New Bluford Shops "Dented" Gondolas

[OldEastRR]

Wow ... as of 3/30, Hogtrainz is nearly sold out of these things. Will this mean another run, different roads. soon?

[bman]

I'm curious to see what the underside of these look like when someone has theirs.

I'm no photographer but happened to be next to mine workin' on the layout framework. Hope this shows what you are looking for.

[thomasjmdavis]

Wow ... as of 3/30, Hogtrainz is nearly sold out of these things. Will this mean another run, different roads. soon?

They announced another run a couple months ago.  9 more roadnames.  I have Erie (Erie RR, not EL) cars on order.
https://www.bluford-shops.com/

[nkalanaga]

One thing to note - I found it today.  I tried to install MTL 1015 couplers on one, as the stock couplers don't seem to like to couple to each other.  Oddly, they couple to MTL couplers fine.  Weird...

Anyway, take the truck off, which took some very careful prying.  The pin is tight.  Remove the coupler screw.  Pry the cover plate off - right.  It didn't move.  Look very closely.  It's not a cover plate.  The cover plate is between the box/bolster casting.  Remove the screw BEHIND the truck, and remove the entire casting.  The pivot post is on the flat cover plate, not in the box.  Harder to hold the coupler in place when reassembling, but I got it together.  Screw everything back on.  Test the couple.  Worked, but didn't like to swing freely.  Seems the 1015 was just a little thicker. Took it all apart and put the original coupler back in.

I bent the non-knuckle side of the coupler open a little bit with tweezers, and they couple better now.  But I'm not impressed with the coupler mounting design.  No real need to disassemble the entire bolster and draft gear just to change a coupler!

[Sokramiketes]

They look great and ride low, whatever coupler box design was needed is OK in my book.  It's great to see gondolas of appropriate length in N too!
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[chessie system fan]

It looks like the decking and underside is one metal piece.  That's what I needed to know. Thanks.   

[Sokramiketes]

It looks like the decking and underside is one metal piece.  That's what I needed to know. Thanks.   

Yep, solid metal for weight.  Then a plastic four-piece body assembled around it. 

Which is FANTASTIC for conversions. 

[thomasjmdavis]

Mine arrived today.  To address a couple concerns in recent posts- mine roll fine, not quite so well as the Bluford 55 ton hoppers I have, but certainly within my personal tolerances.  And mine couple almost as well as any two MTL cars I have, so I think I will leave well enough alone.

Very much on the plus side is the interior detailing- nobody I know of has previously mass produced dented gondolas, much less dented on the inside.  And they also have interior rivet detail, ala ESMC and Prairie Shadows.  Also of note is that the gons come equipped with the correct brake for a given prototype- the NKP with a side wheel, the NYC with a lever.

My one question, having only, so far, had 2 cars delivered- one 'light' and one 'medium'- are all the cars of, for instance, 'lightly dented' identical in terms of the dent pattern, or are they somewhat different one to another?

[peteski]

I don't have any of these but looking at the photos in the ads, the dents don't look very realistic to  me. It is like bunch of artificially created rounded bumps. And the pattern is also too even looking. It looks like someone took the dies and using a Dremel with a spherical grinding bit created those "dents".  Real dents look more random and not all round in shape. I'm not all that impressed.

[bigdawgks]

Agreed. The dents look too repetitive, and the way the side panels are blown out with all the ribs and edges still being totally straight seems improbable. Looking at actual photos of dinged up gondolas they don't really look so uniformly deformed. But I get why they did it - it probably would be a lot more expensive to make a realistically jagged model with injection molding (not being able to reuse tooling with the "pristine" variant). This is where I think you could actually get better results with 3D printed bodies. Plus you have the advantage of being able to make each instance uniquely different.

[robertjohndavis]

We knew what we were getting from the initial pictures before orders opened. The dents are the hard part. With that done, we can handle beating up the ribs and rails. These cars are going to rock after a bit of work. Mine arrive this week. Can’t wait to dive in. - Rob

[OldEastRR]

Dents need touch-up? Ribs should be bent? Get out the ol' soldering iron!! (probably need to beat-up the paint job, too). I guess they designed these cars for guys who are hesitant to pay over $100 for a completely accurate fine-detailed car. What? No gouges in the wood floor? Sacrilege!!!

[nkalanaga]

And how many people are going to be examining the individual dents in a car, in a train, on a layout?

I went back and looked at ex-GN/CB&Q cars, in BN paint, and most of those had straight ribs, regardless of the number of dents.  Of those that had damaged ribs, most were photographed in the late 1980s or later, so nearing the end of their revenue lives.

[peteski]

And how many people are going to be examining the individual dents in a car, in a train, on a layout?

Well to me all  those rounded "pimples" don't look very realistic.  That's all. YMMV.

[Sokramiketes]

I don't have any of these but looking at the photos in the ads, the dents don't look very realistic to  me. It is like bunch of artificially created rounded bumps. And the pattern is also too even looking. It looks like someone took the dies and using a Dremel with a spherical grinding bit created those "dents".  Real dents look more random and not all round in shape. I'm not all that impressed.

Well, the dents are part of the solid model before tooling.  And I say that because the inside surface matches the outside surface treatment.  It would also be hard to had carve the balooned surface before adding the spherical denting. 

I'd look at some more prototype photos before poo-poohing the effect.  Big heavy things hitting steel plates do tend to make rounder dimpling.  The ribs are the structural elements and damaged least.  Same reason why everything below the sill level is still straight too... it isn't in the carrying zone.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/chuckzeiler/19092042062

How we've seen them modeled in the past isn't consistent with the prototype.  And I'm glad to have set aside the soldering iron approach which lead to the least prototypical effect in practice!