Walthers Heavyweight RPO Baggage


Believe these cars were origionally tooled for the C&O George Washington Passenger Train, and are of a C&O prototype. The car is in the "Proto" series. The Western Ownership cars could be similar to what the SP or UP used.
 
Yeah, things aren't getting any cheaper, that's for sure, but $85 is about going rate for a model of this caliber these days, and that's about $25 more than a video game cartridge, or about equal to three plastic model kits if you do cars, military or aircraft. It has a full interior, Kadee clones, metal wheels, and so forth. Quality is high.
 
Mail trains are a thing of mine, and, unfortunately, heavyweight head end cars are sort of scarce in HO, and most other scales. There are kits out there, resin, the old faithful Walthers "silverside" kits. Upgradable RTR includes the stuff from Hornby, and plenty of old IHC and AHM, the old Model Power stuff, the old and new upgraded Roundhouse models, not to mention the Athearn blue box "shorties". I don't care for shorties. I'm kind of cursed with wanting accurate models. That can get expensive or very demanding of your time, or both. Usually both. You find yourself looking at expensive stuff. Brass is one way to go, and if you think $85 is expensive, well, stay off of Brass Trains.com! You'll probably have a stroke when you see what new models cost there. That's swimming in the deep end of the pool! But. I digress. I was told about these by a friend and fellow passenger train modeler. I went to my LHS and they had just arrived. They looked pretty nice. There are two configurations, arched roof and clerestory roof, and a bunch of road names. I picked up two, one lettered for SP and one plain green unlettered car. The unlettered car comes with both roofs. Here they are:

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I checked the library to see how accurate these things would be for the SP before buying. They're pretty close. Below is a photo of one next to a correct brass car. The brass car cost about twice what the Walthers car did and I still have to add detail and paint. It's pretty close. The window in the baggage compartment was plated over in many cars in later years, so you could leave it as is or add the window if you want

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Last up is a shot of the model above a photo of an SP BP-30-3. (That's Baggage Postal - 30 ft. RPO compartment - 3rd design for you non SP guys ;) ) The rear door could be modified to the correct width, or you can do what I'm going to do: Call it close enough! It's not perfect for me, but it is a most acceptable stand in!

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There were many window and door variations on these cars, so they will fit in on a lot of railroads. Lastly, yes guys, they are expensive, and yes you can go and cut up two of whatever old whatever kit or car you can find and make something similar, probably for lots more if you put any kind of value on your time. That's for each modeler to decide for him/herself. I don't get much hobby time so for common stuff, I buy it and save my valuable kit building time for projects I really want to build (structures mostly). There were generally only one of these in a train, maybe two in a large mail train so you don't need to buy 10 or 15 of them. one and a baggage or two will do for passenger trains that had them. Mail trains did have multiple RPO's so you'd need to do a little research for what train you want to model.
 
Thanks for all the photos and the tutorial, ALAN!
Those all look really great - and I like what you said about the modeling.
Being away from the hobby as I was for so long - I am just shocked by the cost of everything!
My neighbor just installed a new cooktop in his kitchen yesterday - at 4 times the price of a few years (20) ago.
It's just terrible what inflation does to us all.
 
If you are interested in mail trains, there are many different sorts of cars in them. Following are some of your choices: Many are "price friendly"!

This boxcar can be used as a storage mail car (unopened until destination) or express shipments. Basic Athearn, in the ten buck range

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Fresh fruits and flowers, especially the fist harvest often were shipped in express reefers like this one. It's an Intermountain model, in the thirty buck range. Kits are availavle on the swap meet circuit for less, say in the fifteen buck range:

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Below are three different models of the same car, a SP 60 ft. baggage, similar car used by the UP. On top is the latest update of the old Athearn Roundhouse model. The roof is magnetically attached, its easy to add an interior. In the middle is a brass car, (don't ask how much that one cost!). I wanted it because it is correct. Note the panel count between the baggage doors. This is the only flaw in the Athearn/Roundhouse model. On the bottom is an old Roundhouse kit I upgraded with Central Valley trucks, Walthers diaphragms, Bethlehem car works steps and Walthers roof vents. I did a string of these

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Below is roof detail for the three cars. The brass car is on top. Note the presence of conduit and the gas line on the brass model, one of the reasons you pay so much for these darned things! In the middle is the upgraded Roundhouse, and on the bottom is the New Roundhouse model. The globe vents here are really more for passenger cars than for baggage cars. Note the little vent on the roof. It's for a toilet. Some of these cars carried messengers, so they had a desk and "facilities" for the messenger. Those cars had a star above the number. The upgraded Roundhouse model is in the thirty buck range. the old Roundhouse are all over e-bay at various prices averaging around fifteen bucks

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Last, the GGD models. Anyone hear of GGD? Golden Gate Depot. They are a division of Sunset Models, a brass importer, and they did a series of plastic Harriman cars. All of them had problems, some worse than others. The Baggage and RPO's were done as "shorties" They were up front about this, but still, I never got why they did that. Note the difference in length against the correct brass car. they also left off some rivet detail on the sides and roofs. It was their first try at HO plastic, and they stumbled a bit. The coaches and the All Day Lunch care were OK. All cars were lit and had good trucks, diaphragms, and overall nice detail. At $90.00 a pop though, that's too many issues for me. That being said, they look ok in a train following the three foot rule. I guess most modelers didn't care as they sold very well.

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Maybe next Trainfest I'll display a mail train!
 



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