Walthers Ballast Hoppers... Any Good?

[Catt]

very hard metal too,when I put MTL trucks under mine I ended up drilling out the truck pins because they would not let go.

[kiwi_bnsf]

I really need a full train of UP MOW ballast hoppers for my Tehachapi pass (set in 1999), and a cursory comparison of these Walthers cars with the UP M110 Ballast Cars, they look similar…

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/rsPicture.aspx?id=187675

Unfortunately the Walthers cars do look pretty coarse.

I think this is the first thread I've ever seen discussing these cars, but they seem pretty common, and I would have thought they'd be quite popular.

I second the earlier comment - BLMA needs to tool some up…

[Catt]

I second the earlier comment - BLMA needs to tool some up…

No thanks,Craig does great work but a train full of his cars would bankrupt most modelers including me..I'll settle for a 10 pack of surgical grade #11s and some quality time modeling and improving what I got.

[nkalanaga]

Catt:  Probably glued in.  I bought some Walthers log and GSC flatcars when both were new, and every one of the trucks was glued.  The GSC cars were a pain to drill out.  The log cars were easy, as I removed the bunks (the ones that hadn't fallen off in shipping) to paint the cars.  On those I could drill all the way through, as the hole went through, and the bunk covers it when installed.  Most of the trucks on the GSC cars broke when I tried to pull them off.  Not such a bad thing, though, as all of the wheels were out of gauge, and plastic wheels can't be fixed.  They all got new MT trucks.