Older Style Nickel Plate Car by AccuRail

Milepost 525

 
In my last post, I mentioned our trip to Columbus and The Train Station.  In addition to the old, used cars I found, they had a nice selection of Accurail kits as well.  I picked up a couple including this dandy Nickel Plate single sheathed wooden boxcar.  As you can see from the photo, it has metal doors & ends, making it a little newer in style than the typical wooden car.  If I'm not mistaken, the car number appears to put it into a class of war emergency cars that were built during WWII when steel was in short supply.  These cars were later rebuilt into steel sided cars with wider, 8' doors.

Kit assembly for a car like this one is pretty much straight forward.  Brake components are attached to the floor as three separate castings; the triple valve, brake cylinder & air tank.  The main elements of the frame are attached to the floor as well.  Couplers are installed with a small screw and a cover plate.  For what it's worth, I've never had much luck with the Accurail coupler; I substitute Kadee #5s in place of the kit supplied ones.  Trucks also attache with either a screw or a friction pin depending on the age of the kit.  The weight needs to be glued to the floor to complete that subassembly.  Details on the car body are sparse; the modeler only has to add the brake shaft and brake wheel.  Finally, the body is attached to the floor.  The body id cast slightly concave along the sides and there are small friction tabs on the inside car walls to hold the car floor in place without any glue.  One word of caution:  care must be taken when putting the body on the floor; the stirrup castings are very fragile and break easily.  Don't ask me how I know this.

All in all, the car is a sharp model that is relatively easy to assemble.  One could knock out a couple of these in a very leisurely time.  Your efforts will be rewarded with a neat addition to your freight car fleet.

dlm

Comments

[Leisa Dreps]

This is cute! My son would love this. How long did it take for you to assemble this?

[Car Floor Mats]

Really nice :) hope to have one.