NP 50' DD woody...?

[Puddington]

I picked this car up at the swap box at the LHS for a couple of bucks; The NP had a bunch of these for early auto box service ( hence the end door) and the road number was right, so what the hey.



After adding MT trucks and weathering I decided I wanted to see who made this little gem....ah...um... no markings at all; nothing, nada......

The doors look to have been replaced; the bottom is a solid metal slab, al la Roundhouse, but it looks too detailed for Roundhouse; in addition the center sill on the frame is unique....

Anyone familiar with this car and know it's origins ?

Many thanks !

[wcfn100]

Walthers.

And the doors just came warped.


Jason

[Chris333]

Walther's made it and the glue they used to hold the doors on usually warped them. I cut the 2 doors off of a good car and cast a few in resin for my warped cars.

For me it was the only Walther's car worth a crap.

[Chris333]

I just looked at mine and the ends look like separate pieces, but mine doesn't have a end door?

[wcfn100]

I just looked at mine and the ends look like separate pieces, but mine doesn't have a end door?

Yeah, there is a cavity for the end piece.  I got one with and w/o.  I had got one to hopefully make something like this:

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=68647

Now I'm  just hoping to use the ends and doors and rebuild the sides and the radial roof.


Jason

[Puddington]

Walthers it is...thanks gang - warped door aside (I braced mine inside and they are kinda better) it's a nice little car, even if the roof is wrong.

[wazzou]

I'd replace the 70T roller bearing truck on the near end with a bettendorf truck like that on the other end.  Nice cars though.  In my opinion, the best car Walthers made was the PS 4427 cu. ft. low side covered hopper...just not in Chris's era.

[Nato]

  Western Pacific had alot of these both with and without the end doors. I bought a bunch in several roads inlcuding NP who had them with the end doors. I was luckey, none of mine have warped doors,but yes far too much glue used, when I first saw these I thought maybe the doors could be opened, thats how they should have made em. Walthers should re run them sometime if they still have the tooling.        Nate Goodman (Nato).

[Puddington]

45 year old eyes...didn't even notice the different trucks.... sigh. :-\

[CoalPorter]

Is that Walther's car anywhere near scale ? It seams to tower over the other wood side box cars, like MT's. I've always avoided them because they look too big, even thought I'm a WP modeler.  ??? ???

[Nato]

    I compaired a car to A the old industry standard,the Atlas now Trainman 50 ft. DD box  car and a similar Micro Trains 50 ft. DD car. Leingth on the woodie, the same, height maybe an inch and a 1/4 taller than the Atlas car and maybe an inch taller than the MT car. The Mt car appears to be about a 1/4 of an inch taller than the Atlas. If these cars represent the standard 10 ft. height for many cars then the Walthers car could be a micro scosh taller, but then these cars were built to haul automobiles of the 1920's 30's which were high and square shaped. If I recall there was an indepth article on these cars in Rail Model Journal,but I don't recall the year only that it was shortly after the N car came out, I believe there was an HO one from Walthers several months earlier. Nate Goodman (Nato).

[daniel_leavitt2000]

There were pretty nice cars... You gotta wonder though, did this car (along with the previously mentioned Pullman Standard covered hopper) come from the same design guys as the PD 5000 hopper, the coil cars or the balast cars?

[up1950s]

I have a dozen or so of the Walthers 50' o/s and about 10 of the CC 50' 1.5 door o/s . We are long over do for a updated tooling of a 50' o/s box , preferably done by Atlas . Was there any 50' double sheathed cars models made ?

[hegstad1]

This car is pretty close to the NP prototype.  The largest inaccuracy is the roof which I altered a little bit to make it look more like a standard NP radial roof.  I also scraped off the ladders and added individual grab irons.  Pretty good detail on this car really.  I see these quite a bit at the local swap meets for around $5.00.  Can't beat that.

Andrew