Wheel Car

Note: This is not a 'How To', but a display of a completed 'Scratchbuilt Project' showing what can be done with some materials and time. It does not have to have been judged for AP Points.

Click on small photo for the larger

October 26, 2004
I would like to submit a photograph of a Gould 40' 50 ton flat car that was kit-bashed by my dad around 1982. He wanted to build a wheel car but was unable to find the needed parts. He wrote to the Gould Company asking for assistance in locating the necessary items to finish the project. Two weeks later, he received the parts in an envelope along with a letter from the owner, thanking him for choosing Gould to kit-bash. The car is equipped with #5 Kadee couplers and Kadee sprung trucks.

Dad and mom never had a lot of money and he was forced to sell nearly everything he built. I know he was taken advantage of a few times. Anyway, his railroad knowledge went back to when he was a boy and rode the switchers behind his house in Chester, SC. He said the engineers would tell him about the railroads that ran behind his house. Dad was so good, he could hear a steam engine's whistle and tell you what it was, who made it, and which railroad owned it. I do not exaggerate.

I never met a man who carried so much knowledge in his head. Many a time I wished that knowledge could have been transferred to me. His name was Fred Mangum, and he lived a very colorful life.

Jim Mangum

Jim is 66 and says that he inherited his dad's hobby a year or so before his dad died in 1996. Jim has many of the kits his father assembled, including some craftsman kits. His father was a model maker going back to the early 40s. - rph

If you wish to submit a photo for consideration, send the photo (no larger than 800x600 please) to TJ Klevar along with a description of how you built it, techniques you used, and any special tips you wish pass along.