# USA trains Heavyweights



## derPeter (Dec 26, 2010)

Hallo MLSers,
i have got my 5 UP-cars and they did not fit with the aristos in height.
Couplers are too low, so i made new holding device.
Trying to remove the truck, there are the 2 wires for light going thru the truck. so i had to unsolder. Also turned the wheelflanges to 2mm to run at 5mm track, see the pics..
Greetings derPeter


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

People have also put Kadees "inside" that u-shaped bridge.


The short wires are indeed a pain in the butt.


with the nice electronics, you can easily eliminate one set of pickups, and the reduction in rolling friction is dramatic.


My buddy and I both bought the 10 car set (I run 12 cars) and stringlining has been an issue with the rolling friction. 



Camarillo Pacific makes the Kadee mount.


We are going to change the carbon brush pickups to ball bearing pickups.


They are great looking cars, except for the threaded bolt visible in the center of the observation car


Greg


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## derPeter (Dec 26, 2010)

Hallo again,
got some small ballbearings 1/4" x 1/8" (6,35 x 3,175 x 3mm)
only 8pcs. per car, because the middle axe is loose.
The brass bushing can be easy removed with M3 thread tap.
Axle has 2,8mm dia, so i made small sleeve from alu-sheet, see pic
And added the kadees #820
Greetings derPeter


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

What do you mean about the wheel flanges, did you turn down the flange width or depth?


what does "run at 5mm track" mean? Surely your track is not 5mm wide. 


In any case, your coupler mount is very much like the Camarillo Pacific ones, of course, a good solution.




Thank you for the tip on the bearings. I'm going to take a different route because I want power pickup, but the friction losses I am seeing are coming from the carbon brushes, so converting to Train-Li ball bearing wheels with the power pickup and eliminating the carbon brushes.


Greg


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## derPeter (Dec 26, 2010)

Hallo Mr. Greg,
wheel flange originally is 3mm depth, so i turned down to 1,8mm depth to enable run on track with 5mm height (Euro-Standard, Märklin and others)
greetings derPeter


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Thank you!


Sorry, forgot the height, duh! We would refer to that as code 200, yes, the flanges were probably riding on the "spikes".


I try to shoot for 2mm flange depth myself...


Greg


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## du-bousquetaire (Feb 14, 2011)

Has any body who has these cars, checked dimensions? I was wondering just how close thes could be to 1/32 scale? Iin which case I have a few projects to use them in. I have no way of seeing one here in Europe without odering them. Could any body post length width and height for them as the catalogue gives the length over couplers and these are overscale for short radius curve operation. They seem pretty close to 1/32 and that would be cool. Thanks for any help.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

They are perfectly 1:29 as advertised. 

Tell me which ones you want measured, they are just outside.

club lounge car (we call a combine) 33-3/16" body without diaphragms, 4-3/8" width of body at sill (measured through baggage door)

Greg


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## Paul Burch (Jan 2, 2008)

Like Greg said, the USA cars are 1/29, but the Aristo cars are a little small for 1/29.


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## David Leech (Dec 9, 2008)

Perfectly 1:29?
I guess it all depends on ones definition of 'perfect'!
The combination Club/Baggage car appears to be to Pullman Plan 3951.
This has a side length of 77' 3 ½", plus the one vestibule of 3' 9", plus the Baggage end of 1' 0" for a total of 82' ½" or 984.5".
So in 1:29 it should be 33.948", so the model is a little over ¾" short.
As to width, the overall width of Pullman Heavyweights was 10', or 10' 1" depending on which Pullman plan you are looking at.
4 ⅜" in 1:29 scale represents 10' 6 ⅞" which might cause issues on some railroads.
Cheers,
David Leech, Delta, Canada


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## Paul Burch (Jan 2, 2008)

David,
Is the prototype length from coupler pulling face to coupler pulling face, or the ends of the car?


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

His numbers and post say the side length plus the length of the vestibules, so no couplers, no diaphragms as I read it. It should be from buffer to buffer (usually a raised block at the very end of the car, right under the bottom of the diaphragm)

I looked a bit for some drawings, and I have not looked to see if the USAT unit has a buffer... hmm.... hold on, walk out the back door... so the "buffer block" seems to be sort of simulated by the draft gear for the coupler.... and I have been changing over to Kadees with the Camarillo Pacific conversion boxes.

I did the initial measurements with a tape measure...

Looking at that, it appears that the car measurements I have given would be around 3/4" longer if I measured buffer to buffer.... *so might still be "perfect" in length*, 

I also got a pair of vernier calipers and measured body width again, 4.197" > 121.713" inches in prototype, or 10" 1.7" wide *perfect*...

I stand by "*perfect*"

Greg


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## David Leech (Dec 9, 2008)

Paul Burch said:


> David,
> Is the prototype length from coupler pulling face to coupler pulling face, or the ends of the car?


Hi Paul,
I will preface this with the fact that I can only go from what information that I have in books and plans in my possession.
Pullman may have changed things from plan to plan!
As you may know, for some reason Pullman would list and show lengths of a car as "just the sides" over end sills.
So you have to add to this to get whatever measurement suits your needs.
As I said, the vestibule is 3' 9" over bodywork, or 4' 5 ¼" over buffer, and 1' 8 ¼" at the 'blank' end over buffer.
A long way to answer your question, but I hope that it does.
Cheers,
David Leech, Delta, Canada


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

so David, are you satisfied with my better measurement on width? Do you agree that in this world "perfect" is acceptable? 

I'll re-measure the length over buffers... so to be sure, 4' 5-1/4 plus 1' 8-1/4 plus 77' 3-1/2" so I get 4+1+77= 82 foot, 17" or 83 feet 5 inches for the prototype over the buffers (seems long)

that should be 34.52" right?

Greg


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## David Leech (Dec 9, 2008)

Greg,
If it is perfect for you, then I am happy for you.
Regards,
David


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Just yanking your chain a bit David, but you did come back and dispute "perfect"... so I cannot get you to admit that the more precisely measured width is indeed "perfectly in scale"?

Did you post just to "put down" the USAT product? I thought we were all happy for ANY new products.

Greg


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## Paul Burch (Jan 2, 2008)

David,
Take a look at this drawing. heavyweight pullman passenger car dimensions - Bing images

This drawing shows the length over the coupler pulling faces.


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## David Leech (Dec 9, 2008)

Paul,
Yes it does, but it is not an official Pullman drawing.
It looks to be a railroad 'Folio'. As "The TwilightLimited" was a New York Central train, I would assume that it is one of theirs.
As per the diagram, the Pullman list shows the Plan 3957 with a length of 74' 6", which is between end sills.
I would think that the railroads produced their folio diagram books so that the conductors would know how long each car was so perhaps they would know the total length of the train when coupled up, or something like that.
There are lots of different drawings of passenger cars made over the years, and I tend to be a little careful when researching and would much rather use an actual builders drawing if I can.
Cheers,
David


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## Paul Burch (Jan 2, 2008)

David,
It is interesting. I have wondered why some drawings would show coupler pulling faces as the length. I see it quite a bit on locomotives.


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## David Leech (Dec 9, 2008)

Paul,
For interest, here is a link to the Pullman plan of the same car, fortunately a lot of plans are in the Newberry Library.
I don't believe pullman ever made side elevations of their cars, at least I have never seen one.
Perhaps as the actual windows were a standard position height wise, so all they needed was the dimension between them to make up a side.
It would be interesting to go back in time and see just how they did build a car.
Cheers,
David
*


https://tinyurl.com/y6br9ryn


*


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

I went there too, unfortunately the resolution is so low on many pictures that you cannot read the writing, this one is 500 x 500 pixels... seems that is the max resolution you can download.


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## David Leech (Dec 9, 2008)

Looks good to me when it's full screen and then you zoom in.
I think they told me years ago when I first contacted them, that some of the early scans were done when technology was not as high definition as it is today.
Maybe you were looking at one of those.
All in all, for free it's great.
I'm sure if you offer them a few dollars they will rescan one for you.
Cheers,
David


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Thanks David, I did not try the expanded view controls, the downloadable version is limited to 500 x 500, but using the zoom function on the site, and then further expanding the popup window to full screen does indeed make it readable.... and you can zoom from there.... then you can do screen capture...

On the link provided to the observation car, I did get this (just for reference)

On the left side of that drawing, looking at left to right

No measurement of the very end of the car, from the buffer to where the vestibule steps start
The length of the steps is 2’ 8”
The next measurement is 74’ 6” over the end sills
Then there is another 3’ of space
Then there is 2’ 9” of steps,
And again, there is no measurement from the steps to the buffer, or the extreme end of the car

81’ 11” is what I get without the very ends of the car on each end.

Maybe I can find a drawing that has those missing dimensions... Does this car seem representative, as we can approximated the un-measured areas.


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## David Leech (Dec 9, 2008)

Greg,
I think the 3' of space should be included in the 74' 6".
Here is an end of the only Pullman blueprint that I have, and it shows a vestibule dimension.
Whether ALL vestibule were the same, I don't know, but I would think they were standardised for ease of building.
The drawing is done to ½" to the foot so the diaphragm, and I 'assume' the buffer, measures the 8 ¼".
Cheers,
David


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

In the first drawing, you can see the 74' 6" does not include the vestibule steps, nor the short amount further.

In the drawing above, I can see a dimension line that seems to have a dimension line that is almost to the outer edge of the diaphram, but not quite, interesting.

In any case I think the USAT heavyweights are pretty darn accurate, the width checks well, and its at least very close on length, close enough we would want the exact drawing.

But to the point of the original post, no, they are 1:29, not close to 1:32.

Greg


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

No more scathing comments? All this angst because I said they were perfectly in scale?


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## Paul Burch (Jan 2, 2008)

Greg,
You trying to stir the pot!


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Well have not been taken to task for a while, so when facts were produced, all of a sudden it went quiet. Funny how real data eventually wins out over emotion.... 

Greg


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## du-bousquetaire (Feb 14, 2011)

Hi Greg, David and Paul and thanks to Greg in giving me the answer, Unfortunatly being in the midst of building a new and quite large garden layout here in the sunny south of France, I didn't get to it until today,















so I appologise for the late response. I was interested, as I looked at photos of these cars and found them much more satisfying than the Aristo ones. (The rivets are finer, the proportions, etc.) And I thought that the coach could be a good base to make some P70 coaches that I need so much being a slobbing Pennsy fan, if they were anywhere close to 1/32 scale. You answered that question and as I have a set of J&M pullmans I was able to make a quick comparisson and they do seem to be 1/29th scale, so much for that idea, its shelved! Besides I still would have had to make a PRR four wheel truck plus many more modifications, so it is likely that I might as well start from scratch.
Right now I am very busy building a new pike which will feature an twelve arch four track brick viaduct to replicate Rockville bridge and one of my curves is exactly the same radius as Horseshoe curve and partly four tracks also. This is also to serve as a long passing siding for fifty or so cars freights. I will probably do an article on it in the G1MRA newsletter. Right now I am busy laying track and building turnouts three of which are N° 10 turnouts to enter the four track section. Hey, uploading images sure is a lot simpler with the new renovated forum, congratulations. Keep safe!


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Yes, USAT has been pretty darn true to 1:29 in their stuff (the ultimate series, not the cheapo box and reefers)... Many people have looked to the Aristo's with a 1:32 steamer since the heavyweights are not really "tall" cars, and with a big 1:32 loco, it looks all right to some.

In any case, great photos and please keep posting more on your build. Love the viaduct!

Greg


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## du-bousquetaire (Feb 14, 2011)

I got the idea for the viaduct on Bob Head's fabulous layout in Britain before he passed away, I copied it on my old track in Valmondois and have posted some photos in the past taken on it. Here I had the room and the desire to expand it a bit. The whole project was based on having wider radius curves than before so trains look better and we should have less rolling resistance. shortest mainline radius is 6 meter 50 and the other curve goes to 6 meter 90 almost 7 meters. Best, Simon


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## ferroequinologist (May 8, 2016)

Simon, This reply of mine is going a bit off topic but good to see images of your new track and I do love the idea of large long viaducts as it makes a great stage for viewing the trains. I trust you still model French Nord as well as Pennsy trains and when your new layout is finished please start a new thread with many images of both Pennsy and Nord trains.
I am jealous of your wide radius curves as I am stuck with 3 meter radius.
Russell


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

At this point, off topic is fine, since the OP was really that the USAT coupler height was different from Aristo (which really has been true for over 20 years ha ha).

Then it degenerated into someone else asking about the scale and an arguement and finally proof they are accurate 1:29 models.

So much more enjoyable to see a new railroad being built from a long time participant on this forum!

Greg


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## du-bousquetaire (Feb 14, 2011)

Thanks for the encouragements friends, I will endeavour to post another post on the layout on the apropriate forum, when it is more advanced. Sorry I "poluted" the post on USAT heavyweights. Unfortunatly for me who keeps to 1/32 strictly, as these cars and the LW cars are very nice. Many years ago when I started US prototype modeling a friend lent me the Aristo heavyweights to see how they looked behind my MTH GG1 and you really could see the scale difference, so I decided to stick with 1/32. But now I have quite a good passenger consist in that scale so it is no problem. The only thing missing really is P70 coaches, combines and some Owl eyed P54 to go with my Atlantic.(Like the "Valpo dumy", just love that nickname it had!) Russel: the layout will have one side French following the NORD Ry and the other side will be pure Pennsy. Best of two worlds.


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