I think this was a flea market find many years ago but I really can't remember:
I've acquired many NKP freight cars over the years because my fictional railroad interchanges with the NKP in Buffalo. I don't think I gave it much thought until recently but I'm curious as to why this one is painted silver instead of boxcar red like all my other NKP boxcars.
I'm thinking two possibilities. Could it have been for a priority freight service like the NYC Pacemaker service. Or could it have been intended as an express boxcar intended to be run in passenger train service with silver Budd passenger cars.
Any other ideas?
OOPS: I posted the wrong picture. I just corrected that.
John, A Silver NKP aluminum box car would be really cool to see in real life.
Bob, PC101
It was an experimental aluminum boxcar.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
PC101 John, That Silver NKP box car would be really cool to see. Bob, PC101
John, That Silver NKP box car would be really cool to see.
It would have been if I had posted the right picture. I just fixed that.
I just found this Kadee version of it, looks like #8502.
s-l640.jpg (640×427) (ebayimg.com)
I just found these photos of #8500.
NKP 8500 Chicago IL 1949 | The Nickel Plate Archive (nkphts.org)
NKP 8500 Frankfort IN 12-1947 | The Nickel Plate Archive (nkphts.org)
I've got one of those which I believe was an Athearn blue box repainted by Bev-Bel or such:
NKP8504_Express2 by Edmund, on Flickr
I had painted up a Kadee PS-1 (a close substitute) in aluminum but when it came to trying to apply the 50 year-old Champ decals they simply disintegrated in the water.
NKP_Express2 by Edmund, on Flickr
I believe NKP had ten of these made. They had steam and signal lines plus marker brackets for passenger service.
I'd really like to get a "Kadee Quality" one to replace the present one I have.
Regards, Ed
John-NYBWOOPS: I posted the wrong picture. I just corrected that.
Thanks John, I was going to mention this earlier today, but no need.
Mike.
My You Tube
I have three of these cars and have read they would have been express freight added on to the "The Canadian". Would these also be aluminum?
Brent
It's not the age honey, it's the mileage.
https://www.youtube.com/user/BATTRAIN1/videos
You can never ever out-train poor nutrition.
BATMANWould these also be aluminum?
I'd have to say steel, painted aluminum.
Wish I could be there to see if a magnet sticks to it
Cheers, Ed
gmpullmanWish I could be there to see if a magnet sticks to it
Let me just run to the train room and check Ed.
Just to expand a little on Dave H's answer...after WW2, several railroads experimented with aluminum (or aluminium for our UK friends) freight cars; generally these were not painted but left in their natural silvery color. I know GN had some silver aluminum boxcars for example.
gn2500.jpg (670×298) (steamerafreightcars.com)
Around the same time, a number of railroads began using stainless steel streamlined passenger cars. Some railroads that had these cars painted their steel express boxcars and/or refrigerator cars (or even some older heavyweight passenger cars) silver to match (more or less) the color of their stainless steel passenger cars.
The NKP 8500-8509 were constructed for head end service in 1947. Materials were supplied by Reynolds Aluminum. At the same time, RI 20060-20069, M&St.L 1000-1018 (even numbers only), ALTON 1200-1209 and C&O 2900-2909 appeared. Around this time, World War II had ended and the Korean War had not yet begun, so there was a surplus of aluminum. See the Sunshine Models product description on the Steam Era Freight Cars website and the MR magazine (page 34 of the Mar. 2003 issue). 1045
Aside from the color, is there any distinctive spotting feature for an alluminum boxcar?
Could any typical boxcar kit be used for one of these on a freelanced railroad?
-Kevin
Living the dream and happily modeling my STRATTON AND GILLETTE Railroad in HO scale. The SGRR is a freelanced Class A railroad as it would have appeared on Tuesday, August 3rd, 1954, in my personal fantasy world of plausible nonsense.
SeeYou190 Aside from the color, is there any distinctive spotting feature for an alluminum boxcar? Could any typical boxcar kit be used for one of these on a freelanced railroad? -Kevin
Yes, alumnum paint will do fine in HO scale.
I have one, I will try to get a picture.
C&O also experimented with aluminum hoppers - I have models of them as well.
Sheldon
So I have not found my NKP model yet, but here are the C&O aluminum hoppers.
And a C&O aluminum box car that really is aluminum, offered by Globe, likely soon after the prototypes hit the rails in 1947 - but they got the car number half wrong....
Recent (last 10 years?) NKP offering from Athearn:
I didn't know about these and now I need one.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
BigDaddyI didn't know about these and now I need one.
Same here... the SGRR will be getting one!
I don't understand why anyone would want one of those boxcars. After all, they are just silver painted plastic.
If you must get an al u minium car why settle for painted plastic when you can get:
or this:
Was the Southern articulated hopper car (with the disc-brake single axles) in aluminum? I believe all the Big Johns were...
UP had IIRC some hoppers articulated in the middle over a single truck.
Then there is that analogue of Iron Highway, the BN TroughTrain... which didn't even work in steel, but did that stop 'em from implementing them in Wonder Metal???
maxman I don't understand why anyone would want one of those boxcars. After all, they are just silver painted plastic. If you must get an al u minium car why settle for painted plastic when you can get: or this:
The C&O model made by Globe I posted a picture of is actually aluminum.
As for beer cans, not interested in them full or converted to railroad cars.
OvermodWas the Southern articulated hopper car (with the disc-brake single axles) in aluminum?
I don't know about a Southern hopper, but this ACL hopper claims to be stainless steel.
-Photograph by Kevin Parson
Which brings up another question...
How many freight cars were made of unpainted stainless steel?
I sure know a railroad with a whole lot of stainless cabooses!
That ACL car is a real worthy successor to a battleship gon! The only problem is that, after looking carefully at the car details, I find I'm suddenly hungry for something from Burger King...
Ed's going to have his usual splendid documentation of the car... it's a covered hopper, btw... but here's some contemporary, if perhaps a little blurry, description:
https://www.freightwaves.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Screen-Shot-2020-10-16-at-12.12.06-PM.png
OMI made this in brass... but NOT properly shiny, it would seem.
And it sure looks like it made it to SCL (renumbered to 200000):
http://s3.amazonaws.com/rrpa_photos/4690/SBD%20200000.jpg
(if this link chokes, somebody edit it properly and repost). Proudly displayed in Rocky Mount, NC.