# Precision Scale Tank car (1/2 scale)?



## San Juan (Jan 3, 2008)

I'm wondering if anyone here has one or has ever seen a Precision Scale G scale tank car. They are supposedly 1:24 (1/2 scale)

Does anyone have dimensions on these cars? 

For our 1:22.5 scale layout, I'm currently using the Bachmann Big Haulers tank cars. Nice, but not exactly prototypical for a frameless narrow gauge tank car. 

I thought about converting our Bachmann tank cars to frameless tank cars, but I just can't figure out a way to do it that doesn't require basically scratch building an entire tank car from the ground up. Also the Bachmann tank top filler would require lots of body work to get it to look and operate correctly.

So I'm wondering if the Precision Scale tanks might work on our 1:22.5 scale layout. Being 1:24 they might look OK. At least I know they will be smaller then giant 1:20.3 rolling stock. Could be pricey though as they are bras models. And likely hard to find them anymore. I'd probably want the version painted in "Gramps" lettering. 

But it would be nice to have accurate looking tank cars to go along with our oil dock:


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## Scottychaos (Jan 2, 2008)

FYI..you mean 1/2" scale..not 1/2 scale!  
"One half inch scale" is 1/24 scale..half an inch equals one foot.. 
1/2 scale is "one half scale"..literally 50% the size of the prototype!  
a prototype car that is 40 feet long would be 20 feet long in 1/2 scale. 

nitpicky? perhaps..but not really.. 
the concept of scale, and multiple scales, in this hobby is confusing enough already (especially in large scale) 
getting it wrong increases confusion. 

getting it correct decreases confusion.. 

Scot


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## Dr Rivet (Jan 5, 2008)

Matt 

Yes, 1:24 scale made circa 1985-86. There was one on eBay last week at $400. Way too high. Original price $265-$285. Ought to be able to get them at $225-$230 maybe less. Correctly scaled, so since Iam sure you have A Century and Ten of D&RGW freight cars [Sloan], just check the dimensions on the drawing in the book.


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## toddalin (Jan 4, 2008)

I was babysitting a Precision Scale Shay for a while. Extremely well detailed, I think it would have been a bit small to run with 1:20.3 or even 1:22.5. I don't know about their tank cars, but if they are like the engine...


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## chuck n (Jan 2, 2008)

Matt:

I don't think that the 1:24 scale of the tank cars should be a problem. All of my the narrow gauge freight cars of LGB, USA, and Delton (advertised as 1:24) are very close to the same length. All of these cars are a lot closer to 1:24 than 1:22.5 (assuming the cars are 30' in length). You might have a problem with any kits in 1:22.5 that you might have built and in my opinion the ca. 10% difference shouldn't be noticeable.


I came to this conclusion several years ago when I wondered why USA and LGB ng cars looked well with my Delton cars and my supposedly 1:22.5 cars didn't look correct (even remotely) with my 1:20.3 engines an cars. Even though there is still about a 10% difference between 1:20.3 and 1:22.5. The same as between LGB, USA and Delton. I measured the length of the cars and the difference between the LGB, USA and Delton in negligible. From my measurements, there is in reality a 20% difference between the LGB, USA, and Delton cars, and 1:20.3, not 10%.


Chuck


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## San Juan (Jan 3, 2008)

Useful info all, thanks. 


Didn't know the Precision tanks went back to the mid 1980s. That's around the time I got started in G scale.


Our current freight roster consists of USA, LGB, Hartland, Bachmann, and MDC. All work very well together. The MDC short caboose seems to be the smallest in scale when compared to the rest. But it still fits in well.


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