Broadway Limited Sound Stock Car Review

[thomasjmdavis]

I want one with velociraptor sounds...

That sounds like a job for the MT horse car, in appropriate Jurassic paint scheme, of course.  Along with accompanying D78 Lab Car, 12-1 crew car and obs car so you can view the park.

[daniel_leavitt2000]

As I said in another forum. This car is one of the biggest insults to a group that a manufacturer has ever perpetuated in the model railroading community. This wasn't just an oversight or discrepancy, this was an outright con-job to the poor souls who preordered the model. It really is that bad.

Also, that moo soundtrack. Does it remind anyone else of Annville Meat and Power from Preacher?

[towl1996]

As I said in another forum. This car is one of the biggest insults to a group that a manufacturer has ever perpetuated in the model railroading community. This wasn't just an oversight or discrepancy, this was an outright con-job to the poor souls who preordered the model. It really is that bad.

To your point, all the pre production photos and artwork showed models with open slats and stirrups. Nowhere was it mentioned that the body would be solid. So in my mind there was a little bait and switch that went on. Had I know the body would have been solid I never would have pre-ordered the model in the first place. The real loser in all this is the shop in which the pre-order was placed. Me, I'm out shipping charges.  With N scale moving toward more prototypically correct models, one would expect a certain level of accepted accuracy to be present.  As I said before I will never pre- order a BLI product again.

[jagged ben]

This really is bad.  Reminded me of my Life-Like stock car from my first N-scale 'Little Joe' trainset from 1987.    Except that that car had open slats:  http://www.spookshow.net/freight/llstock.html

[eric220]

OK, the over the top bashing is starting to get a little old.  Let's have some data points here, otherwise known as "photos or it doesn't exist."

First up, we have the BLI official product photos of both the N scale and HO scale cars:



Next up, prototype photos courtesy of Bill's Pennsy Photos:



In comparing these photos, I see the following:

• The overall rendered detail and quality of the casting is very good, and far superior to anything produced in the '70s or '80s. (That's not to say that all the nicely rendered detail is accurate.)
• As noted ad nauseam, the N scale car is one solid casting, and no attempt was made to cover that fact.  This is a significant difference from the artwork, HO scale model, and every expectation that BLI put forward before releasing the car.
• Also as noted ad nauseam, the stirrups on the N scale model are filled in, unlike the HO model or prototype.
• The ride height of the N scale model is markedly higher than either the HO scale model or the prototype.
• The metal cross braces on the prototype are pretty darn thick, and I actually don't think the N scale rendition of those details is too far off.
• The ladders on the N scale model are grossly oversized.  Not too badly for a $15 car, but unreasonably so on a $70 car.
• The roof walk on the N scale model is getting kind of thick.  Again, not objectionably so for a $15 dollar car, but for $70, both the roofwalk and ladders should have been etched metal or some other process that would allow finer renditions.
• On both the N and HO models, there are a series of notches along the center horizontal rail.  Those appear to be incorrect renditions of braces clearly visible on the prototype.
• The N scale model doesn't have a panel for the herald, and the HO Scale model kind of half-there.

Overall, after comparing the photos, I think the two biggest sins are the solid body construction (which I believe borders on false and misleading advertising) and the ride height.  If they were able to lower the car and at least conceal the solid body construction, I think this product would be orders of magnitude better.  As others have said, the final N scale car kind of looks like a wonky outside-braced boxcar.

[peteski]

If not anything else (I still feel that all the details are exagerrated), the gaps between the boards on the ends have the same problem which prevented me from buying a bunch of Rapido meat reefers: the engraving of the gaps between the boards is extremely wide and deep.  The gaps are as wide as the boards! They almost look  like there should be daylight shining thought them. 

This is what I mean:

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But to me the entire car as a whole just doesn't have the "ambiance" that a model needs to look realistic.

[daniel_leavitt2000]

I think this is a very poor model, and the reviews and opinions are not hyperbole. In fact, I think they are a bit restrained. Yes it has rivets, but lets look at other details.

1. End boards have gaps as large as the boards themselves. This gives a Youngstown door appearance rather than a flat surface made of flat boards. Also note that these "boards" have a rounded appearance, magnifying the issue.

2. Likewise the side boards are smaller than the open spaces, and have a rounded appearance. Since the "open spaces" are filled in, this makes the car look like it is constructed from fluted material rather than boards. This is akin to tooling a streamlined passenger car with clapboard siding.

3. Speaking of the side; what is going on with that tabbed board halfway up the body on each side of the door? The prototype photo shows that there is barely a cut out at all and the perpendicular post is flush with the boards. On the HO model, this is also an issue with the post sunken several inches into the body, but look at the N model and the post has disappeared into the filled in area, leaving the board with saw-toothed cut outs for no reason. Awful.

4. Those ladders - foot thick rungs look like vintage Walthers.

5. Filled in end steps. Really? Has this ever happened in N before? Maybe LoneStar?

6. Rides high in the trucks. Not a deal killer. There is plenty else going wrong for that.

7. Look at how fat the running board, its end supports and the brake wheel are. Yikes.

8. The door looks like it has Youngstown corrugations, not open slats.

[peteski]

I don't have any American prototype stock cars handy, but just to see the quality molding that is possible in N scale, Here is a photo of a Prussian prototype stock car.  It was made at least 30 years ago by Fleischmann (which I consider to be Micro-Trains of Germany).    it is a very small car too (a standard MT wooden boxcar is next to it for size comparison.  As we can see much finer detailing is possible, even in a injection-molded 30-year-old car.  The entire body is molded quite thin, so it looks very airy.

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[John]

As I said in another forum.

I generally don't read other forums .. 

[wcfn100]

3. Speaking of the side; what is going on with that tabbed board halfway up the body on each side of the door? The prototype photo shows that there is barely a cut out at all and the perpendicular post is flush with the boards. On the HO model, this is also an issue with the post sunken several inches into the body, but look at the N model and the post has disappeared into the filled in area, leaving the board with saw-toothed cut outs for no reason. Awful.

Those notches are one of the interesting design decisions  I was talking about.  That could have been made to look much better but still convey that detail of the prototype.

A couple things beyond that are the door tracks.  The upper track is almost on the roof for some reason.  The lower track is also a mess.  It's supposed to be a thin bar that runs under the door but set back from being flush with the front.  The model has what I can only refer to as a book shelf extending well beyond the door.

Is this a new style of truck or were these done on another car before this?

Jason

[nkalanaga]

"5. Filled in end steps. Really? Has this ever happened in N before? Maybe LoneStar?"

Yes, the GHQ/DI(?) AAR flatcars from some time back.  In their defense, they were solid pewter castings, and I doubt that they could have made any other way.  They'd also be easy to replace with wire if they bothered me enough.

Other than that, those were beautiful cars, and I'd love to have more of them.

Peteski:  No, the grain wouldn't moo, unless one had a BIG problem.  Even tribbles don't moo.  And I doubt that the PRR originated enough grain shipments to have ever needed a grain-hauling stock car.

[crappie]

 has anyone changed to trucks with couplers