X31 & X32 Boxcar (Part 2) - PRR X32As from Boswer

PRR 59505, an X32 class auto-boxcar

The PRR's double door X32A class cars are a classic choice for auto parts and automobile service across the nation.  I should note that the X32As didn't have end doors, but did have good size side doors for loading larger items.

Pennsy had the following cars in 1950 ORER:
351 X32As from the 58800-59449 series listed in Autoparts service with special auto-parts racks installed, AAR classed as XML.

50 cars of X32A were fitted with permanent auto racks, which could be raised to load as conventional boxcars. AAR classification XMR.

297 cars in the 58800-59449 series were downgraded to plain XM boxcars

59 cars in the 60112-60171-series were downgraded to plain XM boxcars

The ORER notes list the individual cars that differed from the rest of the group of cars, so modeling exact cars historically for service is possible, but not to the level of which auto-plant/parts pool they were in unless additional documents or photographs are used.  Many other auto cars were pulled from X32B, X38, X26C, and X31 subclasses.

A History of Automobile Car Operations

Many Southern Pacific divisions had freight symbols which moved autoparts in established agreed routes which involved splitting the ownership of the assigned cars between several railroads by mileage of the route offered.  

SP North Coast Perishable with an automobile and auto-parts block, including a PRR X32, at the headend pass through Bealville.

These cars often would be sent to the auto parts plants to receive special racks or holding fixtures to hold the needed parts.  Some years the new models of automobiles would require adjustments to these racks before the new production could begin.  Therefore it was common on these routes to see mixtures of double and single door cars from multiple railroads, which were part of the same "pool" all moving the required parts to the assembly plants.

The automobile boxcars, which moved finished autos weren't as tightly restricted in which autos they could carry or where they would be taking them, but instead they would move around the nation to where the orders for the autos were.  Obviously some railroads would have their automobile boxcars in more tightly assigned service to support the auto assembly plants they serviced.

SP Autoparts & Automobile Operations

The Southern Pacific served automobile assembly plants in the Los Angeles area and San Francisco Bay Area.  Assembled autos from other assembly plants were also shipped into the SP served areas.

SP 64210 unloading new '56 Chevies at Sonoma depot, CA in 1955-56 - Troy Marmaduke collection

In the photo above we can see the two autos stacked on the right side of this SP 40ft Auto car have been unloaded from the Evans auto-rack and at least one more car is still on the rack to the left, with the shiny bumper showing above and to the left of the man.  This is at the Sonoma depot freight platform deck, with the ramp well used in this case to get the Chevies down to ground level.  This would be common for smaller towns to get freight to customers which did not have their own spurs.  Everyone would go down to the station to get their goods, even the local car dealer!

SP 67789, a Walthers single sheath DD boxcar, making a delivery to King Lumber, Bakersfield CA, LMRC circa 2018 photo.

Automobile boxcars moved not only automobiles and auto parts, but extra "automobile" cars could be seen moving pretty much any over-size covered load anywhere across the country.  Some loads requiring double doors or even end doors.  Downgraded "Automobile" cars on the SP didn't often loose their stenciling, but would be found in finished lumber service or other assignments.

"HH Goods"?

The Santa Fe Warbonnet article on the Wreck of the SCX at Cajon from 1949, or so, listed a consist with what each of the cars were carrying.  Several of the 50-odd cars that were listed showed "HH Goods", which were household goods.  These cars were not hauling goods for resale, but instead these were the Allied and Mayflower moving vans of the 1940s and early 1950s, but on rails.  If you wanted to move your family across the country, freight forwarders or other companies could be contracted to ship your goods.

A Family Story

SP Auto boxcar with "rough freight" or maybe "HH Goods" stuff at Owenyo - Rich McCutchan - owensvalleyhistory sp_narrow_g42c_sml

Recently, an on-line comment I read in a forum from Scott L Murdock. "My father started in SP’s engineering department in Ogden Utah. His first job transfer was to Sparks Nevada. SP provided him with a two auto boxcar for the move. He loaded his car in one end and furniture with belongings in the other end. When the boxcar got to Sparks the straps holding the auto had come loose. Luckily the car didn’t start rolling back and forth destroying his belongings!" Scott L Murdock

So there's plenty of options for waybills for "automobile" cars to be used for in our model railroad operations and even local assignments where automobiles might not be unloaded.  

Furniture Cars

A Seaboard car at LMRC stenciled for "Automoble-Furniture" service. 2011, Jason Hill photo

Some roads that didn't really supply automobile assembly plants or routes where auto parts cars would be supplied into a pool, such as the south-eastern US, would stencil their auto cars for "furniture" service, or even dual letter their cars for both.

Pennsy X32A "Automobiles" Cars

Well, enough on what we can use the auto cars for, lets get back to looking at a couple of Pennsy cars from Bowser kits.  

PRR 59505 - "Unassigned"  Car

The 50 foot X32As boxcars that I've picked up over the years are from Bowser and most are lettered for PRR.  I'll be looking at two examples of the class in this post.

Weathered PRR 59505 X32 class auto-boxcar from Bowser kit.

This is one of my earlier acquired cars.  The lettering on the kit shows it's from a Bowser production of the early 2000s I think.  The lettering is pretty good.  The spelled out road name is fairly close to Pennsy lettering style.

In the future, if I decide to do some upgrades, I should probably add a Evans Automobile Rack stripe to the door along with the chain tubes below the floor to put this car in general automobile loading.  This would also allow the car to roam west of the PRR with special large loads, such as aircraft parts to California from eastern sub-assembly plants.

PRR - "Assigned" Car

I picked up this model from a swap meet a few years back.  This car is from a newer Bowser production which has the lettering to assign the car to auto-parts/automobile plant at Grand Rapids, Michigan (Code "PD") included on the basic pad printing on the model.  

PRR 58977 with "Automobiles" lettering and return routing to "PD" placarding.

The car's tare date is showing 1945, so I'll probably be retaring the car for the late 1940s and early 1950s era.  The builder of this car did some rather overall airbrush weathering, which lacks much character that I like in my weathering.  So I'll probably do some adjustments to the weathering on this car when I have done the other tweaks to the car.

Missing handbrake staff, normal on all Bowser boxcar kits from 1990s and 2000s.

The older Bowser kits are missing the hand brake staff, which needs to be fabricated from wire and should have a clevis bell crank on the bottom, next to the coupler.

Underframe of a typical Bowser X32.  Many PRR X31/32s should have reservoir relocated.

Many of these kits I have built over the years have the centersill filled with weight to improve the car's center-of-gravity.  This model had damage to one coupler box cover and screw being knocked out.  It was pretty easy to fix that without much trouble.

In Closing

I'll probably do a few chalk marks on both these X32As to finish them up.  This series of X31/32 series boxcar blog posts will probably be 5-6 parts as I work my way through the various PRR sub-classes and construction details.

A Pennsy "Turtle Roof" X31F in the ATSF-SP interchange track at Bakersfield from TT/TO session in 2018, at LMRC.

If there's interest, I might do some blog posts on other automobile service cars that are easily found in the modeling community.

Jason Hill

Related Articles:

X31 & X32 Boxcars (Part 1) - NP X31 & X32 from Bowser