Working in more than one scale

Skimming through some back issues I just obtained, I was surprised to find in the May 1974 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman that William Johann had won the RMC/Dremel Kitbashing Award for a Watchung Valley HO EMD SD35! He was active in a HO club in southern California and built the model for use there. The article mentions that he prefers to model in OO and closes with this paragraph.

The concept of being able to enjoy modeling in more than one scale due to an association of modelers seems to be an excellent idea for the many hobbyists who, for one reason or another, have yet to settle on a single scale or gauge. In this instance, the motivation was sufficient to prompt a modeler to not only join in the fun but to construct a modern hood unit by kitbashing which was not otherwise commercially available.

The model itself was constructed using two GP35 bodies and the drive and some body parts from a SDP40. I know he made similar models in OO from Athearn parts that were based on an EMD SDL39. It was a lightweight diesel for branch line use, built on shorter than standard wheelbase six axle trucks that could be approximated in OO with HO trucks. As the photo caption notes on this photo I found on Flickr, it looks rather like a small SD40. I have often thought about trying my hand at that one, and someday I may.

Made in Japan: the brass Schorr OO gondola and triple hopper

Last year I posted an overview on Fred Schorr, last week I finished the decals on this Schorr triple hopper, and I have been meaning to post a photo of their gondola as well. Besides being a very active OO gauger, Fred E. Schorr, Jr. imported brass models from Japan in American OO. These seem to be hardly known outside of our OO gauge community. The list of these imported models includes:

Locomotives:
Ma and Pa 2-8-0
DL&W camelback 4-6-0
Alco RS-2 diesel

Passenger:
RDC-1 (coach)
RDC-2 (coach-baggage)
RDC-3 (coach-baggage-mail)

Freight:
Cement hopper (two bay)
Gondola
twin and triple hopper cars (ribbed side)
CV wood caboose

Also visible clearly in the photo with this post are Schorr trucks. Click on the photo for a better view. These were available in Bettendorf and arch bar designs. A close up of a Schorr arch bar truck may be found here.

Schorr advertised his products in Railroad Model Craftsman in the middle 1950s. One model that is sometimes associated with Schorr is a brass OO GP-7. This was actually a Kemtron product but Schorr sold it and mentioned it in his advertisements without noting that it was a Kemtron model and not his own product. See for example the ad in the October, 1954 issue of RMC, which is right next to a listing for another OO classic, the Johann 2-8-2.

Back to Schorr, these cars are great cars! I wish I had the complete set of all of the Schorr imports but as of now I only have examples of the RDC 1, the cement hopper, the triple hopper, and the gondola. This particular car is lettered with parts of a vintage Champ HO decal set for Rio Grande locomotives, and it came out well I think. My goal was to match this lettering scheme.

They are light cars but they look great and on the Schorr trucks they are incredibly free rolling and track well. I could weigh them heavier but instead I either run them at the end of a train or in dedicated trains of lighter cars. When I run these cars I also run with them a light caboose, usually the one converted from Mantua HO that is described in this post.

Interesting Lionel OO track sections

Dick Kuehnemund forwarded these interesting photos of three-rail Lionel track he purchased a while back. Included in a purchase were 2 odd-ball sections which I will let him describe.

1 - A piece of straight "terminal" track in which the actual terminal piece from a regular curved section has been adapted to fit very neatly into the #0062 straight section. Also: 1 outer rail has 2 small gaps, possibly to activate an accessory?? And:

2 - A 1/2 curve, formed by cutting & splicing a regular section back together. The rails on the 1/2 section are ONE piece.

On both, the workmanship is too neat to have been done at home over a 12 pack of Sam Adams!

These are the spring clip type pieces, 1938 style. I have an overview of Lionel OO track in this post. Also Dick notes that "Good old Lionel cleverly(?) required odd-lengths of the 1939 - 42 style of 3-rail track to make such layouts as a simple Figure "8": they offered 1/2 curves, 1/2 straights & 5/6 straights. Naturally, they're VERY rare!!!! In 20+ yrs. I think I've only gotten about 4 of each."

These are interesting pieces--well crafted by someone with some real skill to fit their needs. Dick also has a question:

Have you ever seen or heard of Lionel making 3-rail "adapter" or "transition" tracks: sections with the 1938- style of connectors w / the spring clip under the center rail on 1 end & the regular "later" version as sold from 1939 - 42 on the other end? A friend asked me about them & I drew a blank.

For me I have not heard of this but certainly a craftsman could have put such a piece together. Thank you again Dick for these interesting photos.

Scale-Craft express reefer trucks?

Exhibit “A” below is a photo of two express reefers. The car on right has a standard Scale-Craft passenger truck on it and the one on the left does not. It gives the visual impression of being maybe 85% the size of the regular passenger truck and has plain instead of roller bearings.

I have three pair of these mounted on cars. All of them have freight car size Scale-Craft wheelsets. Click on the photo for a better view.

I had a memory that Scale-Craft had cataloged a type of passenger truck that I have never seen. S-C made a plain bearing 4 wheel passenger truck that is depicted on P. 47 of the Round Lake catalog only—it was introduced very late in their production and I have never seen one in reality [anyone have one?]. BUT, the truck on the car on the left is not that truck--it would have rounded off ends--and S-C never cataloged an express reefer truck!

It looked at first to me like a factory item but looking closer clearly a modeler worked these up themselves by filing down the roller bearings into something close to plain bearings, filing off the brake hangers, and changing them over to the smaller wheelsets. They are actually pretty effective, makes you wish Scale-Craft had in fact produced a similar express reefer truck.

Scale-Craft tie strip

One of your options back in say 1940 if you wanted to build an OO gauge layout was to use tie strip.

John Blackburn forwarded this photo of two rolls of tie strip, along with two pieces of Scale-Craft sectional track. In the Scale-Craft 1940 catalog they list among track parts these sections, switch kits, and “Continuous Tie Section” which was available in 50 and 100 foot rolls. It was priced at 5 cents per foot, but also packaged as part of a track kit, which was the below:

K2218 15 Ft. 2-Rail Track Kit (Consisting of 30 Lineal Ft. Steel Rail, 15 Ft. Continuous Tie Section, Connectors and Spikes … 1.95

I don’t think I would ever want to actually use the tie strip at this point in time but it was one of the options out there and something to keep your eye peeled for.

Which is the real vintage box car?

Two of these three cars I just finished and one is vintage. Can you guess which one it is?

They are all lettered for the Great Northern. The car on top is Hawk and the two bottom cars have Picard bodies, and all have at least a few Scale-Craft parts.

It is not easy to guess is it? The double sheathed wood car is on Schorr arch-bar trucks, the other two on Scale-Craft trucks. Give up yet? Click on the photo for a better view.

In a sense they are all vintage cars as I was not the original builder; all were started at least long ago. But I did work on all of them. The decals probably have maybe given it away? The layout of the decals is a bit sketchy on the outside braced car….

It is what I would call the real vintage car, restored slightly. The outside braced car came to me via eBay and was at that time on a Scale-Craft frame. I had several Hawk frames in my parts supply and mounted one back on the car, which showed marks that it originally was built with this same type of frame. I added the old-style “straight pin” Kadee couplers to complete the restoration, which mate fine with modern Kadee couplers.

The Picard cars were partially built from an estate purchase. A photo of them before painting is here. The “after” came out quite well I think, the steel car coming out better than I expected, a neat paint job does wonders. I used another pair of the old style Kadee couplers on the steel car and Kadee No. 4 couplers on the wood car.

They all run great on the layout. The steel car I will run mainly with other vintage cars and the arch bar trucked car I will run with older time equipment. I have parts to do several more of the same type of steel car, this was just the one that was the closest to done—a project for another summer.

More random notes on setting up vintage (and new!) OO cars with trucks and couplers

I am near the end of this series of “truck” posts. I managed in the recent “truck blitz” to get around two dozen cars running well that either were bad ordered or not at all in service. In the process I learned a few things.

Some cars cannot be set up for certain brands of trucks
This is a function of truck swing, bolster height of truck, and truck wheelbase. Nason and Kemtron (!) trucks have very high bolsters, Schorr very low bolsters. Scale-Craft trucks if set up right are bullet proof and work on practically any car. They are a great design for the operator. With five cars that I had tried to set-up to run on other brands of trucks I ended up throwing in the towel, they are now back on S-C trucks like when I bought them, including the four Bessey reefers in this post. While they looked great on the Kemtron trucks in particular, they were built in such a way that really only S-C trucks would fit the cars correctly due to truck swing issues.

Some cars need an intentional “loose” truck
This has to do with the bolster/car possibly being slightly out of square but more likely the bolster screw hole being out of square. Usually this does not impact both trucks and some types of truck are more forgiving than others. In an extreme case the hole can be drilled out and filled with glue and the truck mounted with the screw glued in at vertical. Put the car on a track while the glue sets so that it is true vertical. If you grease the screw very lightly it can be removed easily.

Get coupler height just right
Coupler height is critical. My “height gauge” for years has been the rear coupler on this locomotive. It sits on the test track right above my workbench. It, along with the NMRA standards gauge, is an indispensible tool. I get everything to be essentially exactly the height of this coupler. This prevents many problems.

Washers—a must!
Hardly any cars need no washers to set up the height correctly. There is a type of washer that S-C shipped out with their trucks. After a while you begin to spot them; the hole in them is too small for a lot of screws, but not S-C truck screws. Use these as often as you can setting up cars with S-C trucks.

Treasure your S-C truck screws and bolsters
I don’t know of any source for the same type of screw. When possible I use other types of machine screw that fit the bolster hole but it is not always possible. I wonder what the average S-C Bakelite bolster will be like in another 50 years? A percentage has totally become unusable.

I am not a fan of S-C dummy couplers
Except of course for long passenger cars, where I love the extra swing they have. For freight cars, ugh, they just don’t generally couple easily with Kadee couplers (but will couple). Lionel dummy couplers are very similar but a bit more compatible with Kadee. Other than on passenger cars S-C dummy couplers are more or less banned from the layout, as are all brands of dummy coupler except Lionel.

I am a fan of Kadee HO couplers
Kadee couplers match S-C and Lionel OO couplers in size very well. The Kadee No. 5 works well in most situations where the car was set up originally for Lionel or S-C couplers, and often can use the same screw hole. I also have quite a supply of Kadee No. 4 couplers that I picked up cheaply over the years. I have made a deal with myself to build these up and use them on every car that can use them, which are mainly freight cars with wooden floors. They are more difficult to assemble for sure but one nice thing about these is the obvious extra slack action they add to the train, it is a nice effect on starting and stopping. But, again, they are not so easy to assemble.

With all that you have no excuses. Get some more vintage cars running!

Truck mounting on S-C flats

Below is a stack of Scale-Craft flat cars, which were shipped out with two different frames. On top is the late frame and on the bottom is the early frame, and it is easy to see that the trucks mount at different locations. The early frame I think was their concession to tight radius curves and the late is for the real situation that scale modelers demanded something that looked less toy-like. The short-wheelbase trucks may in fact be slightly too close to the ends. [See UPDATE].

But what is in the middle? The car in the middle has an early frame and what were called in the most recent issue of The OO Road “Morlok method” trucks. I describe them further in this post, converted from Mantua/Tyco/Model Power HO trucks with re-gauged Athearn 36” HO wheelsets. They are pretty ideal as an upgrade for an early style Scale-Craft flat due to the holes you would use to screw them on are offset slightly--a pair are on top of the flats to show this feature. As such, you can mount them so they look to be closer to the ends. Also, as they are fairly hidden the change of trucks is not very visible, and what you can see looks better than the original S-C trucks. Finally, they track and roll well. These trucks won’t work on every car but they will work well on this particular model, which in terms of my operations has allowed me to free up a few S-C trucks for other cars.

UPDATE: After writing the post I had to check. The truck centers should be roughly 5' 6" in from the ends of these cars. The late S-C car truck centers are less than 5' in and the early more than 6'. Morlok method trucks will improve either type of flat, you just position the hole chosen so that the truck is ofset in the correct direction.

Meetings of OO gaugers

In the June, 2009 issue of The OO Road editor Paul Magnussen notes on reflecting on the passing of Ed Morlok that

It is times like this that make me wish there was some way we could all get together in one place occasionally, since we are spread out all over the U.S. and Canada…. How would you all feel about traveling to an OO gauge convention? If there is sufficient interest from all of the members, perhaps we can organize one.

It is rare for OO gaugers to meet today face to face. I know there is a meeting of OO gaugers at the York meet most years. I don't believe that any OO gaugers came to the Scottsdale TCA convention this year.

The most notable group of OO gaugers to meet regularly for years and years was known as the North Jersey Midland Model Railroad Association. The group was profiled in the February, 1947 issue of The Model Craftsman as follows.

IT ALL started back in 1938, when Newton Guerin and Ray Scheuble walked into a hobby shop and met Paul Hahn and Erwin Schaff. Seeing this in light of the early dawn of the “OO” gauge era, it was truly remarkable to find four fellas at once in “OO” and each one having a home layout in working condition!

After the first shock of surprise of finding out that each wasn’t the only “OO” fan in the country, the next step was naturally to invite each other to visit the respective layouts. A schedule was arranged for each to hold a meeting in turn, once a month. Thus was born the North Jersey Midland “OO” Association.

The following year, with a little more publicity, five more “OO” men were located and all with operating home layouts. 1939 proved to be a great year, with nine layouts consolidated into the association. With each member in turn playing host, it took two months for the boys to make their rounds. But then came the dark days of the war and with it uncertainty. Too much overtime war work, no equipment available, off to serve the country, housing shortage, etc., and so it went until came peace and a new era.

Out of the wreckage of war, the North Jersey Midland survived, but not with nine operating layouts. Only one remained—just one—the “Newton & Northern RR of Newton Guerin…. This layout is now used exclusively and maintained by the club….

Members today own 39 operating locomotives with 14 more under construction. Freight cars exceed 300 units and passenger equipment add 90 more. The Newton & Northern is probably one of the smallest club-operated railroads in the country, occupying a room 9’ x 19’, yet it keeps 12 men operating it, all busy at one time, and by changing crews it accommodates 25 men in full operating schedule. Curves are sharp—24” minimum. Grades are steep, 2.75% maximum, and operating is done exclusively with Newton & Northern motive power, the largest being a consolidation.

The article goes on at length to describe operation on the layout, with 11 photos and a track plan. In the photos you can see President George Crowley, Treasurer Newt Guerin, and Bill Johann, and other members are mentioned in the text.

Soon more layouts were operating again, and in the June, 1955 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman we find a feature article on the Greenbrook lines of David Sacks. I have blogged about this article previously but in relation to the group we learn that

The Greenbrook Lines is the second oldest member of the New Jersey Midland Model Railroad Association, a group of 14 OO gaugers located in the Central North Jersey area. Many of these members have OO layouts of their own and meetings are held on a round robin basis.

In addition to the cover photo, eight photos of the layout are seen here as well, including one that includes David Sacks and another model by Bill Johann. The cover caption reads “Engine house holster Neil Van Duyk, youngest member of the North Jersey Midland Club, keeps plenty busy during club night on the large Greenbrook Lines of David Sacks.” Notable in this photo is a Kemtron GP-7.

While Bill Johann and Dave Sacks both moved west to California, the North Jersey group was still active well into the 1980s. In the “Railway Post Office” column in the May, 1985 issue of Model Railroader we find a letter about a gathering of “true OOldtimers from North Jersey’s group.” In the photo we have Newton “Newt” Guerrin, Erwin Schaaf, George Lehmkuhl, Robert “Bob” Meissner, Alfred “Bud” Spice Jr., Anthony “Tony” Cavanna, George E. Jones Jr., Rowland King, Edward Morlok, and George Crowley. Ed Morlok is described as “a mere youngster in his 40s” and the rest were well up in years.

Ed Morlok passed on recently now and I believe most of the rest of those that were active in the North Jersey group have as well. It is a very different era today for OO, no more round robin groups of “fellas” socializing, running OO gauge trains, and tolerating minor infractions of rule G. [I personally almost never drink, but "rule G" was mentioned specifically in the 1947 article]. Maybe we are destined only to gather on the Internet, but I certainly would be in favor of meeting a few more OO gaugers.

Four vintage heavyweight Pullmans

In the previous post I spoke of putting modified S-C six wheel trucks on four cars. These are the cars and trucks. The rebuilt trucks roll great! They had been modified to the extent that the end beams have all been filed off and rounded. Painted black you have to look for it to notice. As to the cars these trucks are now on they are all Pullmans by different makers painted up generally the same (with green roofs) so they are interesting to compare. Click on any photo for a larger view.

In this first photo the car in the front is a nicely built up J-C models car. It has picked up sheet metal steps and actually I had put this car in running order a while back, which included adding Kadee couplers. More on that in a minute. The other car is a bit more interesting. I believe it to be Famoco. It has die cast ends and other parts that would fit with it being Famoco but also has a Nason frame. It could just be a J-C kit souped up with other parts. J-C and Famoco sides and wood parts are identical.

In the second photo the car in front is a Nason EZ Built car. The brass sides show through here and there and this car was lacking steps. Recently I was able to purchase a Nason kit and in the parts supply I found these steps that matched the ones in that kit. The rear car is Scale-Craft. They went for a bit more modern Pullman design with the wide windows. Both of these cars are lettered for the Burlington.

One tip on setting up the trucks with North Yard wheels, I put a washer between the wheel and the side frame on each wheel on one side of each truck. Why? To help prevent shorting by holding the wheelset just a bit away from one sideframe. I picked this idea up after taking apart quite a few trucks, it can help.

One new thing for me with these two posts has been working with dummy couplers. For the 80’ cars the Scale-Craft couplers are the way to go! They need all that swing to get around my 26” radius curves reliably. I had worked on the J-C car some a few years ago and put Kadee #5 couplers on it at that point. If I had a wider radius I would keep it as it is but I am pondering converting it back to dummy couplers for better operation—or at least a switch to the long shank version of the Kadee.