Fruehauf 40' Trailers are in - Decals for Preferred Pool/BN

[riogrande]

Athearn's new round of 40' Fruehauf TOFC trailers are in stock now so I decided to splurge to add some versions I didn't have, including two pre-dec's (white ATSF and white Chessie) and two plain whites. Even at the new, much higher price, some road names are selling well.

I've seen photo's of a couple schemes on the rails prior to the advent of 45' trailers being common - including the 40' white with green BN logo and the 40' (pre-stretched) Preferred Pool trailers. One reference is a photo of D&RGW train 101 in Rio Grande in Color Volume 2: Utah on page 105; it is an all TOFC hot shot train appearing to have virtually all 40' trailers. Among this train are visible three 40' white Preferred Pool trailers.

Does anyone know when these white 40' Preferred Pool (with the vertical black band logo) were first out on the rails?

Where would a good place be for me to look for decals for Preferred Pool and green BN for 40' white trailers?

Thanks

[Spikre]

James,
Micro Scale used to have some of the sets You want,
but they may have been for Aluminium trailers ?
seem to recall doing a Preferred Pool trailer way back
when.
Spikre

[riogrande]

It may be a treasure hunt. I recall a guy doing trailers for magazine articles referring to some of the 40' trailers of that time as FRP - fiberglass reinforced plywood trailers. I've seen the odd white BN 40' trailers in late 70's/early 80's D&RGW TOFC trains, and the white Preferred Pool trailers appeared to be common then too. From Jim Eager's notes many of those were later stretched (Athearn did do the 45' Preferred Pool from the A-line tooling that used the 5' extensions for example). I've been hoping Athearn would offer the white 40' BN and Preferred Pool but the years keep ticking off and nothing so far so figured it was time to just get a couple plain white and decal'em.

[fr8kar]

Jim, the decals you're looking for are Microscale 87-454. Carter Osborne wrote an article on these trailers in the June 1994 Mainline Modeler, but no time frame data is given. However, he did indicate the fleet of Preferred trailers was divided in ownership among Availco, Seaboard Coast Line and Milwaukee Road.

[riogrande]

Ryan,

Thank you for that reference - another treasure hunt! It would be great to find a good article on the Preferred Trailers in the earlier days.

It does appear for HO TOFC trailers, just like with autoracks, the period most lacking is the late 1970's thru early 1980's - IOW the last ~6 or so years of 40' trailers before 45' trailers began ramping up.

[stottman]

Model RailroadING and Railmodel Journal had some articles in the early 90 as well. I want to say written by Dave Casdorph.

I know they have mostly disappeared off Trainlife, but be sure to check those out... I never had a subscription to any Model RR magazines, and those two were the ones I would buy most often as they had lots of little nitpicky articles like that. Now they are especially useful for period modelers.

[atsfan]

There used to be a guy at Timonium with crates of decals for you to try Jim.

[riogrande]

I checked fleabay and their appears to be some there too. Wish those Athearn 40' Fruehaufs weren't so dang expensive now but I've managed to treasure hunt most of the 2-packs I needed; this batch of singles were all repeats of 2-packs except the white ATSF, but I never managed to find the Chessie 2-packs, so one will have to do! Of course the plain white "owner" versions made way back round 2007/8 are looooong gone.

[surlyknuckle]

Word to the wise-- the trailers are pretty nice...I picked up 5 of them myself. But man, Athearn used that gummy, rubber-cement type glue on the landing gear. As soon as you plop the trailer down, it falls flat because the landing gear just isn't held in by anything. I've spent the last few nights drilling #76 holes in the landing gear parts, and using brass wire c/a'd in place to secure them better. Works like a charm, and plenty sturdy. Were previous runs subject to this problem? Simple project, but it's always a pain trying to drill tiny holes in smalls parts like that without destroying them...

[milgentrains]

Nov 20, 2015 11:38:44 GMT -8 fr8kar said:

Jim, the decals you're looking for are Microscale 87-454. Carter Osborne wrote an article on these trailers in the June 1994 Mainline Modeler, but no time frame data is given. However, he did indicate the fleet of Preferred trailers was divided in ownership among Availco, Seaboard Coast Line and Milwaukee Road.

When did the Preferred Pool trailers disappear from service?

[rockfan]

87-233 also has preferred pool. It has pool, rock, co-op and sf.

[riogrande]

Rockfan, those are the sets I have seen so far - combined sets with several one each type on a single sheet. I'd rather find a set with all 40' foot Preferred Pool but depends on what I can dig up.

Steve, I do not know when the Preferred Pool disappeared from service but from video's and photo's the 45' Preferred Pool ran during my time period of interest, which appears to be from introduction, around 1982 (when the 45' trailers started to show up on the rails in large numbers) thru the end of the 1980's. I'm not sure if there were any still around into the 1990's. They were very common on the D&RGW TOFC trains in the 80's - you'd see many of them in a single train. I have a 1987 video "Rio Grande West" and there is a TOFC train where I could count around 8 or so just in a part of a run-by sequence.

I'm trying to fill in some 40' trailers for the 1970's however, and I haven't been able to find much photographic evidence aside from one or two photo's, but one I have you can see most of the TOFC train from a distance and there appear to be 3 40' Preferred Pool trailers, along with latter day Southern, ICG, ATSF, Chessie, and a number of plain Jane trailers. It's not easy to find photo's where you can ID trailers, esp from the 1970's and early 80's. The Train Worx drop frame will be a welcome addition next year and I've emailed them about doing another one of the N-scale 40' trailers in HO - City Market and Rio Grande. They informed me that if the drop frame are successful they will seriously consider doing other trailers in HO too.

[rockfan]

Riogrande, I'm not going to use the preffered pool decals so if you want send me a message and I can send you that part of the sheet.

[riogrande]

rockfan, pm sent.

BTW, I found some 40' trailer photo's on Qstation:

This shot shows the Southern (similar to the recent Athearn re-run 40' Fruehauf in that scheme) and a drop frame (Trainworx next year) on a duel 45' ATSF flat car- so must be around 1982/83 I'm guessing. Looks like a SCL trailer barely visible on the next car.



www.athearn.com/Products/Default.aspx?ProdID=ATH73333

NAC 45' trailer in this photo and a silver ATSF barely in view (probably 40' Fruehauf - again, Athearn past offering):



This looks like a prototype shot if the recent white ATSF 40' Fruehauf:



Athearn offered their 40' Exterior Post trailers in ATSF - not exact but a good stand-in for this trailer: