Alco PA Trucks

[R.K. Maroon]

A set of Alco PA trucks arrived recently in kit form:

Mystery PA Trucks.jpg (1.26 MiB) Viewed 4489 times

Note the anti-sway bars, the many pieces it takes to build-up the frame of the sideframe (specifically the two rows of parts in the middle of the photo, just below the equalization arms), and the loose journals. I point these out because these were thought to be CLW, but the CLW PA trucks don't have these particular features (at least the ones I have). Here is a CLW kit for comparison:

CLW PA Trucks.JPG (2.03 MiB) Viewed 4489 times

My guess is that the first set is Precision Scale, but I have never actually seen a set of those before. Anybody recognize these as such?

Jim

[up148]

Wow! Those mystery trucks are really, really nice Jim! Look more modern (finer and more delicate) than the CLW trucks and should be considering when the CLW's were brought out.

BH

[Jay Criswell]

Interesting but I don't see a bolster. Am I missing something?

Jay

[R.K. Maroon]

Jay, you are correct: the kit has no bolsters. The previous owner started to adapt these to a particular drive setup many years ago, so I guess the bolsters wandered off at some point as the years went by.

I nosed around the PSC Diesel Parts Catalog, which can be viewed on-line at the their website or downloaded:

https://www.precisionscaleco.com/train-parts-catalogs/

Here is the listing for the PA truck, which is priced around $95:

PSC Catalog -- PA Trucks.JPG (26.8 KiB) Viewed 4416 times

All the parts can be found in the catalog as well, but just not all together. The frame parts are listed below the truck itself, but the brake gear is under "Brakes", the journal under "Journals", and the bolster under "Bolsters" (go figure):

PSC Catalog -- PA Truck Bolsters.JPG (32.3 KiB) Viewed 4416 times

At any rate, the parts all seem to match (missing bolsters notwithstanding), so it does appear that these are PSC.

I wonder what prompted PSC to offer these? They don't otherwise have a broad line of diesel trucks. Hmm... the real question is what would prompt them to offer trucks for the DD40x. I am unaware of a big demand for these. Perhaps a leftover from an OMI order?

Jim

[Jay Criswell]

Jim,

Would you like me to look in my diesel truck box and see if I have the PSC bolsters?

Jay

[aterry11]

Mr. Jay, I sent you a pm over a week ago about the NP passenger cars. Hope to hear from you.
I guess I must now support thread drift

[R.K. Maroon]

Jay, that would be great -- Thank you for the offer. As it is, three sets of these actually arrived. Two sets in kit form and one set built:

Assembled PSC PA Trucks.jpg (234.12 KiB) Viewed 4393 times

I need to take better photos of these. They look like they have a House of Duddy drive setup: Vertical 9000-series Pittman motor with a worm on the motor shaft, white Delrin or Nylon worm gear on the center axle, and Delrin chain to the outer axles. I need to check these out but have other things already on the work bench. All in all there is no hurry on finding bolsters, but, yes, if you are digging in the pile and find some for these, please set them aside.

Many thanks
Jim

[big bad jim]

Not 100% sure about this, but I have the impression that the PSC PA bolsters are the same as those used on the CLW HTC trucks. The CLW bolsters I have sure look like the ones in the catalog. It wouldn't surprise me as other parts in the sd45-2 kit appear to be the same as those offered by PSC, like the dynamic brake housing castings.

If you decide they are the same, and Jay doesn't have extras, I can send you an extra pair of bolsters as I would plan on making new ones that more closely reflect the prototype. Let me know.

Jim

[Erik C Lindgren]

Nice discussion guys

[Jay Criswell]

Jim & Jim,

So far I can only find one. I probably have more but not sure where. Might be a good idea to take Jim up on his offer.

I'm curious, how do the bolsters mount to the side frames?

Terry,

Yeah, I got your email.

Jay

[R.K. Maroon]

Looks like Erik, Jay, and I are all posting at the same time. I believe these are the CLW HTC trucks that Big Bad Jim is referring to:

CLW SD Trucks 01.jpg (1.25 MiB) Viewed 4333 times

CLW SD Trucks 02.jpg (2.09 MiB) Viewed 4333 times

PSC PA Truck Bolster.JPG (37.01 KiB) Viewed 4332 times

Those look like a pretty good match to me. The method of attachment can be seen, at least for these. I will look at the PA trucks a little closer but I think it's the same (going mostly from memory).

Jim

[sarge]

Jim,

I'm not sure why they did PA trucks, unless perhaps they are actually Erie-Built trucks (check the wheelbase). Levon Kemalyan was working on revisiting the Max Erie-built when he passed (which he was getting requests to do), he might have actually done the truck castings, and they got passed down with the rest of the Kemtron/USH stuff eventually to PSC. Admittedly a guess if not a reach.

PSC also might have done them independently, since (for some reason) the CLW ones were very highly sought after in the early 90s. A bit less of a guess.

The DD40 castings probably come from the KTM PSC Crown DDA40x.

[bob turner]

Too bad these old threads are so difficult to search for. I was thinking we had a dedicated sand-cast PA thread, but I got all the way to page 7 and this is as close as I could come.

Here is a genuine set of CLW sand-cast PA trucks - seller might be a bit optimistic, and too bad the sideframes got bolted from the outside, but these things exist.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/CLW-2-RAIL-6-W ... SwKIBf1SiP

Probably not all that rare, since they arrive with about 1/3 of all PAs I have purchased. One can get better performance with later plastic CLW gearboxes, but these would have appeal if we could buy good gear sets for them.

I would be willing to start a new "doorstop" PA thread if there is any interest. Presumably the Shuttleworth folks will retain my images longer than did Photobucket.

[De Bruin]

Yea Bob we did have a sand-cast PA thread, maybe more than one due to topic drifts too. I think you have to go further back than seven though, unless they got obliterated in the last great "culling."