It's late. The winter wind is howling outside and the temp is dropping! There's new snow on the ground. A good night to check the internet and doing so, found this outside braced boxcar:

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPi ... id=1406920

Looked at the photo and got to wondering if this was a rare piece of equipment that somehow got preserved? Yes, there are quite a few outside braced (single sheathed) boxcars that got saved, but look close; this one had its wood sides converted to steel! This was probably a fairly common way to get some more miles out of an old car and other roads besides the Frisco, did it I'm sure. But how many of those conversions have been saved? I don't recall any, but maybe I missed them somewhere along the way. So.......is SL-SF #162739 a rare bird in railroad preservation? Please let me know, one way or the other. And thanks!

Les

While I don’t doubt there aren’t a lot of these around, some quick googling turned up at least one other example. That would be Atlantic and East Carolina 606, impeccably preserved at the NCTM.

More info: http://www.norfolksouthernhs.org/equipment.html

I haven't kept a running inventory, but I seem to trip into such cars somewhat routinely.

Strasburg RR has CV 40025: http://centralvermontrailway.blogspot.c ... xcars.html

The White Deer RR Museum at White Deer, Pa. has a PRR X23 boxcar with portholes, used as a MOW car for years before being acquired.

Another PRR MOW X23, 499327, sits in the Martinsburg, WV B&O roundhouse in Martinsburg, WV.

Yet another, PRR 499369, is at the Northern Ohio Railway Museum, and 499320 is at Illinois Railway Museum.

Others at IRM (of course they have more than one!): Rock Island 264070, UP 100000, Soo 33096 and 41146, Alton 39167, WC 131650, and IC 40285. http://www.irm.org/gallery/boxcars

railfanespee -

Thanks! A beautiful example of an wood outside braced boxcar converted with steel sides. So, there are at least two surviving!


Les

The Central Vermont car obviously still has its wood sides. At least some (all?) of the others are also still wood sided. I guess I'll have to see if I can find photos of these cars when I get a chance, to ascertain whether any have been converted over to steel sides. As I stated in the original post, there seem to be quite a few outside braced (single sheathed) wood sided cars still in existence, but those converted to steel sides don't seem to have fared as well in preservation.

Les

Looked at the IRM website and all of those still have wood sides, with the only exception being UP #100000. However, that car was not converted, but actually built in 1906 as a steel car. That does bring up a good point however; were SLSF #162739 and/or A&EC #606 also built with steel sides, rather than being converted from wood to steel? I wouldn't think so, but I don't have any way to know for sure.

Les

Alexander D. Mitchell IV -

I checked out internet pix of these PRR X23 outside braced boxcars, and they all seem to still have wood sides. I actually found an additional X23 series car (PRR #499303) at the Eastern Shore Railway Museum in Parksley, VA and that one too, still has its wood sides. I do admit that I probably didn't make the subject line of this thread very clear, so I have amended it to help a little.

Les

Les,

Everything you would want to know about these cars was covered in articles in Railway Prototype Cyclopedia Vol. 1 & 2. Unfortunately now out of print, here is an Amazon listing for Vol. 1.

https://www.amazon.com/Railway-Prototype-Cyclopedia-Vol-1/dp/B0010ZG8GY

I got to thinking about IRM's UP #100000 and something clicked in the back of my brain (happens less and less frequently these days). Did some checking here on RyPN and found a photo of another Union Pacific steel boxcar with outside bracing. I had found that car sitting on an out of the way siding at Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Michigan and Chris Salmonson was nice enough to send in a photo of that car. I can't figure how to transfer it over here, but if you want to see it, look up the 2012 thread "Update from the DT&M Roundhouse". Although I can't transfer THAT particular photo, Mike Pannell (of Car 57 "fame"), discovered a bunch of old freight cars, one of which at least, looked like it could have been a sister to the car at Greenfield. I'll try to post it here:

http://car57.zenfolio.com/p412775893/h4 ... #h401cc0f2

My apologies if I screwed something up! Anyway, in that other thread, Dennis Storzek pointed out that the car at Greenfield Village was BUILT as a steel car, circa 1915. So, neither of these surviving Union Pacific outside braced steel cars is a conversion from a wood sided car.

Les

Les, is this the car you are talking about?
http://cn3254.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=4475972

No, this one.

http://www.rypn.org/forums/download/file.php?id=4384

Here is the discussion:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=33511&p=185741&hilit=union+pacific+greenfield+village#p185741

Many X23 boxcars were converted to NX23 cabooses during WW II. Pemberton had one that had an immaculate interior but the exterior was in very rough shape. This car still lives on even though the trust is gone. here is a photo of the car.

Later!
Mr. Ed

NS 3322 -

Dennis has furnished the photo of the correct car (although the DT&I car is neat). When Chris Salmonson originally posted that photo of the Union Pacific 50' Automobile boxcar, he stated that Greenfield Village was eventually going to restore it. Wonder if anything has been done in the last few years?

Well, so far we only have the SLSF and A&EC outside braced boxcars converted from wood to steel sides. So maybe those two really are "rare birds"!

Les

You can add Georgia Railroad to that list, as they had several steel rebuilds of what started as composite boxcars.

Yes, they are rare beasts, because they offered no real advantage. Unlike the composite general service (drop bottom) gondolas, which often had their wood side planks replaced with steel plate, the boxcars needed wood lining. I've just confirmed on another list that the Frisco cars were wood lined. So, all they did was tear all the wood off, add the steel sheathing, then replace all the wood, making the car heavier in the process. I don't see the sense of it, although the Frisco did.

Much more common was to rebuild the cars with Youngstown Steel Door Co. pre-fabricated steel sides. This allowed the interior dimensions of the car to be increased to the then current standard, and yielded a car that looked for all the world like a "normal" boxcar of the era, rather than an undersized antique. While the YSD sides were initially designed to replace the all wood superstructure of the USRA 40 ton cars, while re-using the underframe, eventually the railroads ran out of wood framed cars to convert, and started doing the same thing to the oldest, smallest steel framed cars, until WWII intervened.

Of all the cars we've been discussing here, the USRA 40 ton cars are a design sorely missing in preservation, what with 25,000 built for the WWI war effort. I believe there is ONE preserved. Likewise, one of the same rebuilt with YSD sides should have been preserved, but sadly hasn't been.

Dennis - Okay, but did any of the Georgia Railroad outside braced composite boxcars make it into preservation? If so, please give example(s).

Also, if outside braced (single sheathed) boxcars were torn down and rebuilt with steel sides that did not include the outside bracing, then they would not be included in this particular thread and list! Perhaps you could do a separate thread on wood cars that were rebuilt with those Youngstown Steel Door Company pre-fabricated sides, or other similar fabrications. Those "normal" looking boxcars might also be rare in preservation, but the lack of the outside braces precludes their inclusion in this particular thread.

Les