One puzzle for me recently has been assembling more working examples of sprung Graceline trucks. Their Andrews trucks were introduced in 1941, and the other versions are products they were developing and sold to some extent early in the WWII era. Their post-war successor, Transportation Models, sold a different truck that took the refinements further (but not very well executed, I have never seen one successfully built up).

If you have any of these Graceline trucks around you may not have good feelings about them. The wheelsets shipped out were terrible (the plastic wheels were undersized in every dimension! Don’t track well and look very small in the big trucks), the wheelbase is (with one exception, seen in this photo) well over length, but the even bigger problem is A LOT of these have issues with the castings. Their earlier products have held up better.

However, in reality, by now if a vintage casting was going to go bad it has gone bad already. In various purchases, I have obtained these trucks, including a group of kits for the Andrews trucks. Also, years ago, I had tried to work on these and have on hand usable reproduction bolsters from that project. In short, I had enough parts around to think about working on them again with the Graceline hopper project also underway.

The frustration I had with these in the past was my reproduction sideframes were not stiff enough and also the wheels fall out easily. The few working vintage trucks I had come across all had some iteration of Famoco wheelsets, but those are so variable (tread width and flange issues) that even then they were not very usable.

Another issue in my past work trying to build or rehab these trucks was using modern axles that have the > ends. What I ultimately learned with that was that vintage trucks that are equalized at all actually need blunt end axles or the wheels tend to fall out when handling the car.

Periodically I would note that I had also saved a group of the “oddball” early S-C freight wheelsets with bakelite wheels (like were used on the front truck of the 4-6-0). They track fine, but need a truck with a wide opening and are difficult to use in Scale-Craft trucks, they need an exceptionally long bolster. But I found that these wheels can work great in the Graceline trucks, at least the Andrews trucks, they are in the truck on the left in the top photo.

The other story to tell is of what was some product development being done by Graceline during the war years. According to their catalog from early in the war the trucks available then were the sprung trucks, “the finest detailed and smoothest operating trucks in 00.”

No. 181–A.R.A.
No. 182–Andrews
No. 184–Arch Bar

I had at some point early on stumbled onto examples of two versions of the A.R.A (Bettendorf) truck, all using the same bolster. I actually made molds of the “big” one years ago, which has a wheelbase that nearly matches the Andrews truck. There is also a “small” version that is scaled pretty well for OO, seen at the bottom of the comparison photo and at the right in the top photo.

I have not built up the arch bar example and probably won’t, they are somewhat overscale and fragile. I have a couple working pair of the big Bettendorf trucks (seen also in the final photo, on the left), those I did make work with careful adjustment using modern wheelsets with > axles. The one that intrigues me today is the small Bettendorf. I have two pair I did just get working. The design needs an axle that is very short and square, the journal boxes are small. I have parts to make several more pair but after a thorough search I don’t have any more suitable wheelsets on hand. A project for another day, as the built up trucks really are very nice.

I should mention there are two styles of bolsters. The ones packaged with the Andrews truck kits I have is lighter in cross section but none have been usable. The heavier style works with all these sideframes, and is what I reproduced. 

The springs are not easy to put in. Among the Graceline springs I had the larger diameter ones look better. A lot of those same springs were too big (up and down) and it helped to cut them down at least a little. As I ran out of those I switched to what I am sure are O-scale springs which work pretty well.

I have built up or worked over seven pair of Andrews trucks, mostly with the S-C wheelsets but one has other vintage wheelsets that happened to fit, some iteration of Famoco. I mentioned earlier that I have unopened packages of these trucks, just like shipped out by Graceline. Every bolster I have checked so far has been unusable and I also put the side frames to a simple test. Does it break in my hands? About 3 of 4 cracks easily if not already broken. I can squeeze out one more pair of Andrews trucks from parts on hand (when more wheelsets are located), and have more than enough for the hopper project now.

On that project, a brief update is I have a car together, I plan to work up a frame mold, and have materials to move forward more when the weather cools off a bit, which it will soon. Projects are moving slowly, but I have enjoyed puzzling over them which certainly is what keeps me going in American OO.