CB&Q Work Trains/ Crew Cars

Hi Everyone!
I got a few new tools and want to try out my hand at kitbashing some cars.
I thought an obvious kitbash would be building some crew cars for a work train, for the CB&Q. I remember them as old beat up boxcars and reefers painted silver. I found a few pictures on line. Some look like they were either long boxcars or parts of boxcars mounted on old flatcars. If and when heavyweight cars show up again in Z I will use some of them too.
I think all I would have to do is add some windows and doors and a smokejack to some older model boxcars or reefers from MTL and Penzee. I have seen pictures of the originals with boxcar doors still on, or I could plug them with a sheet of "plywood", or cut up a couple so it looks like solid sheathing. Easiest is to freelance it, but it would be nice to have more pictures of the prototype(rare, and pics of both sides, impossible)
Any ideas would be most helpful, I will also have to shop around for some lasered or etched doors and windows.
Thanks.
Kelley

There are some pics in the CBQ section of the Fallen Flags website. They seem to have had a fair few heavyweights and the usual mix of gons and box cars some of which were wooden outside-braced cars. You should check it out. They seem to be mostly painted yellow including some re-used steam loco tenders.

www.rrpicturearchives.net/rsList.aspx?id=CBQ&cid=15

www.rr-fallenflags.org/cbq/cbq.html

Thanks bunches..I was at the first site but did not find these..I shoulda look deeper...and the second site is new to me too..thank you so much, for those complaining about forums, well this is exactly what I think they are for.

I agree completely! The forums are the first place to try. I'm suprised you haven't seen Fallen Flags before though, It's pretty good, in fact I've got some of my own pics posted there.

Fallen Flags is great:laugh:, there are many excellent prototype pictures for most all American roads. I looked at the CBQ page and there are some great photos in there.

www.rr-fallenflags.org/cbq/fwd-x323abp.jpg

www.rr-fallenflags.org/cbq/fwd-x244dba.jpg

You might be able to use some of the new Searails Pullman heavyweights when they come out. Their baggage car goes really well with the CBQ prototype, except you would have to bash in two windows near the smaller door at the back end of the car. Other than that its just orange. Good luck with the project.

Thanks for all the help. This is one of the pictures I found, and it look like the train I remeber as a kid of the work train parked at Sesser IL.
Kind of hard in the picture to figure out what is silver and what is bare wood. I am not a car expert and am wondering what some of the original cars were. Some are long, like a 50' boxcar, and I see truss rods. Is that even scribed siding or plywood? That would be really easy to make, take off doors and ladders on a 50 footer, cut the holes and add the doors and windows on a the very thin model plywood sheets, bit of paint, do the fiberglass brush trick, add a smokjack and rust...BAM done. I cam model in my head just getting the fingers to do it is the problem.
I think these will kind of lean towards a freelanced kinda thing. Try to get things about 80 percent right and hope I don't get flamed. I agree about the heavyweight cars and am waiting for them to come out.
These things would be kind of dandy in a yard siding even static.
www.mugii.com/john/Pictures/SE_Iowa_1970s/CB&Q%20Work%20Train%20FM.jpg
www.mugii.com/john/Pictures/SE_Iowa_1970s/CB&Q%20Crew%20Car.jpg

While not a car expert my take is it probably started as a reefer or express car and in its present life on the work train they sheeted the car in galvanized steel sheet over the wooden side and added a steel roof to the car and then added the windows and doors. I see arch bar trucks under the car as well. You can use pieces of aluminum foil to simulate the metal siding panels.

cheerz Garth


Kelley wrote:

Thanks for all the help. This is one of the pictures I found, and it look like the train I remeber as a kid of the work train parked at Sesser IL.
Kind of hard in the picture to figure out what is silver and what is bare wood. I am not a car expert and am wondering what some of the original cars were. Some are long, like a 50' boxcar, and I see truss rods. Is that even scribed siding or plywood? That would be really easy to make, take off doors and ladders on a 50 footer, cut the holes and add the doors and windows on a the very thin model plywood sheets, bit of paint, do the fiberglass brush trick, add a smokjack and rust...BAM done. I cam model in my head just getting the fingers to do it is the problem.
I think these will kind of lean towards a freelanced kinda thing. Try to get things about 80 percent right and hope I don't get flamed. I agree about the heavyweight cars and am waiting for them to come out.
These things would be kind of dandy in a yard siding even static.
www.mugii.com/john/Pictures/SE_Iowa_1970s/CB&Q%20Work%20Train%20FM.jpg
www.mugii.com/john/Pictures/SE_Iowa_1970s/CB&Q%20Crew%20Car.jpg

I'd have said that those are vertical planks rather than board. It has the look of wood that's spent a lot of time in the weather without being treated. Unless its been deliberatly stripped I don't think its seen a paint brush for a long time (even something remains of the worst paint job) That is, unless it's weathered silver
It's obvious that not all MOW cars in service were yellow as some of the pics on FF and RRNet predate these pics. The pics are dated April 1971 which is post merger so, technically, these are Burlington Northern cars.
It appears that a lot of MOW stock was collected together from all the railroads involved including those yellow ones which were marked FW&D and C&S. It would be hard to be dogmatic about the colour of any MOW equipment as the habit seems to have been to use any cast offs available and standardising them must have taken ages ( I have a picture of an outside braced wood sided cab in BN service - ex FW&D... I wonder how long they used that before it was retired).
So unless your'e really worried about the "paint police" paint them silver and perhaps throw in the odd yellow or boxcar red one for variety.