Scratchbuilding a PS 5344 boxcar

[cnw1961]

… well, at least attempting it ... Offerings of modern boxcars (aside from some 3-rail toy junk) are scarce in O-scale and a lot of cars that you can get in HO are not available. One of them is the very common 50' PS 5344. As I like scratchbuilding I thought it might be a good idea to build one myself … that still remains to be seen .

I found some good drawings at trainiax.net that I scaled to exact size of my O-scale model. Together with my Athearn HO PS 5344 and my O-scale Atlas boxcars it helped me to get the dimensions for my car. I started by cutting the sides and put them together from 2 layers of styrene: 0.040 on the outside and .060 on the inside to add strength and to support the roof and floor. The ribs and the flanges were cut from .010 and .040 sheet styrene.





Then I cut the floor and the ends and put it all together.



After adding weight, I glued the subroof in place. Next I built the bolsters, because I was eager to see the car riding on trucks. The door you see in the pic was only attached provisorily. I built it for a Atlas Trainman car that I am going to repaint. I will use the doors of the Atlas car for my PS 5344.



Up to that point building the car was pretty easy. Now I had to clear the first hurdle: the roof with its rounded corners and protruding ends. I decided to use .020 styrene and shape it as good as possible before gluing it on. It still took a lot of work to make it sit properly and fix it. I still have to cut the protruding ends. I am glad that it worked out quite well, because if it would have gone wrong, it would not have been possible to remove the roof without ruining the car ... phew ... Now I have to figure out how to do the corrugations on the ends of the car ...