Model Train Talk South Africa

Model Train Talk Workshop => Beginner Q & A => Topic started by: LooVille on March 20, 2015, 11:58:02 AM

Title: What is a Scale Test Car ??
Post by: LooVille on March 20, 2015, 11:58:02 AM

OK, so I did not know this exist  :-[

So I saw it in BigEd's collection and when he ran it at the last Train show lots of guys asked about it, so I decided to do some research and post something here. Maybe more of us can learn something  :thumb:

To find them is quite a mission and they are extremely expensive for their size if you compare it to normal rolling stock. That's just my opinion.
On ebay there is a few $25.00 excluding shipping another one is $11.65 excluding shipping. Shipping is listed at about $25 so you end up paying anything from R400 to R600 just to get it here and then duties is going to charge you another 14% plus minus.

Here is the deffinition...
A scale test car is a type of railroad car in maintenance of way service. Its purpose is to calibrate the weighing scales used to weigh loaded railroad cars. Scale test cars are of a precisely known weight so that the track scale can be calibrated against them.
Cars are weighed for various purposes. These include:

• Axle load limits - Cars are weighed to ensure they are within the axle load limits of the railroad
• Customer billing - Cars are weighed to determine (by subtracting the car's unloaded, or tare weight from the total weight) the amount of cargo loaded. This is used to bill the railroad's customers for the carriage of bulk commodities, so it is essential that the track scales be accurate.

Many scale test cars were small, old railroad cars carrying heavy metal weights as their superstructure. Scale test cars needed special handling so they would not suffer damage, which might alter their weight. They were reweighed periodically on accurate scales at the railroad's shops

Here is a few pictures of the real thing as well as the N Scale version.

Title: Re: What is a Scale Test Car ??
Post by: capeklr on March 20, 2015, 01:24:06 PM

I knew that the German Railways has them, seen photo's of some, but this is the first time that I see photo's of American ones.
Will try and find some photo's of the German ones and post here.

Title: Re: What is a Scale Test Car ??
Post by: BigEd on March 26, 2015, 10:30:43 AM

Unfortunately for LOOVILLE he made the mistake of asking me to source it for him. I found it and he had to pay... :biggrin: