ATHEARN - HO ACF 4600 3-Bay Center Flow Hopper, VTR # 6008 - (G15430)

MODEL FEATURES:


• Three body styles:

• Early - High side ladder & brake wheel, single side stiffener

• Mid - Low brake wheel, short side ladders both ends, single side stiffener

• Late - As above but with double side stiffeners (post 1971)

• Round or trough hatches

• Photo-etched metal roofwalk

• Separately applied wire grab irons and stirrup steps

• Numerous detailed outlet versions

• Separate brake cylinder, valve, and air reservoir with wire brake plumbing

• Multiple roadnumbers

• Fully-assembled and ready-to-run out of the box

• Accurately painted and printed

• Highly-detailed, injection molded body

• Separately applied brake wheel

• Screw mounted trucks

• Body-mounted McHenry operating scale knuckle couplers

• Weighted for optimum performance

• Genesis 100-ton trucks with 36 machined metal wheels and animated spinning roller bearing caps


PROTOTYPE AND BACKGROUND INFO:

The 3-bay Center Flow covered hopper first entered service in the mid-1960s, built by American Car and Foundry. The cars handle loads such as grain, corn, and similar bulk commodities. The Center Flow design relies on the car s rounded body to provide structural strength - eliminating the traditional center sill and making gravity unloading easier.

Our 3-bay car represents the common 4600 cu.ft. capacity version. The railroads looking to replace their aging 40 box cars in grain service needed a modern hopper design - one that could operate within the tighter Plate B clearances for light branchline and industrial service. ACF s design won them many contracts from a plethora of railroads. One can find these cars still in revenue service today in grain trains and other similar service.

Item Specifics