Does anyone know the origin of these? (Photo Heavy Warning)

[plasticbasher]

Hi All,

 

First post on here for some considerable time, not having much of note to say given I've done very little modelling... :-(

 

I have a slightly left-field question and wasn't even sure which forum area to put this in - however this does seem the best place.  Recently on eBay (for a mere £2 plus postage), I won a job lot of three US outline wagons and a (I believe unrelated) station platform and canopy with battery powered signals.  The platform/signals unit is basically a toy and unlikely to be of much use.

 

However the wagons were the reason I dropped in a cheeky £2 bid on this lot.  They came with the most grotesque and overscale bogies (the crude plastic wheels' gauge looks to be about 12-13mm...), but the body mouldings looked HO in the photo's and I figured had to be worth a gamble.

 

When they arrived, frankly I was delighted with what my two quid had purchased and immediately set about fitting some spare HO bogies to the drovers Caboose and the bogie wagon.

The tanker has only really been stripped of the old bogies and will require a bit more work.  

All three wagons scale out as 60' in HO and frankly the quality of the body mouldings is very acceptable (moulded handrails etc, but everything is very nicely done).

 

I've also placed one bogie under one end of the tanker to give an idea of how the wagons would have all looked once....you can really see the difference between the scale bogies and the monsters originally fitted here:

 

Bit more to come in the next post...!

 

 

[plasticbasher]

And here are some close ups of the original bogies and the couplings.

 

 

Some of the couplings were moulded to the bodies (tanker) and some were screwed to the bodies (caboose and open wagon).  There were some moulded "blobs" on all the drawbars (including buffers on the tanker)...mostly removed now.

 

A final shot of the old bogie perched under the tanker:

 

 

Does anyone know the source of these wagons?  I'd love to get a couple more at similar silly money to build out the kids US trains..!

 

Thanks,

 

plasticbasher

[plasticbasher]

Sorry - one more thought.

 

Rather like the way the Great British Locomotives part-work collection was essentially a load of copied Hornby, Bachman etc loco body mouldings, I would not be surprised to find out this might be from one of those cheap battery powered Chinese train sets (plastic track etc) that litter discount stores in the run-up to Christmas.  And the maker has created some "child proof/economy" running gear to go with their rip-off copies of say Bachman or Life Like wagon bodies...?

 

Thanks,

 

plasticbasher

[plasticbasher]

Final comments before I turn it over to any more knowing responses.

 

Any white bits in any photos above are plastic-strip added by me when fitting the scale bogies (I only really needed to slice off the huge pillars the original bogies were screwed too and fit new bogies at a more realistic spacing).  The original bogie spacings were way off and it looks like the caboose and open wagon's bodies have their bottom edges "distorted to suit".  The tankers chassis likewise, hence needing more thought.

 

Also, there are no manufacturers marks, logos, names, serial numbers or any other kinds of clues to the origins of these, anywhere whatsoever!!

 

As these are really for the kids to play with, that fairly discrete chassis "remodelling" is no problem, given how otherwise convincing these wagons are now they are on half decent bogies.  I have some Kadee coupling boxes and Bachmann knuckle couplers to fit, a lick of black paint on the undersides and that'll be three very cheap US outline wagons!!

 

I did some digging through Google images and can locate prototype pictures of the same style of tanker and (I think) the open wagon.  The drovers caboose I've had less luck with - I can find broadly similar ones, but not identical.  The result of those searches is why I think these toys are ripped off from more prototypical models.

[Adrian Wintle]

No idea on the manufacturer, but the original bogies appear to be approximately scale locomotive bogies.

 

Adrian

[HSB]

That bogie is actually a representation of the Blomberg design used under EMD Bo-Bo diesels not a freight truck!

[Glorious NSE]

I'd concur with cheap Chinese train set.

The original bogie is an EMD "Blomberg" truck, the prototypes would be found under loco's!

The tank car is not very American in outline, i'd suggest it looks to have been copied from a European chemical tank of some kind?

The caboose looks over-stretched, 'wide vision' cabooses generally scaled out at under 40' long. 

The gon is interesting - again, doesn't ring any bells with regard to prototype (60' + tall + coal is an unlikely combination - any 2 of the 3 would work though!) fittings suggest it is American in style.

Curious, and for £2 worth a punt though.

 

[plasticbasher]

Thanks guys - interesting replies.  I'll dig out links to the images I found later this week just for interest!

 

Cheers,

 

plasticbasher

[shortliner]

Re the Drovers caboose - It looks to me as though it would benefit by removing the section including the two windows immediately in front of the raised lookout - which would restore it to more normal caboose proportions, and not damage the herald. Use the outer edges of the two windows as the cutting line.

[Gilbert]

Gon could pass for a wood chip hopper - BN/GN - that part of the world

Chris

[dave1905]

They all look like some sort of kitbash of other models into something else (note the "gon" has two sets of brake gear, it was obviously a kitbash by the manufacturer or a modeler).   All of them are fabrications and don't bear any resemblance to any real US cars, certainly not UP cars.  The original trucks were Blomberg designs used under EMD 4 axle diesel engines and NOT used under railcars.  The VGN or N&W had some "battleship" coal gons that were shorter than the gon pictured, but used 6 wheel trucks.  There is nothing N American that really looks like the tank car.  The caboose would require about 2/3 of the area of the on the long side of the cupola to be removed to end up with a bad model of a real caboose.

 

You would be way ahead by just setting them on a shelf as curiosities, rather than spend hours modifying them to something almost, sorta, kinda, maybe, but not quite, looks like something N American.

[Joseph_Pestell]

The diesel bogies look to have come from an S gauge model.