Sorry, the photos would not load so I removed this message.
I regarded making open platform side gate and end railing sections for 19th century suburban coaches.

Maybe later?
Ed Bommer

John and all,
I had posted a rough drawing for the gate/railing section used on the Staten Island cars built from 1884 to 1910. My reference was several photos showing the gate/railings from different angles.

They would be used on Pullman Palace Plan 70 suburban coaches of 1884 that I plan to build for my recently finished Forney. A drawing from 1879 for that car was also posted, along with a prototype photo. Plan 70 cars were built from 1879 to about 1900. I would need 40 castings as each car would uses eight of them. My drawing was made for an end railing section that could be used as a gate by trimming off one end.

Because the prototype railing and gate panels were made of ornamental iron work (1/2" thick x 1/1/2" wide strap iron and 3/4"diameter iron rod) they would be extremely delicate made to actual scale.

In the past, similar cast metal gate/railing sets were made by Q Car Co. for their open platform BMT el car kits, now long out of production. The two part gate/railing sets are no longer in stock.

My thoughts were -
* Make a master pattern and molds for casting them in a low temp metal or some sort of resin?
* Could they be laser cut from sheet brass - about .020" thick (which is about 1" in O scale)?
* What about 3 D printing and if so, what medium would work best?

The problem is that that these gates and railing sections are on the open platform end sills of the car, making them vulnerable to damage. So they need to be reasonably strong as well as replaceable using extra spare parts.

Ed Bommer

Ed, Seems to me like a nickel-silver etch would be your best bet to meet all your requirements and stay in scale. I'd specify half hard metal so it has a little return to it. As always, Tom Dempsey

Hi John,

My Pullman Palace Plan P-70 coaches of the 1880's have been on hold since then, as I've been working on other stuff that had been started but never finished. The Plan 70 cars are intended for the brass Forney I worked on under "Brass Mongering' some time back. They were designed as rapid transit commuter coaches - 'rapid transit' being new idea then. It used short trains on frequent scheduling with high level station platforms for safety and efficiency in boarding and alighting from the cars.

Here is an initial sketch for the end platform gates and panels. The car end platform has four of these, all the same size with right hand end trimmed as needed to suit the application. A lot more work is needed here. I really miss the old WIN 98 and XP image management programs I had in the past for such work. WIN 10 will not accept them and modern replacements tend to out-think what one wishes to do.

A bit fuzzy but a Plan 70 car is on the right in this photo. Fragile as this car may look, quite a few in NY el service were electrified in the 1890's and run to the late 1940's. A few were shipped west to the Key System in Oakland during WW II to help shipyard workers meet their shifts. Two I think, are still there in museums.

Last is a copy of an 1879 Pullman drawing for the Plan 70 Palace coach. Notice the lack of dimensions? Only general overall dimensions were provided then. The master and journeyman car builders in the shop did all the rest in standardizing the parts and assemblies working from the scaled drawing which was done to 1" to the foot scale.

I had the windows custom laser cut - there are 36 identical windows per car. I forgot to also get the clerestory sides laser cut! I also need to mill some bass wood for making up the deck roofs.

Sometimes the scope of work on this elephant waiting next to my workshop table scares me!

Forward one step at time,
Ed Bommer

I really miss the old WIN 98 and XP image management programs I had in the past for such work. WIN 10 will not accept them and modern replacements tend to out-think what one wishes to do.

Indeed, and just why I still have an XP laptop on the shelf that's dedicated to just one bit of software that I have that I cannot afford to "lease" a more modern version of for use on my working desktop computer.