Shapeways Heavyweight Streamlined Roofs

[CBQ Fan]

Has anyone produced one for any of the Micro-Trains heavyweight cars, or considered making them?  I wonder if you could also make skirting for these as well?

[Lemosteam]

I assume you are referring to arch, or "balloon" roofs?

Now that Shapeways has corrected their length calibration issues, I will be releasing some within a month or so.  In particular, what MT cars are you looking to fit them with?  I have to design them to fit each car body as they seem to have varying snap (attachment) schemes.

[Maletrain]

I am not sure what roof shape the OP was really requesting. 

There are some "steamlined heavyweight" roof shapes other than the arch or "balloon" shape that comes down to the original car body height at the ends. 

For example, the B&O "streamlined" a lot of heavyweight cars for their name trains by adding what they called a "turtle" roof and some skirting at the bottom.  Those turtle roofs basically hid the clerestory underneath.  There were two versions: one had a straight roof line to the ends of the car, with a flat build-up of the car end to meet it.  That left the roof about 6" higher than a streamlined lightweight car, so there was an obvious height mismatch in mixed trains.  The other style had a slope at the ends to get the roof line down about 6" to match the streamlined lighweights.  Still conspicuously higher in the main part of the car, but more "streamlined" looking.  In both styles, when viewd from the top, you could see the ribbing of the original clerestory roofs where the streamlining addition did not cover it at its maximum heighth.  And, there was also a slight, but noticeable overhang on the sides of the cars where the additional roofing stuck out beyond the letter boards.

Having some of those roofs to fit Rivarossi/Atlas/Lima heavyweights would be nice.  For one thing, the "streamlining" of those cars replaced the fixed steps with retracting steps, so the lack of steps on the original model is not a problem, but rather a blessing - - we don't have to remove them to add the skirting.  Also, I believe that all of the Rivarossi cars are the same length with the same ends, so designing such roofs on Shapeways should be a one-size-fits many effort.

[sirenwerks]

I'd like to have some rebuilt heavyweight cars, period. A B&O-esque rebuilt coach and diner especially, with the sealed windows and either. or both, roofline versions. There is a designer on Shapeways who has some D&H cars, but they're pricey, even for Shapeways. Hard to build up a couple trains at his prices. A brass car sides and Shapeways roof combo would be nice.

[Lemosteam]

Are you referring to modernizing of heavyweights, similar to what the PRR did with the P70's?

Images would be helpful as I could create the "streamlined" versions of the roofs as an offshoot, possibly easily enough.

[Maletrain]

Maybe this should go into another thread, but it would be nice if somebody made a set of windows that could be arranged as-desired along the sides of a car, between the letter boards and belt rails, so that we could more easily make the proper window arrangements for cars that are not produced by vendors.  For example, the Pullman 8 section - various bedrooms styles, different diners and lounges, etc.  And, making them both in the original, square-cornered opening style and the "modernizing," round-cornered Thermopane style in various sizes would be great, so long as we could buy a bunch of them as a single print at a reasonalbe price. I have been thinking about trying to make these on my own as resin castings, but I am lazy enough to buy a bunch from Shapeways, instead.  Of course, it would really be nice if some mass manufacturer made them as plastic injection castings so that we could more easily glue (really weld) them together into very robust car sides.  And, clear glazing inserts would really make this kind of system attractive to scratch and kit-bash modelers.

[jmlaboda]

As good as it might be to have modernized window sections the problem that you run into is that few car types that were modernized for one road matches anything that another road rebuilt so one size would not fit all.  They were very unique from road to road.  Probably the only two roads that had cars that were similar were Modernized coaches done by Baltimore & Ohio and Erie, with both roads retaining the original window pattern while mounting new windows.

The tapered end arched roof that angles down to the car ends were first introduced with "Betterment" cars, early steps taken by Pullman to create a more streamlined appearance that often included skirting to match but the windows remained originals with no modification.  Betterment cars started to appear in operation in the mid-30s and were by and large replaced by lightweight cars often with the cars then being used only when service requirements demanded it.  Some roads like the Burlington, Erie and Union Pacific did use this type of roof on "Modernized" cars so offering such a roof would be very welcome for some modelers... one can only hope a good quality roof can be obtained sometime soon.

And it is worth noting that while there were modernized examples of Pullman cars on roads like B&O and PRR most modernized sleepers were used north of the border by Canadian National and Canadian Pacific, with both of those roads investing heavily in modernizing cars where as to the south the cars were at best unusual and interesting novelties that were not in great number.  The Canadian modernized sleepers by and large were withdrawn as additional lightweight sleepers were acquired from roads who no longer needed them though a few did last in service into the early-70s.

Having window strips to apply to carbodies to represent other car types that are not presently available may present an easier way of kitbashing some car types that are not currently available but carbodies of cars such as sleeper - lounges and dining cars were not rubber stamped and often you will encounter problems with matching body detail and roofs, which, for some types, were considerably different from what presently is available.  I yet suspect that MT will be announcing some sort of sleeper - lounge solarium observation car but have no idea what their timetable for such will be.

Ideally the single best way of approaching heavyweight cars not currently available would be to offer layered brass car sides that entail the inner window frames, an outer layer having the various rivet detail for doors and windows along with the exterior door and window openings, with separate rivet splice plates, beltrail and letterboard that would be applied as a third layer.  Scott Lupia's Erie Lackawanna business car sides are perfect examples of what could be done but assembling such sides is not for the faint of heart, being very challenging for most modelers to do... I have a number of sides myself and hope eventually to apply them to donor carbodies so my fleet of business cars can be finished... as website development might allow (which does not look likely anytime soon).  Hands down this would be the best way to approach cars not currently available.

[CBQ Fan]

Something like this is what I had in mind:

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=3595328


Sleepers would be my main interest.

[Maletrain]

Yes, that is a "Betterment" car with the second roof option I mentioned.  It also looks like an 8-section - (with who knows what)-bedrooms car, which is currently not made in N scale by any manufacturer.  The B&O had many cars like that.  By the 1953 period that I try to model, some still looked like that, and others had also been "modernized", which showed on their exteriors as windows in the same positions with rounded corners, and glass sitting nearly flush with the car body exterior.

As for methods of assembling car sides from components, I am more interested in making the window arrangements very flexible so that I could use the same set of components to model many different configurations.  That is why I want the individual windows as separate pieces, rather than needing somebody to laser cut or etch all of the windows for a particular car into one piece of material.  It seems that there are many more prototype configurations than there are car sides likely to ever be made.

It seems easier to me to have doors and windows (with appropriate frame details) that can be arranged as desired, spaced out with flat material between them, and fit between a letter board panel and a belt rail (and below) panel, then the whole assembly edge welded together with solvent or glue.  Archer rivet decals could be applied as needed to any fill panels between windows.

[Angus Shops]

HO scale has (or had) a line of heavyweight car side detail parts just as has been described; you could buy single windows, double windows, and a variety in between panels of different lengths that included all the rivet details and such. They were designed to fit between the upper drip strip and the belt rail below. I remember looking at them and thinking "perfect, just what I need but wrong scale". I think they were by Branchline.
However, you can 'roll your own' in N scale by cutting out everything between the drip and belt rails  that doesn't match the prototype (with luck at least some windows are in the right places) and inserting windows and panels cut from a donor car. With careful careful cutting, filing, fitting and glueing you can build a good range of prototypes.
Geoff

[sirenwerks]

Maybe this should go into another thread, but it would be nice if somebody made a set of windows that could be arranged as-desired along the sides of a car, between the letter boards and belt rails, so that we could more easily make the proper window arrangements for cars that are not produced by vendors.  For example, the Pullman 8 section - various bedrooms styles, different diners and lounges, etc.  And, making them both in the original, square-cornered opening style and the "modernizing," round-cornered Thermopane style in various sizes would be great, so long as we could buy a bunch of them as a single print at a reasonalbe price. I have been thinking about trying to make these on my own as resin castings, but I am lazy enough to buy a bunch from Shapeways, instead.  Of course, it would really be nice if some mass manufacturer made them as plastic injection castings so that we could more easily glue (really weld) them together into very robust car sides.  And, clear glazing inserts would really make this kind of system attractive to scratch and kit-bash modelers.

We would need a windowless riveted car body then, to insert windows into as we please.

[Maletrain]

I know we can buy two (or more) cars, cut the windows out of one and cut the window area of the second one, then arrange the windows from the first one the way we want them in the second body and glue it all into one piece.  But, that takes two cars, every time.  Much better to just have the mass-produced windows available separately.  Especially if those windows were made from a weldable plastic, rather than resin or FUD.  That way, you only need one donor car to use as the body to make a car with different window arrangements.  Unless, of course, somebody also makes the complementary "windowless riveted car body" that Sirenworks noted we would need, so we don't have to make our own by cutting the windows out of a perfectly good car.

[thomasjmdavis]

New England Rail Service produced HO replacement windows to fit both Rivarossi and Branchline cars in that larger scale.  I exchanged emails with them 10 or 12 years ago about producing those parts in N scale.  They were very polite, but did not believe they would make back the investment in tooling.  As I recall, they did suggest that if I or someone I knew wanted to put up the money to get the project off the ground, they would consider it, but you would have to sell a whole lot of windows and doors to make it worthwhile to cut the tooling for injection molding.

If you only want a few cars, chopping windows out of a sacrifice car body is not all that difficult- I've done it in both Rivaross and MT bodies.  In N scale, I've also found that if you are careful, you can sometimes cut and paste car side sections, rather than trying to fit windows in place (see, for example, Jerry Laboba's page on chopping up MT RPOs into various things http://n-scalevarnish.info/index/varnish/MT-RPO.htm )And scrap carbodies are not hard to come across.  Mass produced replacement parts would no doubt be a better option, but if you want the car bad enough....

[thomasjmdavis]

To get back to replacement roofs, here is the roof I need the most-
http://rr-fallenflags.org/el/pax/erie-co1000bbb.jpg

something very similar also used on some remodeled Pullman sleepers
http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/43982/rv/singleitem

I think that is what is called a "betterment" roof, but will be subject to correction by the more expert among you.

[Chris333]

To get back to replacement roofs, here is the roof I need the most-
http://rr-fallenflags.org/el/pax/erie-co1000bbb.jpg

something very similar also used on some remodeled Pullman sleepers
http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/43982/rv/singleitem

I think that is what is called a "betterment" roof, but will be subject to correction by the more expert among you.

I could use those as well.