IronBeltKen
Lazy Daydreamer
I found myself needing to obtain five 60ft double-plug-door boxcars to serve my 1:87 scale Ford auto assembly plant during the next planned op session. They didn't have to be super-detailed or of 'contest' quality - they just needed to be of the double-plug-door type, not with sliding doors. Because, as an in-the-know expert recently mentioned, Ford only accepted plug-door 60-footers to serve their facilities [a long, bizarre story - don't ask!].
RTR models were not an option for me because of (1) price, and (2) I wanted to repaint some of them - not easy to do when you have to worry about breaking off fragile factory-installed detail parts in the process. Furthermore, 90% of the RTR 60-footers I've seen on the market are sliding-door models; plug door models are few and far between. So, my most practical [and affordable] solution was to find 5 new-in-box Con-Cor kits of the Greenville 60ft DPD cars on eBay, which I was able to get from various sellers, for a grand total of less than $80 (including shipping).
Of this set, I wanted to have at least one C&O car and one New York Central car - I already had decals for each. The remaining three were factory-decorated for DT&I, PRR, and WP, and would not need repainting.
On the 'plus' side, the Con-Cor boxcars - when fully assembled - look reasonably good from a 3-foot viewing distance, and can be transformed into bulletproof performers by installing additional weight along with Kaydee couplers and metal wheels. The 'minus' side is that I needed to do quite a bit of drilling, reaming, and filing to get some pieces to fit properly. On top of that, 3 of the 5 kits had broken coupler pocket covers - this problem alone added an extra hour to the total assembly time for a single kit (more about that later).
I'll post the photos in individual 'replies' since I'm going to upload them directly to the forum, instead of linking to a 3rd-party website.
RTR models were not an option for me because of (1) price, and (2) I wanted to repaint some of them - not easy to do when you have to worry about breaking off fragile factory-installed detail parts in the process. Furthermore, 90% of the RTR 60-footers I've seen on the market are sliding-door models; plug door models are few and far between. So, my most practical [and affordable] solution was to find 5 new-in-box Con-Cor kits of the Greenville 60ft DPD cars on eBay, which I was able to get from various sellers, for a grand total of less than $80 (including shipping).
Of this set, I wanted to have at least one C&O car and one New York Central car - I already had decals for each. The remaining three were factory-decorated for DT&I, PRR, and WP, and would not need repainting.
On the 'plus' side, the Con-Cor boxcars - when fully assembled - look reasonably good from a 3-foot viewing distance, and can be transformed into bulletproof performers by installing additional weight along with Kaydee couplers and metal wheels. The 'minus' side is that I needed to do quite a bit of drilling, reaming, and filing to get some pieces to fit properly. On top of that, 3 of the 5 kits had broken coupler pocket covers - this problem alone added an extra hour to the total assembly time for a single kit (more about that later).
I'll post the photos in individual 'replies' since I'm going to upload them directly to the forum, instead of linking to a 3rd-party website.