The new old-time boxcars

[Johnson Bar Jeff]

I'm confused by the images I'm seeing for the new old-time boxcars (I haven't yet seen any "in person"). Do only some of these cars have truss rods, or do all of them? Even here on the Bachmann website, the images of the UP and B&A cars show truss rods, those of the CP, C&NW, and PRR cars do not. Anybody know? Bach-mann? Thanks!

[the Bach-man]

Dear Jeff,
I believe they will all have truss rods.
Have fun!
the Bach-man

[Johnson Bar Jeff]

Thank you, Bach-man!

Good to know!

JBJ

[electrical whiz kid]

A long long time ago, when I was a kid, I had happened upon some Strombecker wooden box car kits.  At the time (early fifties), I thought that these were the cat's pajamas!  Now, compared to the current fare, these things came right out of Fred Flintstone.  For some reason, these 'kits' sat gentle on my mind all these years; so I decided that, sometime this summer, I will be doing some wood boxcar kits-yep-the REAL McCoy!  Real wood!!  Wood roof, wood ends, wood floor, and wood sides;  Only, with the usual stuff from Mr. "Northeast Wood Products"; as well as some better things-like kadee trucks...etc.  I suppose that this will represent a "milestone" mark in my model-making history.  Or maybe not...

Rich C. 

[RAM]

Strombecker were not made to operate.   

[Len]

That's true 'out of the box'. But the instructions included with mine show a picture of an "operating" truck being attached with a small wood screw, with the notation:

"For an operating model, omit the wooden trucks and install metal trucks and couplers in position as shown. Many types are available at most hobby shops."

Interestingly, the coupler shown is the old Manua 'hook & loop' type. Mine have Kadee's.

Len

[electrical whiz kid]

Len;
you are right about those instructions.   Thinking back, they were a real hoot!! At one time, some wag told me that these wood and paper kits were the offerings during the war because of the shortage of metals.  As I said, I am constr-no; scratch-building some wooden cars.  I have done this periodically.  When I was in SEA, This guy-Papa-san is what we called him-actually had some of these old strombecker kits-and he actually tried to sell them-to me!  He told me how much he liked American prototype equipment.  I am not sure what made me do it, when I got stateside later in '68, I picked up some kits-Roundhouse, Athearn, and sent them to him, via one of my buddies still there.  I never heard back, but I assume he was happy.

When I was assigned to Wheeler AFB in Hawaii earlier, I had stumbled upon a set of rails-across the active runway, and the apron, three feet wide!  These were used at one time, by the Oahu Railway and Land co., a narrow-gauge railroad that actually worked the docks at Honolulu, Dole Co; and the windward side..  They ran north, up the island from Waipahu to Haliewa, by the North Shore.  Pineapples and sugar cane were the primary reason for it's existence.

Rich C.

 

[ebtnut]

I've seen a couple of the old Strombecker kits back in the day.  Haven't run across any in recent years at the train shows.  They also made wooden aircraft kits, which I did have one of.  Don't remember what the prototype was and I was frankly too young to know how to go about assembling it. 

[on30gn15]

Strombecker also had plastic models, in particular they released in late 1950s a 1/300 scale space station from Disney's Man in space series.

[Len]

The two Strombecker's I have were inherited from the uncle that got me into HO modeling. Considering what they were, he "superdetailed" them by adding underframes, rigging, etc.  All of his stuff had the Mantua 'hook & loop' couplers, but I've converted most to Kadee's. I kept one loco, four cars, and a caboose the way he built them as a memento.

Len