Scratchbuilding a GWR cattle wagon - Part 3 (More Wheels & Brakes)

As I mentioned in my last post about this car, my wife wasn't really impressed with the running abilities of the chassis. There were two causes of this: first, the plastic wheels had been glued onto new styrene axles and one of the wheels was mounted slightly off center (the axle diameter was smaller than the hole in the center of the wheel) and that same wheel was mounted slightly less than perpendicular to the axle. The result was that it had a slight hitch. If she could notice it, the judges would notice it (and I guess I couldn't hide it). Having nearly pulled my hair out trying to build working axleboxes last time, I was loathe to rebuild them. But...

I decided to replace the wheelset with metal wheels. Hornby sold metal wheels of the same diameter, with the same three holes in the sides of the wheel so I bought a pack (#R8097). It came with 10, enough for many attempts! I took a pair and ground down the points of the axles to slip into the axleboxes, and I barely had to spread them. That was good, as I didn't want to break the axleboxes. But, the axle length was now too short and there was too much slop. So, I took another pair and mounted them as is. They almost worked, but the oversize flanges now rubbed on the gouged out rebuilt frame angle bracing. So, I removed the wheels and ground down their flanges on the belt sander. Finally, success! I did have to add some thrust washers between the wheels and axleboxes to remove some play, but they aren't visible from normal viewing angles.

The car is still very lightweight, and there just isn't any room to add weight while still keeping its prototypical appearance. As it is, the car is supposed to weight 2.5 ounces and even with metal wheels it barely cracked 0.80 ounces without its roof. The cows will add a little, but still not enough. I tested the car as it currently exists is on my layout and it rolled around just fine but a train of them would likely bump and derail from any sudden jerks or imperfect track. So, another display case piece. I am starting to realize that superdetailed cars are not always operational cars, and sometimes compromises have to be made for the best operational performance.

Finally, I worked on the brake gear. Some of the prototype cars had no brakes at all, and that is why British trains had "brake vans" at the back to act as anchors to stop the whole train because most of the cars couldn't stop themselves. Some cattle wagons had handbrakes on one axle activated by a trackside lever on one side, and others had dual axle brakes activated from levers on both sides. I modeled a wagon with brakes on one axle operated by vacuum, with vacuum lines running to either end of the car. The brake shoes were cut from a Kadee USA freight car truck brake pad detail set, and the rest was scratchbuilt from styrene, brass rod, and steel wire. I can't guarantee the car is perfect, but it looked like the drawings I found. I didn't include every GWR safety redundancy bit, but oh well. I like how it turned out. I also included the Bachmann sprung buffers on the ends.

Then, I stared at the model long and hard and realized that the bent brass tube air line on the end didn't look great. By pure luck while reading one of my British modeling magazines there was an article on detailing a freight wagon and a reference was made to Wizard Models. After checking them out, I decided to order proper air line castings and while I was there picked up some buffer castings and coupler hooks. It took six weeks for them to arrive, hence my delay in this post. But, they are just what I was looking for and I drilled out the body and attached them with superglue. I still need to polish the buffers gently with some sandpaper, but the car is essentially ready to be painted.

I would be remiss if I didn't point out this terribly helpful link to a website featuring the construction of an O scale kit similar to the model I am building.