Tangent HO 86′ Greenville High Cube Quad Door Box Car Norfolk Southern “Southern, Claytor Repaint 1987+”

Description

Railroad Short Name: NS, SOU

During the 1960s, the most radical freight car designs employed the extreme height clearances offered by Plate F car designs. In 1964, no car type articulated this extreme more than the 86-foot, purpose-built “Auto Parts” boxcars. They became fixtures on the rails all over North American mainlines, riding hot trains to deliver components vital to the productivity of auto plants. While several car builders offered 86’ auto parts boxcars, the most prolific builder was Greenville Steel Car Company of Greenville PA. Greenville produced their Quad Door design in the 1969-1970 period to meet the expanding needs of GM and Oldsmobile production facilities. Like the Double Door cars, these Quad Door cars were acquired by many railroads, and they were assigned to pools where cars from multiple railroads served a specific shipper.

The Southern (SOU) NS-era “BS-84 Claytor Repaint 1987+” is a very common 1980s paint job in the world of auto parts cars. This car was in service for Norfolk Southern. After the NS merger, NS continued to paint cars in pre-NS schemes, this “Claytor scheme” repaint included. The Southern cars were built in February of 1970 as part of a lot that included the distinctive Center-Of-Car cushioning details. The Claytor repaint features the original Apex crossover platforms with a Universal brake stand and brakewheel.

With a tremendous amount of surface area to paint on these cars, some railroads elected to repaint the cars with significant, complex stenciling. This fleet possibly had the largest Chessie “sleeping cat” logo you will ever see on an HO scale freight car! This group of cars represents the B&O Chessie Cumberland MD shops 1979 repaints of the original B&O cars, which were originally delivered in 1970. These cars stand out with the large yellow-painted doors, white “excess height” end painting, and galvanized silver roofs. They also include the safety-inspired “bowling ball” logo on them, as well as ACI and U-1 “wheel dot” stenciling! This Greenville car features Morton style crossover platforms, an Ajax hand brake housing, accurate End-of-Car Cushioning details with truck mounted brake hardware, and 70-Ton Barber S-2 Trucks with 33” wheels and “Timken” roller bearing caps. Interestingly, B&O was the second-largest purchaser of the Greenville quad door box cars, and these eye-catchers went literally everywhere.

Conrail (CR) cars were repaints of the Penn Central 1970-delivered cars. These cars were painted in Conrail brown paint in 1988 complete with the Conrail logo stenciling in white. This 1970-built Greenville group features accurate End-of-Car Cushioning details, replacement Morton style crossover platforms and truck mounted brake hardware. This X60R group of cars ride on 70-Ton Barber S-2 Birdsboro Roller Bearing Trucks, with 33” wheels and rotating “Brenco-6” roller bearing caps.

Another eye-catching scheme was found on the repainted SP cars. Union Pacific (SP) “Building America®” Repaint boxcars from the 2010s include a full complement of UP stenciling styles, UP shield, and UP Building America® graphics. Who cannot love the classy Union Pacific graphics? In 1970, Southern Pacific (SP) ordered two different lots of Greenville quad door auto parts box cars. While some of these lasted in original SP paint into the 2010s, many of them saw Building America paint in a program fashion. The underframe features accurate Center-of-Car Cushioning details with extended draft gear and this car rides on 70-Ton Barber S-2 Roller Bearing Trucks with 33” wheels, rotating “Timken” caps and truck mounted brake details.

Here is an example of a 1969-built Greenville 86’ High Cube Double Plug Door Box Car right after delivery. The classy Grand Trunk Western (GTW) scheme looks especially good on this car (in our humble opinion) with the large GT logo centered between the paired doors. GTW was the largest purchaser of Greenville’s quad door box car design, making them highly statistically relevant for modelers in the US and Canada. Painted in the characteristic GTW blue color with white stenciling, these 1969 cars were seen widely across North America. The GTW cars feature their as-built 1969 appearance that includes Gypsum crossover platforms, Ajax brake hand brake housing, Greenville-applied tack board locations and a beautiful End-of-Car Cushioning underframe setup. 70-Ton Trucks with 33” wheels and rotating “Benco-6” roller bearing caps finish off this dominant offering.

Now, for the models! The Tangent Scale Models Greenville 86′ Quad Plug Door Box Car System continues the design and operational standards set by our industry-leading Greenville Double Plug Door box car models. Our product replicates multiple variations of these cars, including two different draft gear combinations, two underframe styles which incorporate Center-of-Car Cushioning and End-Of-Car Cushioning options, and multiple power brake options. We have now released NINE (9) different build variations of these Greenville prototypes! The Tangent Greenville 86’ Quad Plug Door Box Car includes accurate all-new 70-ton trucks with 33” wheels, and include “spinning” roller bearing caps appropriate for each paint scheme. Finally, our cars are weighted properly and are equipped with genuine Kadee® scale couplers mounted in specially-designed coupler pockets which means they operate as good as they look. Due to the car’s size, we recommend curves of 24” or larger for these models.

Features:

The Tangent Greenville 86’ High Cube Quad Plug Door Box Car System is a state of the art, dimensionally-accurate scale replica that was tooled to Greenville Steel Car plans and verified with field measurements. Our model comes with highly accurate “true-to-life” colors and “hyper-accurate” lettering including exact stenciling, fonts, and lettering placement. Our Greenville 86’ system of models offers a multitude of detail variations and phases to replicate the many different Greenville Steel Car offerings. We make the best cars money can buy in HO scale. A quick synopsis of our era and railroad-specific detail variations include:

• Dimensional accuracy – designed from actual Greenville blueprints and verified with field measurements
• Highly correct “true to life” colors
• “Hyper-Accurate” lettering including exact fonts and lettering placement
• Body shells with overlapping side panels
• EOCC (end of car cushioning) or COCC (center of car cushioning) “near scale” draft gear variations
• Genuine Kadee® scale couplers
• Separate flexible rubber air hoses
• Under car brake system variations
• “See through” etched metal end crossover platforms in three possible options: Gypsum, Apex, or Morton
• Side tack board types/sizes and locations
• Twelve (!) prototypically-accurate brake stands (Ajax, 2 Universal versions, 2 Equipco versions, 2 Miner versions, Champion-Peacock, 2 Elcon-National versions, Peacock 850, Klasing 1150)
• Two possible handbrake “brake wheel” options
• Optional 3rd door arm hinge parts to be configured one of three ways
• All-new 70-Ton Barber S-2 “Birdsboro foundry” Roller Bearing Truck
• 33” wheels, as applicable to these 70T models
• Truck brake beam part, accurate for these 1969-1970 built Greenville production cars
• Three “rotating” roller bearing truck cap options
• Recommended age 14 years and older

Finally, our Greenville 86’ High Cube Quad Plug Door Box Car models feature our all-new 70-Ton Barber S-2 “Birdsboro foundry” Roller Bearing Truck. And yes, these trucks are available separately! The separate trucks feature a choice of 3 different “rotating” roller bearing caps and 3 different wheel options. Each truck also has the option of two separate brake beam parts, either for body-mounted brake systems (which are our standard offering), or for truck-mounted brake systems (available as a swap-in part). Our trucks and parts are available separately right now, and our RTR-cars come equipped with the correct configurations of trucks and parts!