Car Fleet

 I’ve got too many cars. There’s a shock, a model railroader who has too many cars. I’m slowly trying to upgrade the fleet. As a general rule I never buy any shake the box cars any more.

What I’m building, however, will utilize a lot of cars. My freight house complex for example is going to need rough 200 forty-foot box cars per session. Additionally the grain elevator/flour mill/New World Pasta can probably accommodate another 100 cars. This list goes on.

My point is, while I’m upgrading, I’m afraid to dispose of any cars, yet.

One other problem associated with new, highly detailed, models of interesting cars is the cost. Two new USRA outside braced wood 40’ boxcars from Rapido were $92. Another argument for shake-the-box cars.

Specific car types that I want are another compelling reason to look at new cars. I wanted X-3 tank cars on the layout. The X-3 was the most common tank car of the Steam Era, and it stands to reason you’d see them on my layout. Acid tank cars; chemical tank cars; 6000 gallon tank cars; multi-dome tank cars (Find me a RTR model of a two or four dome tank car and I’ll kiss you, NOW THERE’S A REWARD!.

These are all becoming available, and I’ve picked up a number of them all (With the X-3, BOY DID I!).

In the case of tank cars when I’ve purchased a new, prototypically correct  model, I’ve disposed of the Athearn 16000 gallon version. In fact, with the exception of a few Athearn tanks that I custom painted and lettered for “Atlantic Inland Diesel Fuel Service”, I have no Athearn tanks cars left in my collection.

Flat cars. Here I’m generally pretty good. I own several Athearn flats that have custom loads on them. A number of Con-cor flats that were custom painted by the WMRHS (*1), with those clunky break stands (*2).

For the most part my flat car fleet is P2K 53-6 flats.  By 1952 the 40’ flat was rare. I have a number of 40’ & 36’ flat cars for MOW, and idler cars for over-sized loads (No, John, not the Battleship Gun load).

My coal hopper fleet, while huge by some standards, is made up of almost totally prototypically IN-correct models. I need lots of coal hoppers (*3), they are all painted black, and are all heavily weathered. The handful of super-detailed models are all lost in the thundering herd. It must be said, however, that Quantity has a Quality all its own.

So my effort to upgrade my car fleet could be graded as follows:

Tank Cars B+

Flat cars B

Reefers C+

Box cars D

Coal Hoppers F

Point is, I’m trying. 

When your model railroad is a 3D game board, and operations is your sole reason for being, your cars are going to get handled. I’d be pretty happy if guys used coupler picks, I have a NUMBER of cars with quite noticeable greasy finger prints on their sides, but I’m not very fanatical. 

I’ve operated at a couple of places where owners caution you not to retail ANY car, call him to do it. That’s absurd! I respect those rules, but NEVER go back (*4). I think those owners are in the wrong hobby.

This is not a consistent balancing thing. I’m not objective. I like some things more than others. I’m not going to replace my boxcar fleet wholesale with Westerfield and Sunshine kits. I’ll leave that to those guys who have the Sunshine mass production process mastered (*5).

(*1) WMRHS - Western Maryland Railway Historical Society

(*2) Which you can cut off, file, sand and paint. Then add the Tichy brake detail to the end of the car, and Viola! (Pronounced VEE-Ola just like the Stooge’s)

 (*3) Roughly 450 cars

(*4)  I operated on one layout where the owner would not allow you to couple or uncouple any equipment, nor line ANY turnouts. You were supposed to call a helper to do it. I took my 20 cars forward across the layout and then back the other way. Once I got back to the point I started from I set down my throttle, walked into the crew lounge and ate cookies for 3 hours. What a joke.

(*5) Bill Darnaby routinely builds 12 Sunshine kits A WEEK. Chuck Hitchcock replaced his boxcar fleet, over time, on his Argentine Industrial layout with Westerfield kits, for the most part. These two exceptional modelers are among those modelers who enjoy building craftsman kits, and can undertake the process of rostering huge fleets of craftsman kits.