That work trains are an interesting thing to shuffle around the model landscape from time to time.
Way back in the bad old days, Rhys cast up some really nice resin Yc tops and we both built about 5 of these up on Peco chassis as seen in the above shot taken on Otaki to Cass. I still reckon they look good.Trackgang makes a nice Yc and a 30 foot van that was converted into a plough van by ECMT in the early days of this blog. Cranes and crew carriages could also be added to the consist.
Another good looking work train item that covers the period from late steam to today is the YD side tipping wagon. Walthers in the US came out with an N scale Diffco side dump car last year, and this is the same company that made the NZ wagons. They differ slightly in detail to the NZ items, but its nothing a galloping horse would notice, and due to the US one being longer than ours, they might scale out pretty close for length in NZ120.
It looks a bit like a model, but this is a work train from Tuesday with four YDs up near Avoca on the Midland line:
3 comments:
my thoughts exactly. have nearly finished my modern cab Trackgang DG and have assembled 1 of my 6 trackgang YC wagons. the primer i used on YC is not correct brown, so will have to try another brand to get darker finish. fiddly work to assemble a YC, but i am impressed with how it turned out and it is not warped. the other wagon you mentioned YD? any idea when they first appeared or did i miss that comment.
YDs built 1958 and are 9300 over headstocks (or 77.5mm in NZ120)
The walthers models are 50 footers, or about 95mm (approx) in N, so a little long. They have 5 vertical posts in the doors vs our three, so you could take one section out or hope that nobody would notice...
Per my venerable copy of "New Zealand Prototypes - Vol.2" published by the NZMRA Oct 1962 the following are some further notes on the Yd 1/2 30' bogie side dump wagon:
"In 1949/50 the Railways Department introduced a completely new type of wagon in the Yd side dump wagon.These wagons were imported in a partially finished state, the superstructure being built under contract by the "Differential Steel Car Company" of USA (Difco, bogie side frames cast in NZ to patterns supplied by UK firm of Davies & Lloyd, brake gear of Australian Westinghouse manufacture & standard NZ draft gear fitted.
35 wagons were imported and assembled in 1949/50 with road numbers 1001-35; 20 for N I, 15 to S I; load is 25 tons, capacity 486 cu.ft. average tare 16-13-3.
In 1958 a further 35 were placed in service, road #s 1036-1070(10 to SI, 25 to NI).
These latter wagons differ slightly, with 5ft wheelbase bogies (vs 4.75') & bogies centred at 21' (vs 20')- also tare 17-11-0
Finish is red oxide.
Per plan, body length is 27.75', over buffers 32.5'; width over headstocks 7'3", 6'5" height above rail to top plank; 7.75' inside body.
Walthers N scale version TTn3.5'ed scales out to length of 33', width 7.5', height 6.75', bogie centres 4.5 ft - so a very close match applying the old "two foot rule".
The NZR Yd 1/2's (first lot) as drawn show four posts per side, so even closer.
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