13 tips for storing your trains 1. Modern trains go in their boxes. Be sure you store them out of direct sunlight and fluorescent lighting in a cupboard, drawer, or other dark, dry area. A packet or two of silica gel inside the box helps keep moisture and humidity low so your boxes won’t get […]
Available at www.rapidotrains.co.uk in 10 road numbers and several paint schemes. List price: £39.95 (approximately $50.00 as of this writing) Pluses Fine handrails, detailed interior, free-rolling metal wheels, and NEM coupler pockets Minuses Loose interior detail needed repair Verdict A highly detailed rendering of a staple of GWR and early British Railways rollingstock – every […]
WASHINGTON — Amtrak’s Office of Inspector General today issued a report highly critical of a manufacturing process that has led to defects preventing Amtrak from accepting any of the 12 of 28 New Acela trainsets and 22 of 28 café cars already produced at Alstom’s Hornell, N.Y., facility. The 38-page report contains redactions of monetary […]
WASHINGTON — Emergency inspections following last week’s derailment of a DC Metrorail train found 32 railcars with bolts that are loose, or at least not as tight as required, the Washington Post reports. A Metrorail 7000-series train derailed Friday after striking an object later determined to be a brake disc from a previous train. That […]
WASHINGTON — No injuries were reported after a DC Metrorail train derailed Friday morning near Reagan International Airport, an incident Metro officials said was caused when the train struck an object that fell off a preceding train. The derailment occurred about 10:45 a.m. and involved a southbound train heading toward the Franconia-Springfield station, the Washington […]
WASHINGTON — The National Transportation Safety Board has called for development of new standards for gaskets used by tank cars in flammable-liquid service as a result of investigation into a January 2022 derailment and fire involving a BNSF Railway Train in Oklaunion, Texas. The NTSB released a synopsis of its final report on Thursday. [The […]
Q What is the meaning of tank car color schemes? Is there a color code? Some tank cars have a contrasting horizontal stripe on the middle section of the tank, while other tank cars are painted a solid color. Since some tank cars carry hazardous or toxic chemicals while others carry edible materials, are the […]
Meatpacking firm John Morrell & Co. led the switch away from ice in refrigerator cars. Two of Morrell’s Mather cars converted to mechanical refrigeration head east on the Illinois Central’s Iowa Division in 1954. They were the first mechanical meat reefers. Basil W. Koob photo […]
New CTT products for September 2023 Locomotives and rolling stock An Electro-Motive Division SD70MAC road diesel locomotive has joined the Atlas O Premier Line. Paint schemes include BNSF Ry. (green and cream), CSX (dark blue and yellow), Lake State Ry. (blue and gray), Metra (blue, black, and orange), Paducah & Louisville (green and white), R.J. […]
Trouble with TankTrain cars: Sometimes I think this column should be called “Jim’s latest screw-up.” Here’s a recent case in point. I’d just gotten my Athearn TankTrain cars and was carefully opening the boxes, taking the cars out one at a time, and checking them over. I checked the wheel gauge with a National Model […]
A 65-foot mill gondola is the latest addition to the Micro-Trains Line Co. N scale freight car lineup. The injection-molded plastic model features positionable drop ends, metal wheelsets, and body-mounted Magne-Matic couplers. The Micro-Trains gondola is based on a Santa Fe class GA-47 prototype built by General American Transportation Corp. (GATC) in 1937. The gondolas […]
I thought about calling this column “What on earth were they thinking,” but that wouldn’t have made a good title because someone looking at the table of contents would have had no idea what the article was about. The “they” in my unused title was Atlas, which had the N scale whale-belly tank car shown […]
