Best Approach? Building Heavyweights for the 30s

[Anonymous]

I've got all the diagrams I need to scratchbuild a nice Erie heavyweight Business Car for the 1930s. Now that I know the work involved, does anyone know of a kit maker producing them?

EDIT: I confess I wanted out easy, but want I really need is in a response below.
SMS

[orsonroy]

Bachmann, Walthers, and Athearn all make heavyweight platform obs cars. You might want to look at them first, to see if you can kitbash one. Otherwise, there really isn't anything available except in brass (which might be more cost-effective, unless you want to scratchbuild the car)

[Anonymous]

Well,
That's just about what I've done. I can't find any brass heavyweights that come close to a look-alike and at the expense, I don't want to hack it apart.

What I have done is rip apart a Bachman Spectrum Platform Observation. The windows were all wrong and so were the doors and the platform fence. So, here I've got everything apart, sawn windows, details off, paint off, and I realized I have to add three and a half scale feet to make an easy go of it -- to make a model of the Erie Business car #1. I've found about half of the needed detail parts from Bowser's Cal-Scale.

So I'm left with what is a good way to add three or four scale feet and still have a decent looking model. I'm particularly worried about 1.) the soft plastic of the model itself is much easier to mar than resin. 2.) How on earth am I going to sand and mask my seams and still maintain strength when I add weight? 3.) Can I make realistic looking rivets to replace the ones I've inadvertently sanded off.

Windows I've gotten from a New England Rail Service. And the rest, as I said, can come from Cal-Scale.

At $25 to $30 each, the Spectrums are easy to find and I have another 'pristine' Obs. to chop up if this one fails. I just need to know there will be a light at the end of the tunnel.

[orsonroy]

Car #1, eh? Well, I couldn't find any photos online, but the Fallen Flags site does have the car diagram. You're right; none of the business or obs cars available have anything close to the correct window spacing (figures). Your best bet is to keep doing what you're doing: cut out the windows above the belt rail, and replace them with NERS windows and details. As for a new platform railing, try Taurus or Scale Structures; they both have at least one type of etched brass railing apiece.

And good luck! I'm in a similar boat, trying to create NKP wood coaches, RPOs, full baggage cars and smoker/baggage cars. I've bought about a dozen of the Roundhouse Pullman Palace cars (for the windows, mainly), turned them into flat kits, and am in the process of pasting chunks of them back together based on the class diagrams. Interiors and correct underbody detailing will come later.

[emdgp92]

If you *really* want to have fun, try kitbashing a PRR PS124 sleeper from the Rivarossi car. Not only is the door on the wrong end (for the postwar sleeper), but you have to rearrange nearly all the windows on the corridor side, as well as splice in a few on the room side. As if that wasn't enough, the car comes with the underframe details molded into the floor. Trust me, moving them around was fun. Not.

I don't know about the Bachmann cars, but the Walthers ones look to be the easiest ones to modify. You can take the entire carbody apart to make it easier to cut. Plus, you can lay both sides atop each other...and then saw them to get identical lengths.

Good luck with the project!

[Anonymous]

doctorwayne:

Thanks for all the fantastic information. I'm going to the swap and show in Erie, Pa. on Nov. 6 so I'll be on the look out for new material.

But, since I've got one on the operating table, I want to keep going forward.

I decided to go ahead and add lenght to the spectrum Obs., add the underframe girders then remove all other details, including windows, etc.... add homemade rivets. That's where my fun comes in.

I'm going to make a mold of my new blank and cast it in resin. Then add the details I need to make the correct car, including windows and doors then letterboard and paint.

Any thoughts to cure me of my madness?

[doctorwayne]

No need for a cure, just keep at it. It won't be long 'til you're like the rest of us builders and bashers: perfectly sane and oblivious to the world of ready-to-run.
Wayne