Hunting for plastic underframes with bolsters

[mmagliaro]

For a project I'm working on, I need some body bolsters from the underside of a 40' freight car.  Ideally, the car bottom is plastic, comes out, and the two bolsters can be easily cut away with some strokes of a razor saw without a lot of other junk in the way.

I had an old Precision Masters 40' reefer kit that was ideal for this.  But I only had the one and I don't have any more.

I also have some Intermountain 8000 gal tank car plastic kits that would work, but the bolsters need a lot more trimming than I would like because they have tank supports and other stuff molded onto them. 

I just want the bolster with the tapered shape, rivet detail, and the truck mounting hole.

If you have anything like this you'd be willing to part with, please PM.  Thanks.

[peteski]

Many currently produced MTL underframes have flat metal  floor with the bolster brake hardware and  everything else being molded out of plastic. That plastic detail piece snaps into the metal floor.  You might be able to order just the detail piece from MTL, or ask Joe if he could set you up with those pieces.  But it is made from slippery plastic, so it will be difficult to glue.

[mmagliaro]

Many currently produced MTL underframes have flat metal  floor with the bolster brake hardware and  everything else being molded out of plastic. That plastic detail piece snaps into the metal floor.  You might be able to order just the detail piece from MTL, or ask Joe if he could set you up with those pieces.  But it is made from slippery plastic, so it will be difficult to glue.

I did order some of the plastic detail underframes from MT, but they have everything *except* the bolsters on them.  The plastic piece includes support ribs, fishbelly beams (if applicable) and all the brake parts, but doesn't have the bolsters - unless there is some other generation of car bottom I'm not aware of.  Good point about gluing.  With the pieces I took from the Precision Masters car (and if I use IM parts), they are styrene.  I need to glue this to brass anyway, to I'm just using 2-part epoxy.  But even epoxy won't stick to Delrin for bupkis.

[Chris333]

3D printing?

[Missaberoad]

Intermountain boxcars/reefers are probably your best bet...

[u18b]

I was recently given some freight cars from the 70s.
I could send you some.

PM me.

[wazzou]

Intermountain will sell 40' or 50' center sill sprues with attached bolsters.
I think I bought 50 of each probably 10 or more years ago for .25 per sprue.

[mmagliaro]

Intermountain will sell 40' or 50' center sill sprues with attached bolsters.
I think I bought 50 of each probably 10 or more years ago for .25 per sprue.

I was just about to post when I read this!   Reading up on the lineage of Precision Masters, it appears that the steel reefer that has the undercarriage I want ended up as this Intermountain car:

https://www.intermountain-railway.com/n/html/65502.htm

I will send them an inquiry.

[Missaberoad]

I was just about to post when I read this!   Reading up on the lineage of Precision Masters, it appears that the steel reefer that has the undercarriage I want ended up as this Intermountain car:

https://www.intermountain-railway.com/n/html/65502.htm

I will send them an inquiry.

Not exactly... Although both the precision master and Intermountain car are models of PFE R-40-23 reefers, They are not the same tooling.
The tooling for the PM car was bought by Red Caboose and should now be owned by FVM. The IMRC car was tooled by them in house and not acquired second hand.

The Intermountain underframe should work for the same purposes as the PM part tho...

[randgust]

I've hacked the plastic bolsters off several legacy Trix and Atlas cars for projects, and what 'gets you' is how thick they are.   It's easy enough to saw them off the underframe, but you've going to have to file down about .040-.060 in thickness off the bottom if you plan to put them on the bottom of the floor of something else.    I know you're up to it, but if you can find a casting that doesn't need to have that done to it, it's probably a better idea than what you might have originally thought.  The tip is to put a bolster pin in them as a handle while filing them flat again.

My 'epic' past project was replacing the bolsters on about 10 Rapido single-dome tank cars so that they'd take MT trucks.... that was a long time ago.   But just recently I did the same thing to get better bolsters on my wooden circus cars.    Technique still works....

[mmagliaro]

Randy,
Yes, I found that out right quick.  I needed them to be only .075" thick at the deepest part (where the coupler pin goes in).   With the one Prec Masters bottom I had, I cut the bolsters out and just ran them back and forth over a flat piece of sandpaper on a flat surface, taking care to change direction and position frequently so it came out even.

If I hadn't been so short-sighted at the start of this, I would have remembered that the IM parts are actually a better choice because they make the entire brake rigging assembly (reservoir, triple valve, brake cylinder, and all the piping and control levers) as a single, neat, separate part and I could have use that too, instead of having to cobble together all the brake rigging myself.

I have contacted Intermountain about all these parts, but it's been a week and I'm not holding out a lot of hope.  Their website says they will accept parts requests on a "limited basis", but it also says they will  *not* be honoring parts requests because of the China factory closing.  So I'm not expecting much help from them any time soon.

Meanwhile, I do have some Prec Masters kits coming from eBay that I got on the cheap, so that will do me for the bolsters.

[Ike the BN Freak]

I got 2 packs of Gloor Craft bolsters, don't foresee a need for them myself.

Shoot me a message if you want them

[mmagliaro]

I got 2 packs of Gloor Craft bolsters, don't foresee a need for them myself.

Shoot me a message if you want them

Thank you, sir, and everybody.  But I don't need them.  I got my Precision Masters cars in the mail today and cut bolsters off them so I'm set.
Out of curiosity, where did these Gloor Craft bolsters come from?  Did Gloor Craft offer parts from their kits as spares at some point?  I know the brass N5c Quality Craft and N6b Gloor Craft (same company) had white metal cast bolsters in them.  Is that what you have?

[Ike the BN Freak]

The Gloor Craft bolsters I got come in packs of 4 bolsters per pack. Found them in the used section of the local shop.  The bolsters I have sound like the ones that came in the caboose kits

[Spades]

Gloor Craft released an all door boxcar and a 50' Railbox kit.  They did sell separate detail parts.