I don't know when it happened but sometime after 1906 the waycars started to
get built new with steel underframes.
There were actually two different steel underframes... one for the cars as
built new with them and one for the retrofitted
cars. And, of course, the retrofits came in two different lengths... one for
30' bodies and one for 28'.
It is interesting to note that some of the 28' cars received 30' underframes
and were stretched to fit the underframes.
Knowing how cheap the Q was, it was probably because they had 30' frames on
hand and didn't want to waste them.
The 28' cars were stretched in a number of different ways.... with the new
section added between the three windows
and the cupola, between the windows and the end, and some even had a fourth
matching (or not) window added in
the stretched area.
Wreck rebuilds or otherwise resulted in a number of oddballs.... like the car
saved (not yet "preserved" as it is in pretty
rough shape) that has a four window window in the middle in place of the three
window style.
I think the more generous steps made out of steel instead of wood went with the
application of steel underframes but
haven't researched that either; ditto the disappearance of the "Possum Belly"
tool boxes, but that may have predated
the removal of the truss rods on wood underframe cars.
No construction drawings of 28' cars have surfaced; the closest we've unearthed
was a floor plan for a small batch of
30' three window cars built as such with the same windows as four window cars.
Charlie Vlk
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