This all-new production of these ready-to-run Brainerd boxcars from Moloco covers several new lettering variations for Northern Pacific and Burlington Northern, as well as an undecorated kit.
With freight tonnage growing in volume, in 1955, Northern Pacific’s own Brainerd Car Shops in Brainerd Minn., began building 50-foot long general service boxcars. Unlike most double-doored boxcars of the period, these cars had the 15-foot wide door opening centered on the sides of the car, instead of being offset to one side. These cars utilized off-the-shelf carbody components supplied by Stanray, including ends and roof panels and 7.5’ wide sliding doors supplied by Youngstown.
Moloco’s model represents the 50-foot XM cars produced from NP’s Brainerd Shops beginning in 1956, with car sides supplied by Youngstown, distinct with a pronounced dip in the side sills.
These premium quality replicas exemplify the state of the art in model research, design and construction with ultra-fine pad printed lettering and data positioned according to photos for each road number. Each car comes with a vast array of details including separately applied NP-specific ladders, etched metal running boards where appropriate, and metal stirrup steps for durability. Underpinning each car are 70-ton trucks with CNC-machined metal wheelsets and Kadee scale-head metal knuckle couplers. Each model is presented fully-assembled and ready-to-run right from the box for $69.70 each. Undecorated kits are $52.70 each. Available now from authorized dealers or direct.
Moloco Trains, molocotrains.com
Leading off this new run from Moloco is a new variation of the arched “Northern Pacific” lettering scheme. Unlike the first production, this version depicts prototype cars built in February 1957 with a new variation of NP’s Monad herald with “RAILWAY” spelled out at the bottom together with a heavier weight arched “NORTHERN PACIFIC” lettering as compared to the first run.
Northern Pacific updated their graphics from the small arched “Northern Pacific” lettering to a ginormous “NP” to the left of the doors, and a much larger Monad logo to the right side of the car. The first iteration of this large “NP” scheme included periods after the N and P., perhaps a nod to traditional reporting mark designations years before. Also, due to the increased size of the Monad herald to eight feet in diameter, the “Vista-Dome” slogan had to be written in four lines instead of one. New for this Moloco production are cars with this first version of the large graphics with the big “N.P.” and 8-foot Monad. Also offered in this production is the later version of the large graphics, but with a plain large “NP” (no periods), and no “Vista-Dome” slogan, but with stacked reporting marks (unlike the first run), and no running boards on the roof.
In March 1970, the Northern Pacific, Great Northern, Burlington and SP&S railroads were granted permission to merge and form the Burlington Northern Railroad. Many of these Brainerd-built 50-footers were soon repainted into BN’s bright Cascade Green colors and renumbered into BN’s 235000 number series. Unlike Moloco’s first release that addressed BN’s 1972 rebuilds in the 245000 series, this new production offers these early BN repaints in the 235000 number series.
