Micro-Trains - 800 00 080 - Boxcar, 30 Foot, Narrow Gauge - Colorado & Northwestern - 1024

Model Information: Micro-Trains introduced a Nn3 narrow gauge range in 1988 that includes a 30' boxcar, a 30' gondola, a 30' flat car and a caboose. The models are re-run occasionally since then.

Prototype History: A class of 750 boxcars, 30ft long and with a capacity of 25 tons, has been delivered to the D&RG by the American Car & Foundry in 1904; they were numbered from 3000 to 3749. In 1926, these boxcars were extensively rebuilt, keeping only a few iron parts from the original boxcars, but the new cars retained the same numbers. A large part of these boxcars remained in revenue service until the end of freight operations on the Rio Grande narrow gauge in 1968. Many boxcars of this class have been preserved today, including 45 on the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, about twenty in their original condititon on the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad (plus 22 other converted to passenger cars), 9 at the Georgetown Loop Railroad and another 4 at the Colorado Railroad Museum. All the Rio Grande boxcars were completely made of wood (body and frame), except for numbers 3000-3749 which received a steel roof during their 1926 rebuilding.

Road Name History: The C&N was established in 1897 with the goal of connecting a recently discovered gold mining region around Ward, Colorado to Boulder by way of Sunset. There was a brief flirtation with building the line as a 22” gauge tramway but plans for a 3’ gauge steam road won out. The C&N followed the route of the Greeley Salt Lake & Pacific up Boulder Canyon (the GSL&P was completely destroyed by flooding in 1894 and not rebuilt.) This time, C&N engineers marked out a line higher up the canyon side to avoid the flooding issue. They reached the first mines around Sunset in 1898 and came to an agreement for trackage rights on the Union Pacific Denver & Gulf to lay four miles of 3rd rail to reach the Pennsylvania Mill at Culbertson east of Boulder. That June, they reached the mines at Ward. The mainline from Boulder to Ward was 26 miles long and gained more than 4,100 vertical feet with grades as steep as 4.49% and curves as tight as 30 degrees. They also managed to avoid any tunneling.

Traffic levels were a bit disappointing and in 1903 the company was reorganized with “Railroad” replacing “Railway” in the name. In 1904, C&N built a 20 mile branch to the mining town of Eldora (they had vague dreams of building into Colorado’s Middle Park and the line to Eldora was a first step in that direction.) In hopes of attracting tourists into the mountains, C&N made another trackage rights agreement, this time with Colorado & Southern from Boulder into Denver’s Union Station in 1905. There was a brief ray of sunshine thanks to a new dam that began construction at Nederland, just east of Eldora. C&N was in a position to move men, equipment and material to the construction site but work on the dam turned out to be seasonal and inconsistent. An economic slowdown in 1907 suspended construction on the dam and the C&N fell back into receivership. In 1909, C&N was reorganized as the Denver Boulder & Western.

Brand/Importer Information: Micro-Trains is the brand name used by both Kadee Quality Products and Micro-Trains Line. For a history of the relationship between the brand and the two companies, please consult our Micro-Trains Collector's Guide.

Manufacturer Information: Micro-Trains Line split off from Kadee Quality Products in 1990. Kadee Quality Products originally got involved in N-Scale by producing a scaled-down version of their successful HO Magne-Matic knuckle coupler system. This coupler was superior to the ubiquitous 'Rapido' style coupler due to two primary factors: superior realistic appearance and the ability to automatically uncouple when stopped over a magnet embedded in a section of track. The success of these couplers in N-Scale quickly translated to the production of trucks, wheels and in 1972 a release of ready-to-run box cars.

Micro-Trains Line Co. split off from Kadee in 1990 to form a completely independent company. For this reason, products from this company can appear with labels from both enterprises. Due to the nature of production idiosyncrasies and various random factors, the rolling stock from Micro-Trains can have all sorts of interesting variations in both their packaging as well as the products themselves. When acquiring an MTL product it is very important to understand these important production variations that can greatly enhance (or decrease) the value of your purchase.

Please consult our Micro-Trains Collector's Guide