While you are correct, that didn’t stop Accucraft from selling their flatcar with a hump. They had the trusses too tight and the car had a distinct upward curve.
The linked thread on MLS (below) has the story, but of course the pics are gone. Here’s one pic of my attempt to flatten it:
https://www.mylargescale.com/threads/my-not-so-flat-car.1179/
What does Accucraft selling flat cars with a hump have to do with
“More Lengthened (Aristocraft) Sierra Coaches” ?
It’s all about turnbuckles with only RH threads. Keep up!
To get back to the topic . . I took the observation over to Jerry’s after sorting out the roof and removing some more windows. It looks like a derelict but the length is good.
Painting is the next question, as there are lots of black details. I may do some masking and hope my Hunt Green paint is close to the current color.
I also need to decide on the interior lights. The incandescents didn’t mind which way the power goes, but LEDs so. I think the full-wave bridge can probably handle another LED or two, so I will try that next.
I took the roof off to work on the lights, and did a quick clean-up so it can be painted. One of the vents had to be moved back to the middle. The rim/ring came off with the hobby saw, and a quick drill set it up for the move. The old hole, and the gaps in the roof cut, were filled.
Well, its been a busy couple of months. After rescuing trains from Hurricane Ian, I had to fix my LMS coach as David Leech sold me some 9’ trucks. It’s made the same way, by cutting 2 Emily coaches in half.
Then I sold my Shay (not a Shay fan) and a trolley which was cluttering the floor, and the C&S #22 mogul, as I got offered another one in pieces. Finally I bought something I had been looking for: an AML B&O 1/29th 0-4-0; from an estate. It needed a few tweaks, but runs fine.
But I digress. The Sierras have been sitting on my shelf giving me the eye and making me feel guilty. So I took out the Observation and gave it a coat of Hunter Green.
I wanted to see if it would match, and cover the gold on the original. It looks quite good.
Next (maybe by Easter) is to mask the black and paint the letterboards, and the other side of the coach.
Stretching those cars really help with the look! Well done,
I am glad I am not the only one that sets ambitious time frames!
A spare 5 minutes yesterday and I got a coat of satin black on the nameboards.
Looks like a derelict coach in someone’s scrap line. The next trick is to fit clear perspex window glazing and rebuild the frames that broke out when I was handling it. I hope I didn’t lose any. Then to figure out longer truss rods.
Love the brake car. Have thought about doing the same thing with a spare set of Lionel Annie and Clarabelle cars.
You mean like this? It’s a pair of Emily bodies joined together, with duckets from Smallbrook and 9’ trucks from David Leech.
The Emily chassis are on the Annie/Clarabel coaches which look much better (imho) as 6-wheelers.
It’s now Summer and it has been a busy spring! (Hurricane Ian didn’t help.) I cleared a couple of shelves and attacked the coaches again, as I wanted to get to the windows soon.
More green spray finished the bottom sides and removed the gold paint, and some black satin on the letter boards got rid of the Santa Fe. The roof has flat black primer.
I also tried Brasso and other metal cleaner on the Obs railings, but the aren’t brass - some kind of pot metal with gold paint! So I got out my gold paint pen and spruced them up a bit.
Next is the jigsaw of re-fitting the window frame details.
With a little bit of spacing and some 
mods I bet the “Top Shelf” stuff will do a 4’ diameter in Hawaii?
Just saying?
You mean the shelf above the coach? That’s O-scale Lionel from the 1930s. Yes, it will do 4’ diameter. No, it’s not going to Hawaii. 
Still plodding along, in between other summer jobs (evening concerts at the Maritime Museum, boating, etc., etc.)
I had to replace most of the horizontals with new styrene as they are brittle. It is also noticeable how much larger and brighter the windows look without the faded plastic originals, which had both curtains and a gold subframe around inside the window frame. Here’s the new (left) with my combine (right) which is waiting for a lot more work.
At this point I was about to call it a day with this coach when I noticed the windows in the Observation end, so I tried to pop them out. More brittle coach side - and the outer sides are thin as the wires go up to the marker lights. (You can see the contact pads for them. I only have one to reinstall.)
So, fix those windows and screw it all back together!
P.S. I dug out the photos of my other 4 coaches that are sitting in Florida waiting to be chopped. As I hoped, one is an Observation and has the 2 markers that I need.
Here’s the other pair. If anyone wants them, just let me know as I am not doing any more!
The end of the line. I finished installing the roof, end markers, etc.
The truss rods had to be lengthened, so some 1/16th brass rod came in to play. The original turnbuckles with their M1.6 threads were nice, but I have no M1.6 die and couldn’t thread the rod, so they got drilled out 1/16th. The queen posts were the originals, shortened a bit as I wasn’t using them in the slots of the base [right side of this pic] so they were also drilled out 1/16th and bits of the old truss rods used as pins. A little superglue keeps them in place.
Here’s the beauty shots of the completed project.
I then put it on the display shelves for safety. There are lots of delicate bits - anyone who has run these for a while knows how easy it is to break off the end steps, etc.
I like the look, especially the openness of the windows. ‘Orbisonia’, the coach above, is a short Fn3 [1:20] coach based on the Carter Bros kits. This one might look good with Bachmann coaches as it is clearly a smaller scale? I’ll take a pic when I get to Jerry’s to try it on a layout.
I am dropping the combine project. The coach isn’t as good as it could be as the plastic is too brittle, and I am assuming the combine will be too. Maybe I’ll make a combine using the bodies in my FL stash.
Pete, this is gorgeous! It’d be the pride of any railroad! Sorry the combine project will be a no-go, though, at least for now.
Eric
I was just about to throw the old boxes away [anybody want one?]
when I realized they have styrofoam molded ends, so I tried the Obs box on the coach:
Certainly better than letting it sit without the box.
Well, maybe not. Just over a year, and I decided it really wouldn’t be that difficult to finish the combine.
Back in the spring, I had sanded down the sides and letterboard, thinking it would be ready for paint. This week I took it down and fetched the paint and sprayed the lower green to get rid of the gold filagree. When I looked at the result, the large area above the belt-line on the baggage end was a bit obvious, so I gave that a shot too.
Now to touch up the rest of the joint with green, and brush-paint the black with some satin black acrylic I found in Michaels.
In the past year, I had visited my still-unoccupiable-condo in FL and cleared out the other 4 junk coaches, collecting any good steps [they tend to snag when the cars are used and they rip off a corner where they are screwed on.] I also brought back some other bits, including a roof and underframe, plus a couple of trucks.
To make the Observation, I had used most of the 2 floors from the coaches, and only had one left, plus a few ends. As you can see, I now have enough to finish the floor.
I then looked at the roof, which has vents and stacks from the stove. On the originals they are symmetrical - the baggage end has the same vents as the passengers. With my extra roof pieces I could make some changes. I decided on only one vent, so I sanded off the outline of one of the back pair and filled it with putty.
Then I looked at the stack hole. Wouldn’t a combine have 2 stoves? I dragged out my “Slim Gauge Cars”, which has plans for several coaches, and found that the concept was unusual but there are prototypes. So this combine will have two stove pipes.
Now I have to cut the old roof to make a longer one for the combine. Stay tuned.
Are you possibly thinking some HEP cabling for HVAC along with high speed roller bearing trucks and of course ditch lights for the obs end of the car?
