MTL 60' Boxcars

[unittrain]

Are the MTL 60' Hy-Cubes (the Berwick boxcars) vertically compressed? Just wondering because they are the same height as my 85' Hy-cubes and the prototypes are both 17', and the MTL's need lowered.

[bbussey]

Yes.  Very much so.

[ljudice]

Argh, say it ain't so...

Well now Exactrail should do their 60' boxcars in N...

[milw156]

When you guys lower cars, is there a metric you are shooting for, or just eyeballing until it "looks right"?
Rick

[bbussey]

You try to get it to where the floor height is where it belongs.  How the coupler must be body-mounted also comes into play.  But when the carbody height is compressed, you're really in a no-win scenario.  It's much easier when the carbody height is accurate even if the car is standing too high over the rails.

[unittrain]

Argh, say it ain't so...

Well now Exactrail should do their 60' boxcars in N...

Problem is will they figure that since we have the MTL's that it won't be worth it to them figuring it is a duplicate! I hope they do them!

[bbussey]

I don't think that would deter one of the other mfrs from tooling the car if they believed it would be profitable.  A new model could have nearly as many schemes in its first release than MTL has released in entirety, if not more.  Fox Valley introduced a properly-dimensioned FMC modern boxcar and has released dozens and dozens of schemes to great success.
 

[Mark5]

I hope somebody comes out with correct versions of these cars - I'll drop the N&W versions of these that I have like hot potatoes!

[milw156]

You try to get it to where the floor height is where it belongs.  How the coupler must be body-mounted also comes into play.  But when the carbody height is compressed, you're really in a no-win scenario.  It's much easier when the carbody height is accurate even if the car is standing too high over the rails.

so, put an Atlas ACF PD boxcar on the track, measure the height to the door tracks, and file off enough bolster of MDC, FVM, MTL's to bring the door tracks down to about the same height??? Are there any other cars that don't need to be lowered, including covered Hoppers, hoppers, gons, & tanks???
Rick

[bbussey]

The safe thing to do is measure the distance between each model's floor height and the rail top.  Here is a list of most of the injection-molded RTR freight cars currently in production that stand the correct height above the rail.  The safe thing to do however is to measure the distance between each model's floor height and the rail top.

Athearn:  all covered hoppers; all GSC flats; 50' ATSF steel reefer; 40' milk reefer; articulated auto rack; `65 mill gondola; all ex-MDC modern boxcars.

Atlas: USRA boxcars wood and rebuilts on Andrews trucks; standard and wide vision cupola cabooses; NE6 caboose; C&O caboose; Evans gondola; Thrall gondola; ACF Precision boxcar; FGE boxcar; pulpwood car; all covered hoppers; Hart ballast car; all twin hoppers; articulated auto rack; ore car.

Bachmann:  NE caboose; new 10k tank; new 40' boxcar; 55' centerflow hopper.

BLMA:  all rolling stock.

Bluford:  all rolling stock.

Bowser:  both PRR coal hoppers; both ex-DVFC covered hoppers.

Con-Cor:  all 50' flats and gondolas.

Deluxe: 53' flat; coalporter gondola.

ESM:  all rolling stock.

ExactRail:  all rolling stock except Vert-a-Pak.

Fox Valley:  B&O Wagontop.

IMRC:  60' flats; 40' composite gondola; 40' steel milk car; 8k tank; grain covered hoppers.

Kato USA:  all rolling stock.

Micro-Trains:  10k tank; 40' steel ice reefer; 50' mech reefer; all twin hoppers; 90-ton coal hopper; all covered hoppers; all cupola cabooses; scale test car.

Red Caboose:  all rolling stock.

TrainWorx:  all rolling stock.

Walthers:  GSC flat; coil car; Difco dump car; North American boxcar; 100-ton hopper.

[milw156]

Thanx for that list, Bryan! Athearn must have made some drastic changes to the floors for the ex-mdc cars cuz the originals are certainly no where close!
Rick

[bbussey]

I should have said "some of the ex-MDC modern boxcars."  I don't remember the specific models offhand, but the later-tooled ones hunkered down over the trucks and stood at the correct height.  I don't believe Athearn has reissued any of these models as of yet.

[unittrain]

Thanks for posting the list, it is good all these other models are correct! I will make sure to put my vote in to Exactrail for the 60' boxcars. They are doing a ton of great models in HO and we have to get some of these in N. I'm looking forward to seeing what they announce.

[christoph]

Bryan, thank you for posting the list.
One addition for those interested in the Atlas cars:  the USRA cars with Bettendorf trucks can be easily lowered by drilling out the mounting hole of the truck.  No modifications of the car body is needed.  I posted this on Trainboard a year ago, here is the link to the picture : http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/showphoto.php/photo/136565/title/lowering-atlas-car-with-50-ton-bettendorf-trucks/cat/1232

[atsf_arizona]

Here's a photo web article I did five years ago documenting what I and others have done to
lower MT cars to correct ride height.  In my case, yes, I 'eyeballed' it:

http://home.comcast.net/~j.sing/Lowering_N_scale_ATSF_Hi-Cube_Micro_Trains_boxcar.html



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Hope that helps!