Does anyone make these?

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Hmm, I want to do this project really badly, but I'm not quite sure how to replace the original hopper gates with the ballast gates.

I can put a load in the car to hide the fact that it doesn't have slope sheets so that I don't need to put them in.
 
Well the slope sheets would be the easiest part of the project, just squares of styrene glued in basically. Putting those in will be easier than replacing the hopper gates, and since we view the layout from above typically, it'd be a very obvious and eyecatching change to the car.

And judging from the photo, those slope sheets go right up to the top of the car sides, so you couldn't just load the car and pretend they're there either, because realistically the load should be two piles in the separate hopper bays.
 
Ah, that's all I needed. I was wondering how steep the sheets are and how high they went. I'll just take the slope of the two end bays and extend them with slope sheets.

I'm still not sure how to change out the gates though. Since the original gates are part of the bays, wouldn't I need to cut out the entire bay?

I haven't seen the ballast bays as a separate detail part so I'll have to find a junker car to cannibalize.
 
What you need to find is Eastern Car Works #9100 MK Ballast Door conversion. That has the proper doors for the car. They are tough to find and I have been getting any I can for the 60 car CR Ballast train I am working on.
 
Also the load can look like anything as it all depends how the cars were loaded. Here you see cars that were loaded by a front end loader.

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DSC04249.png
 
You'd have to rebuild the hopper bay below the frame of the car. Like I said, the slope sheets would be the easy part.

You could sacrifice a Walthers ballast hopper to get the ballast gates.

I think a detail part did used to exist from Eastern Car Works, however ECW seems to be toast.
 


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