Con-Cor - 0003-540000 - Passenger Car, Lightweight, Corrugated - Undecorated - 5-Pack

Specific Item Information: 1940-1970’s era “N” Corrugated Side Rivarossi models 5 car sets. — 1 Baggage/ Railway Post Office car (about a scale 78 Ft long) — 2 Coach Car (about a scale 78 Ft long — 1 Round tail end Observation car (about a scale 82 Ft 1ong) — 1 Mid-Train Dome car, (a scale 85 Ft long (Con-Cor) This set was originally shown as new in the 1997 Walthers N&Z Reference Book.

Model Information: 1940-1970’s era “N” Corrugated Side Rivarossi models 5 car sets.
Each Set consists of:
— 1 Baggage/ Railway Post Office car (about a scale 78 Ft long)
— 2 Coach Car (about a scale 78 Ft long
— 1 Round tail end Observation car (about a scale 82 Ft 1ong)
— 1 Mid-Train Dome car, (a scale 85 Ft long)

Prototype History: In the post-war period, passenger rail service boomed. In order to increase efficiency, the railroads set to replacing their old wood, steel and concrete heavyweight passenger cars with newer lightweight, streamlined cars. The new cars were made from stainless steel, aluminum and Cor-Ten steel. These cars required less motive power to pull and were cheaper to manufacture. Production was also concentrated in a few manufacturers rather than each railroad making its own. This led to standardization which further reduced costs. The new "lightweight" cars were also given "streamlined" designs to make them more visually appealing. Budd, Pullman Standard and ACF were all well known manufacturers of these cars.

Corrugated cars were developed for strength of construction. Similar to a cardboard box, the design presented a greater material strength than their smoothside brethren. These cars were not typically painted.

Road Name History: Although they may be molded in color, unpainted and unlettered, undecorated products are marketed to modelers who seek to custom decorate their models for private roads and/or road and/or company names that were not commercially produced by any of the major manufacturers.

Undecorated models are frequently also unassembled or only partially assembled and required modelers to be comfortable with glue, paint and sometimes solder in order to prepare their models for display. Materials for these models can vary but often include plastic, pewter and resin. Models may or may not come with decals or other decorations such as plastic signage, railings and ladders to enhance the appearance of the final product.

Brand/Importer Information: Con-Cor has been in business since 1962. Many things have changed over time as originally they were a complete manufacturing operation in the USA and at one time had upwards of 45 employees. They not only designed the models,but they also built their own molds, did injection molding, painting, printing and packaging on their models.

Currently, most of their manufacturing has been moved overseas and now they import 90% of their products as totally finished goods, or in finished components. They only do some incidental manufacturing today within the USA.

Important Note: The Con-Cor product numbering can be very confusing. Please see here in the article how to properly enter Con-Cor stock numbers in the TroveStar database.