn stuff

...and some LifeLike (Proto-No-Thousand) cars...

...and some Tyco reefers....

Wayne

Nice work with some inexpensive cars. I like boxcars, but sometimes trying to get them right can make your head explode.

Different era, but have you seen this thread on another forum I somehow stumbled upon?

I'd not seen that thread before, but upgrading trainset quality cars is a common pasttime for many: the cars are cheap and plentiful, but in many cases, once the overly-thick paint has been stripped off, some of the moulded-on detail is surprisingly good.
With some prototype photos for general guidance, it's fairly easy (and very rewarding) to make a credible-looking model from what many consider to be a toy.
Back when I was modelling the '60s/'70s era, I did similar work with Athearn, Tyco, MDC, and Front Range cars. Athearn, Tyco, LifeLike, and Model Power diesels were also good fodder for upgrading and kitbashing, and I wasn't above hacking up Atlas diesels, either.

I did notice that the poster in your link was using a #11 blade to remove the cast-on grabs, but a #17 or #18 would do a better job, and either can be shaped, using a cut-off disc, to suit specific jobs, like this #17 cut-down to fit into narrow spaces:



Wayne

Doc, great lesson in frame construction and detailing of older boxcar models!
I never have seen my models with your sight of your accuracy in model construction! However in most cases I searched very specific prototypes as modeling objects maybe also additional construction plans and documents - and so I hope that I built near to prototype - leastwise some models.
Your explanations are masterfully and extremly helpful. Thanks!

I neglected to post a followup to this topic. I have the cars mostly finished, just some touch up painting left, and I built some Accurail cars and TM cars, too:
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I had broken stirrups and door guide on the Wabash car, so I replaced with brass stirrups and some styrene channel.

I need decals for the TM car:

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Underframes:

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I also added brake detail to a Accurail steel car:

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I (mostly) enjoy doing the brake rigging on these cars.

I bought some used cars and kits from some acquaintances who are downsizing or changing their focus, so I will start separate threads on those topics.