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with the car propped on one edge so that the wires are straight and paral- lel. Paint the guard rails with Polly S Oily Black or equivalent.


The next step is to fabricate the bridge


plate from .015″ styrene sheet. See the drawings for dimensions. The plate is re- inforced on the top with four 2′-0″×2′-0″ plates cut from .010″ styrene and mount- ed on the corners, and on the bottom with two pairs of .080″ channels on ei-


The InterMountain flat cars are good mod- els of a Greenville prototype. To complete the New Haven car (left and below), two high stakes are installed at the end with the fabricated bridge plate. In addition, 26 smaller stakes are glued into the stake pockets and wire forms the side rails.


These cars, originally built by the Greenville Steel Car Company in 1944, were modified in a similar manner to the earlier cars except that the guard rails were fabricated using two pipe railings attached to steel angle irons inserted into the stake pockets. An additional five cars from this series were converted in 1952. With piggyback traffic continuing to grow, the New Haven built 300 addi- tional 40-foot, 50-ton flats in two lots in the 17500-17799 series at its shops in Maybrook, New York and Readville specifically for this service in 1951-1952. Increased trailer length by this time resulted in loading only one trailer per car. Finally, the New Haven built 100 more cars at Readville in 1954. These 40-foot, 50-ton cars, numbered 17800- 17899 were nearly identical to the pre- vious two lots except that they used welded steel underframes and roller bearing trucks. The final chapter in the New Haven’s piggyback fleet consisted of 200 79′-6″ cars built to the revolution- ary Clejan design by Pullman-Standard in 1956. Their unique design eventually presented an interchange problem in the face of the 85-foot GATX car equipped with the ACF hitch utilized by Trailer Train, which vastly simplified securing the trailers and thus rapidly became the standard of the industry, and the leases of the Clejan cars were terminated by the New Haven in 1962.


RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN


Modeling the car The exquisitely detailed and unher-


alded (pardon the pun, the cars are available lettered for the New Haven as well as other roads) InterMountain flats exactly duplicate the 54′-6″ Greenville cars, and the model conver- sion follows what the prototype did. The first step is to cut two high end stakes five scale feet long from Ever- green Scale Models ³/₆₄″ angle. Then, cut off one side of the angle (the one that will be perpendicular to the edge of the deck) to a depth of nine scale inches. These two stakes are then ce- mented with cyanoacrylate into the end stake pockets opposite the B end of the car, with the open side facing the end of the car. Then 26 side stakes, measuring two scale feet each, are cut and mounted. (Note: all stakes should be oriented so that one flat side faces the inside of the car and the open side faces the end stakes on each side. In addition, early photos show a pair of high stakes in the third pocket on each side to keep the front of the trailer in position, but with additional experi- ence these were subsequently found to be unnecessary and they were re- moved.) Once the stakes are secure, ce- ment two pieces of .015″ spring wire (use cyanoacrylate) to the inside of the stakes along the entire length of the car on both sides. This is best done


ther side, with ¹/₁₆″ angle across the plate between them. The rivets are simulated using Archer rivet decal strips. Carefully cut and remove one board from the deck opposite the B end and substitute a .080″ channel cut to fit. Paint the channel and the bridge plate with Oily Black and mount the plate on the channel. Secure it to the end stakes with lengths of ¹/₁₆″ rigid springs or threaded metal or styrene rod material to simulate the springs on the prototype. Weather the entire deck and bridge


plate with thinned Floquil Grime and Rail Brown, adding streaks of thinned Grimy Black along the tire track area. Add details including a few stained wooden


jacking timbers and wheel


chocks, several SS Ltd. screw jacks and small piles of fine chain arranged along the center area between the tire tracks, and your car is ready for service. If you really want to go all out, as I


did, add a single trailer (or two short ones) secured with the assortment of chains, blocks and jacks in place. The chains extend from the front and rear undercarriage of the trailer to hooks mounted in the deck of the flat. This is best accomplished by cementing short lengths of the chains to the underside of the trailer first, then mounting the trailer on the car and finally cementing the loose ends of the chains to the hooks so they are taut.


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