Milwaukee Road Passenger Car Project

[chessie system fan]

As I posted in this past week's Weekend Update thread, I've started designing some Milwaukee Road passenger cars.  The impetus for starting all of this was a chance purchase of "Hiawatha - Nothing Faster On Rails."

 https://www.milwaukeeshops.org/  As a designer, I can't recommend this book enough. I've never seen drawings that thorough before.  Just check out these sample drawings and you'll get the idea: 
 https://www.milwaukeeshops.org/pages/sample-pages-hiawatha-nothing-faster-on-rails

My (probably overly ambitious) plan right now is to create a model of every passenger car Milwaukee owned in every variation. I'll post my progress here on this thread as I work on each car, and as I'm not a Milwaukee Road expert I'm sure I'll need plenty of advice along the way!

[chessie system fan]

I elected to begin work on the first car in the book: the 1937 Tip Top Tap cars, numbers 151-152.



Still to do:

The floor -- it's mostly done.  The holdup was the trucks and truck bolster but I just bought a few Fox Valley trucks.  I don't own any Fox Valley cars. If anyone can post a pic of a Fox Valley underframe that would be a help.  Dimensions of the bolster in mm would be even better.

The boat -- haven't started, but every 1937 car used the same boat.

The steps -- I plan on getting these etched in stainless steel.

[chessie system fan]

Skipping ahead a few pages in the book, I spotted some low-hanging fruit.  I took my Tip Top Tap design, deleted the back half, shifted the baggage door slightly, rearranged the roof vents and added a few end details, hit "mirror," and express cars 1300-1304 were done.



To do:

The floor: same as the first car, I still need to design the bolster and make sure the body mounted Micro Trains couplers will be at the correct height.

Underbody details: mostly done

The steps: etch.  I'll do this once I get a few more cars done.  The fret for each car will include every step and grab iron a car might need. 

[chessie system fan]

More low-hanging fruit: 1936 mail and express cars 1200-1204 were nearly identical to the express cars.  I just deleted a baggage door, shifted the roof vents and added the windows and that was it.



To do: the same list as the express car, because it uses the exact same floor.

[u18b]

Getting popcorn. 
Looking forward to this thread.

[Sokramiketes]

Looking great.  What are you using for the design software?

On the steps, etched sounds good, but brass or nickel silver will hold paint better than Stainless over the long run. 

FVM trucks?  FVM underframes too? 

[chessie system fan]

I use Fusion360. 

The Fox Valley trucks are correct for the 1937 cars so I'll use them.  I haven't decided what to do yet about the 1939 and 1942 cars, which are a different style.  But I'll use my own underframe design.

I'm thinking that etched brass will be too fragile.  I've seen too many crumpled brass steps.  I haven't seen any stainless steel crumpled steps, though.  But that's as far as my thinking has gotten right now.  I'm open to alternatives.

[peteski]

How about phosphor bronze?  It is a form of brass/bronze, but stiffer and springier than brass.

[Pizzaparty]

Are fox valley trucks easy to get? It looks like they sold out of one style. I’m guessing there’s not much in the way of a stand in that’s close

[sd45elect2000]

I use Fusion360. 

The Fox Valley trucks are correct for the 1937 cars so I'll use them.  I haven't decided what to do yet about the 1939 and 1942 cars, which are a different style.  But I'll use my own underframe design.

I'm thinking that etched brass will be too fragile.  I've seen too many crumpled brass steps.  I haven't seen any stainless steel crumpled steps, though.  But that's as far as my thinking has gotten right now.  I'm open to alternatives.

I think there were, or still are 8 ft. wheelbase Nystrom trucks. I think ,many of the 1942 cars were built with 7 ft wheelbase later changed.

Kato has the 8ft Nystrom trucks for their Hiawatha. I know of no other Nystrom trucks available.

[keeper]

This is a very interesting thread.

There is someone on shapeways who is selling Nystrom trucks.

[chessie system fan]

Correct.  Here's the Shapeways link:

https://www.shapeways.com/shops/nlaempires

It appears to be only one style truck but with mods for different axle lengths to use either Fox Valley or Kato wheels.  And it's a later style truck from the '40s.

[chessie system fan]

By the way, if you've ever wondered how Milwaukee came up with its unique roof profile, this photograph sort of explains it all.  It's actually pretty logical for 1934, if you think about it.

Some Milwaukee MofW Rolling Stock in St. Paul in June 1964 -- 3 Photos by Marty Bernard, on Flickr

[skytop35]

Getting popcorn. 
Looking forward to this thread.

Same here !

[chessie system fan]

So here is my printing progress so far. I'm still experimenting with print angles and settings.  The cars got a super quick coat of gray spay paint to show detail.

My first test was the mail and express car, using the preset Photon settings on my new M3 Premium and printed flat.



Printing flat was not successful.  The suction on the fep film changed dramatically once it got to the shallow roofline. Notice that the car edges have a correct curve, but the middle area has a harder edge to it. That plus the multitude of supports on the interior makes it not feasible.

The Photon preset layers are 0.050mm. Notice the layers on the roof.



The next test was completely vertical and with 0.040mm layers (at 2.250 seconds).



It's possible that big vertical line on the right was my fault.  I might have bumped something in another room bad enough to cause a jolt.   

But you can see that the smaller layers made a big difference on the roof.  However, you can see some distortion of the roof vents. You can kind of see it on the bottom left vent on its left side.  Printing vertically didn't give them enough support.



I do like how the roof hatch turned out.  The undercut looks great.  However, I don't know that there will be a way to get around those striations at the bottom of the car.  The curve is just too shallow for the machine to print it cleanly.  Maybe when 16K or 24K printers come out one day the problem will be overcome.