Boston Elevated, 8 Window, Closed Car

 

Concept

To create a turn of the century (the other one) Boston Elevated Railway, 8 window closed car.

 

Using the photos in the “Streetcars of Boston”, Vol#1, by O.R. Cummings, several similar versions were selected. This model is being fashioned after one of them.

 

Products used:

Bachmann Closed Cars - 2 each

LRP #004  Trolley Base + Pole Kit

LRP #005  Trolley Hook

 

Disassembly

There are several clips along the inner letterboard edge that hold on the car roof. Carefully pry or pull apart, by hand, the upper edges of the letterboard, and as you do, it should seem like the roof is now separating from the main car body. Carefully lift up on the roof section. Remove the metal rods holding up the straps for the standees your car will carry. Paint the straps a dark brown or red for a leather color.

 

Remove that ugly plastic structure where the coupler is under or in front of the dashes.

 

The two Bachmann closed streetcars are cut, basically each in half, and spliced together. This is not quite as difficult as it might seem. Getting the roof to line up is a bit trickier. Be patient. You will want to make many, many test fits before gluing either the bodies or the roof together. This includes getting the upper windows in the roof sections to appear to be spaced the same. Frankly, on this model the roof is spliced twice, as there was a major goof up, trying to salvage as much of the roof as possible for another project.

 

Once you have the roof spliced together and it fits onto the car body shell nicely (well, as best as one can!). Then splice the trolley boards together and figure out the center of the car (mine only has one trolley pole), pre-drill the holes to accept the trolley base

 

Save the seats, and splice these later. Paint these a tan color to represent the cane. Add some black strips across the width to show some separation of the lower cushions.

 

Details Products used:

LRP #008  K-28 controller

LRP #002 Coupler

Fender moustache

LRP #009C  Brill 27 trucks

 

Background

The cars were built in 1900 by the St. Louis Car Co. They have longitudinal seats (“bowling alley seats”) and would seat 34 passengers. For trucks and controls, these cars sported Peckham #14B4, motors were G.E. #86 (2 each, or one per truck). The controls are K-38G and had hand brakes only (goose neck hand brake). The cars were  34' 11" in length, 7' 11'' in width, and 11' 4'' high. (Info taken from the web site of the Seashore Trolley Museum).

 

One car still serves at the Seashore Trolley Museum. The one example 8 window car they have is #396. This car survived in Boston as a work car prior to it’s move to Maine. It was also featured in a 1960’s film, “The Cardinal”. The museum also has several examples of single truck Boston cars as well.

 

Procedure

In this section of working on your Boston Elevated Railway, 8 window car, the K-28 controller will be added to the front platforms, couplers are added, a small life guard is added to the area under the platform, trucks are installed.

 

Controller: Note, this car had a different version of the K-controller, but the K-28 is also the correct size box. The controller should be placed on the platform (looking forward) to the left of the “goose neck” hand brake assembly that came with the Bachmann car.

 

Couplers: A small diameter brass wire was fashioned as a long u shape, and also has a small radious added to it. This acts as the tow bar bracket. A small scrap of wood was added under the platform at each end to hold the anchor plate for the tow bar to be attached. LRP #002 was added. Originally, these cars just had a straight tow bar with a pin hole at the end. For towing purposes, they added a small box shaped devise that would keep the tow bars in a straight line, so the cars and couplings did not buckle when stopping or pushing on the towed car. On this model, it was decided to just use LRP #002.

 

Life Guard: A small life guard has been added. Some surplus parts from kit LRP #003 were used. This kit comes with two sizes of fender moustaches, where one is only needed per kit and so this is a surplus part. (LRP is willing to sell the moustache part upon request). This fender or life guard originally was made to slide back and forth on a small angle iron on each side of the fender. On the model, they have been made stationary, and are affixed to the under floor (platform) area with brass rod and glue.

 

Trucks: This car originally had a Packham #14B4 truck under it. LRP #012 is a Brill version of a truck that would have been used in this same time period. Note on this model, the trucks under the car are for 2 1/2'' gauge, not the usual 1 3/4'' that most modelers use for the LGB type track gauge. Also, these cars originally had a 30'' wheel, and the trucks placed under the car are 33'' and so the car may appear a little higher on the trucks than it should. (30'' wheels are available from LRP upon special request).

 

To Install these, two small wooden bolsters were made from strip wood (3/4'' x 1/16'') and run the width of the car. Carefully measure your trucks to be sure they will still swing out past the platform knees. Once this is completed, glue them both to the underside of the floor, and later add the car body bolster plate to the center of the width of the wooden bolster. Drill a small hole for the screw to hold the trucks onto the car. Add the trucks. Be sure they are well secured to the car, so they do not fall off when the car is lifted from the tracks.

 

Remaining items in next installment:

Interior details, bumper on front and step details