Large Scale Central

? about USA trains boxcars (unlettered?)

Did USA Trains ever offer a painted (Box Car Red) but unlettered wood side boxcar?

Using USA trains color name (Box Car Red) for this type of boxcar:

USA Trains R19079

I found one of these:

a few years ago on ebay and I lettered it for Rio Grande Southern:

I’d like to now do a similar project for a boxcar, but haven’t been able to find a painted/unlettered USA Trains boxcar.

Also no response yet from USA trains via email…usually they are pretty good responding.

Any ideas?

They used to have a “Classic” series which were narrow gauge wooden cars. As for unlettered cars, I’m sure they came out with a few of them, but that was years ago.

USA has the American Series of 1:24 Mostly the decorated Refers, there are the 2 auto flat cars and the work train, Aristocraft had the Classic series of 1:24 cars, most of Delton with the rest of Delton going to Hartland Loco Works.

John

I get the idea that undercoated stock doesn’t sell very well, since I see so little of it in any scale. I have not seen any undercoated USA reefers, I am not saying there weren’t any, I just haven’t seen them. I wonder if the one you got was a standard catalog item, or of there is some interesting backstory to it.

You did a real nice job with it.

Edit, I just checked USA website, and they have an undercoated reefer listed (R1600X Undecorated - Gray). (http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-smile.gif)in gray (http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-frown.gif)

If you can’t find an undecorated, I’ve found that Krylon and Rustoleum Red-oxide primers work well. Just use a little sand paper to lightly remove the graphics, dry it off, and spray on. A quick coat of clear will seal the primer and allow for decals.

USA Trains is the best.

Just received an unlettered (painted) boxcar straight from their factory fresh off the paint line:

I changed the truck side frames to bettendorf to better reflect the RGS prototype. When I bring this car to our layout in Colorado I’ll then add the couplers (Kadee), grab irons, brake wheel, and lettering.

Now that is a nice blank canvas to embellish any way you want. Did you have to special order the thing?

David Maynard said:

Now that is a nice blank canvas to embellish any way you want. Did you have to special order the thing?

Yes essentially a special order.

I happened to get lucky in that they were painting a grouping of these American Series boxcars soon after my inquiry. So I didn’t have to wait very long to get my car.

Well that worked out.

In the smaller scales some manufacturers sell data only cars. Where the car is unlettered except for the size and weight data. I wonder why the LS manufacturers don’t try that. Maybe LS is mostly an RTR market. I mean, after one changes out the wheels and couplers and…

That’s cool, Matt!

The American Series are the newer reefers that already have the platform for mounting Kadees easily without any surgery? What kinda Kadee’s are you gonna put on there?

Michael Kirrene said:

That’s cool, Matt!

The American Series are the newer reefers that already have the platform for mounting Kadees easily without any surgery? What kinda Kadee’s are you gonna put on there?

Thanks Michael.

I think you mean the “Ultimate Series”. The box car I got is the old style that Charles Ro first introduced in the late 1980s. So no easy coupler mounting pads (http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-frown.gif)

I started out with the standard truck mounted Kadee 831 and later Kadee 909 couplers. The RGS reefer pictured above shows truck mounted Kadee 909 couplers. It has since been converted to body mounted couplers.

Around 2 years ago I converted my rolling stock fleet to body mounted Kadee 906 couplers.

Body mounting on older style USA Trains boxcars, like the one I just received, requires building a coupler pad and much surgery to the underframe and car ends. I also add Ozark Miniatures coupler pockets on the end beams of the car. In addition, the Kadee 906 coupler “air hose” is cut off and then gets painted with Folk Art Asphaltum craft paint.

Here’s the best picture I have that shows a body mounted Kadee 906 on one of my USA Trains boxcars. That’s also a body mounted Kadee 906 on a modified Hartland flat car in the background:

Link to full picture