30-Foot Flat Car

The 30-foot Flat Car was my first effort at scratch building rolling stock. I couldn't find any kits that were what I wanted, so I started from the beginning.

I found a scale drawing of a narrow gauge flat car in 'Argentine Central' by Abbott. There wasn't a lot of detail, but I could get the general dimensions and pro- cede from there.

I drew the plans on a CAD program to full scale, then scaled the drawing to 1:87 for HO scale. This allowed me to have 'true' dimensions when I made the assembly jigs.

My machinist friends allowed me to mill the jigs on their CNC. This greatly eases assembly by keeping the frame square.

The basic frame for this car is used on all the other 30- foot cars, as well.

The overall dimensions are 30ft x 8ft. The frame has six beams of 4 x 6 section with 6 x 8 end caps. The deck is made of 2 x 6 planks. Truck bolsters are 8 x 16 and queen- post timbers are 6 x 6.

After the frame and deck were fabricated, I painted the assembly with acrylic earth tones to look like weathered wood. I found an additive for the acrylic that allows the paints to be used as stain; this helps blockquotevent warpage of the wood when using water-based paints.

Detail parts are available from a number of sources. The trucks and couplers are Kadee, though cheaper units can be had. I like the Kadee parts because of their weight; the cars are very light otherwise and there is some difficul- ty keeping them on the track if the roadbed is uneven.

The other details are plastic and available from Tichy or Grandtline. I had a great deal of difficulty determining what the various brake systems were and what was appro- priate. I finally found some articles on line that explained the differences. I also discovered Brunk's 'Up Clear Creek on the Narrow Gauge' which has a wealth of detailed draw- ings that show the variations on the rolling stock of the Colorado Central RR. This provided me with a good idea of how many grabirons, &c. I should have on the cars and the arrangement of the brake parts.