Cheap-O Auto Parts Train (in breakable styrene & basswood)

[Rufus T. Firefly]

PRR L5 ?

[rogruth]

PRR L5 ?

Yes.

[Jay Criswell]

The whole Jakl family is artistic and talented. Their layout truly is a Family Affair.

Some of the nicest people you could ever meet. Proud to call them friends.

By the way, who made the decals?

Jay

[E7]

Thanks for the ID on the L5 guys. Not a big success, which is probably why I hadn't seen one!

[R.K. Maroon]

Jay, the decals are Walthers. I am a novice as far as decals go, but I understand that early Walthers decals are not as desirable as Champs or Micro-Scale, but the later ones (which are distinguished by a plastic film envelope instead of paper) seem to be better. I don't recall how I came to own two sets of decals for these 86' high-cubes, but I was glad to have them when the Jakl's were looking. Ed says his dad is going to send back the extra set, which I provided in case he needed the spare. They will be available waiting for the next chance to use them.

Jim

[Jay Criswell]

Thanks for the feedback. I was going to see if I had some too. Maybe if I do, I'll send them to you for disposition.

Jay

[De Bruin]

It's been awhile, but as I recall the L5 on page one belongs to Gordon Ralphs of the Southern O Scalers, think he snagged it off E-Bay for a fairly reasonable price. It's a very interesting model; like the prototype heavy and powerful, I seem to remember it made a rather distinctive noise while operating with an impressive amount of tractive effort, though oddly (again it's been awhile) it ran off of AC current despite being a two rail. The car body appeared to be scratchbuilt from sheet metal, despite lacking some finer details, again I thought overall it was a good model and a smooth runner to boot though I can't recall the specifics of its drive. Gordon is a hardcore PRR fan and definitely has a knack for finding interesting and unusual models like this.

[E7]

Pete, In the Wikipedia article, it claimed it was not deemed as successful as it's predecessor the dual engine DD1 and lacked power because of it's side rods (a fact which didn't seem to hinder MANY a steam engine).

I still like the looks of the thing !

Rich

[De Bruin]

Over the past month I've turned to some e-bay and show purchases that required some TLC to become operable on Trackworld, specifcally here Lykens Valley models suffering from missing parts, couplers, trucks, finish issues etc.

First up a "Waffle" sided box car listed as the desirable Walthers version which I purchased off da bay for dirt cheap, my elation with the price gave way to disappointment when I discovered upon close inspection the car was the predominately wood Lykens Valley version, was not sealed well before decaled etc. I would have completely removed the finish and re-decaled it, but that prospect had the fresh smell of a project from hell soooo...The prototypes were built in IC's Centralia shops in '69 and equipped with four sets of belt rails, hence their distinctive car sides.


Here's a Lykens Valley kit rendered as one of the early sixties PRR X60B Greenville cars, one of three purchased at last years Chicago show, they came as car bodies only w/o trucks and had long bolster mounted couplers to get them around curves, which were discarded in favor of dummies. This one also suffered from inadequate sealing prior to painting and decaling but cleaned up nice enough imo. Importantly all three car bodies were correctly weighted when assembled, which can be an Achilles heel for these kits.


The Lykens Vallet 85' Hy Cube kit was listed in the 1974 Walthers catalog as optionally being able to be built in the four or eight door version, and listed for $10.95 each. The monster above represents the IC's 1964 Thrall Car, originally delivered in the brown "Mainline of America' scheme, but here rendered in the Orange "Split-Rail" scheme. which I've only slowly gotten used to, to the point where I almost like it.


I almost passed on this one as I'm not a fan of this NW scheme but it turned out to be by far the best built and finished of the three. I was able to locate and compare it to a prototype photo on George Elwood's site and the decaling is dead-on accurate. In retrospect I regret not buying more of these as the original builder had done one of every road in the series offered by Lykens Valley, including the AT&SF, Milwaukee, SP, NYC, UP etc.


Finally, I bought this PC-ized X60g at 2016 Chicago meet from a different seller, delighted at the time to locate both the car type, the scheme, built and finished quite well, that had not been excessively over or under weighted, again a common affliction with these kits. Oddly, the builder/owner had it riding on Gloorcraft PS passenger trucks, which I replaced with the KTM roller bearing trucks, likewise installed on the previous three. These trucks got a bad rap for rolling resistance but operate well if you keep them lubed and (opinion) look REALLY cool.

[J. S. Bach]

...snip...

Here's a Lykens Valley kit rendered as one of the early sixties PRR X60B Greenville cars ...snip...

I have that car (picked up at a show (Timonium, MD, I think) some years ago, (oddly I never snapped a photo of it by itself):

100_2955.JPG (1.1 MiB) Viewed 7551 times

The same seller had the N&W available as an un-built kit.that I did not get as I had my fill of building one of them with this AT&SF one:
.

100_2954.JPG (1.35 MiB) Viewed 7551 times

The "target" and the "shock" decals are each one-piece, a real bear to get right. I still do not believe that I got them (mostly) right! I use Athearn metal roller-bearing trucks and drawbar-mounted KD couplers, #5s, I think.

[De Bruin]

Thanks Dave, now I'm kicking myself for not snagging the AT&SF version last year. What an awesome looking scheme.

[R.K. Maroon]

Pete, those indeed turned out great. What monsters! I wonder how well a string of these tracks on the average O-scale layout -- or, more to the point, on Pete's layout . The visual alone would be worth the attempt -- impressive no doubt. Heck, the two that Dave shows together are cool enough.

Jim

[J. S. Bach]

I gave a little thought to czeching out the Lionel 86 footer to see haw hard it would be to two-rail but decided that I do not need any more cars that take up a good portion of the layout without even moving!

[De Bruin]

I was thinking about those Lionel's too, but they're indeed a pain to convert and pretty damn expensive to boot. I was hesitant at first about these in general but eventually decided they weren't that different than wrestling around with scale 85' passenger cars. The big test of course will be if they run on downtown club's grades and curves. Here's the improved auto-train consist lapping one of the curves at Vaterheterville on trackworld. I'm trying to get a video of the whole thing to load to my "Photopukeit" hosting site but me thinks it's too big.



Whenever and whoever comes out with a decent flex-van set though, definitely would go for that regardless.
oop, forgot this one, Maroon will recognize this, a meat products "liner" off the CB&Q.

[Chris Webster]

I was hesitant at first about these in general but eventually decided they weren't that different than wrestling around with scale 85' passenger cars.

I presume the boxcars are easier to build because you don't have to do any interior detailing!