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I got a 5 car set of Con-cor Amtrak Superliners in Phase IV colors. I know these aren't as nice as the Walthers, no wonder comparing the price. They are nice enough and I would like to add some weight and maybe some interiors. Are there any cheap interiors for these cars? Also I am thinking about using some car window tint to darken the windows or some technique to keep from seeing into the empty car. Is there any trick to taking the roofs off?
Here is a coach and a sightseer lounge car that were used the other 3 are new.
Jerry, I have 16 of those cars. Originally, mine were lighted inside, but, no interiors. I took out the lighting that was screwed to the underside of the roof. They had so much drag w/the light pickups on the axles is why I removed the lites.
The roof comes off pretty easy. I pried the roof off w/a small screwdriver on the ends. When the roof comes off the side glass is part of the roof. So, if you want to paint a tint on the glass, do it from the inside. Be sure to mask the shell before paint.
I added a lot of weights to mine & be sure to check the wheel spacing w/an NMRA scale. Mine were way, way out of scale. I never found any cheap interiors or diaphrams for the ends either. I did buy close couplers for the cars, but they wouldn't go around my curves, so I had to go beck to the #5 Kadee's.
I'm not a big Amtrak guy, but I thought these were pretty nice for the price I paid for them. Maybe get an Athearn P40 to pull them.
I think once the windows are tinted, some added weight and metal wheels they will be good runners.
I found these interiors but they are a little too much money for me. Does anybody make some cheap generic interiors that I could cut down or modify to fit? Looking for cheap here, I'm not a rivet counter, to me everything in model railroading is an approximation of real life anyway.
In the Walthers catalog there's a company that makes interiors for these cars. I buy all my stuff on line from Toy Train Heaven & Standard Hobby Supply. You can check their prices for interiors. There are many on-line hobby stores & the rest of the guys on the forum can tell you other places to get good deals.
The one major thing that needs to be done to the Concor superliners is to replace the trucks - the ones provided are completely incorrect. Train Station Products makes correct trucks you can replace the stock ones with.