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I bought 5 older atlas cars off Ebay, mostly for kitbashing, but two of then are worth doing more with, I would like to re truck then for Lionel couplers, and I have a older set of Lionel trucks but the center plate on the bolster sits to high and the car does not look prototypical.  One is a flat the other is a gon  so changing trucks is the easy way, with truck mounted couples   Ideas and thoughts

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I bought 5 older atlas cars off Ebay, mostly for kitbashing, but two of then are worth doing more with, I would like to re truck then for Lionel couplers, and I have a older set of Lionel trucks but the center plate on the bolster sits to high and the car does not look prototypical.  One is a flat the other is a gon  so changing trucks is the easy way, with truck mounted couples   Ideas and thoughts

You could remove the bolster, I've done that before and it got it to the right height using Lionel Standard O trucks.  BTW, I would take any old Atlas plastic trucks off of you...I have a use for them.

Some thoughts.    First, as far as I remember, POLA did not make Atlas Cars.    POLA sold cars under the AHM brand name.    they had a 40 ft box, sort of 1923 ara, a steel reefer, a 40 gondola (now in the Lionel line I think), and a 40 ft flatcar.    they also had a bobber caboose, a european style little switcher and the Fairbanks Morse A  unit cliner.   for steam they came out with the 2 4-4-0s, an IHB 0-8-0 and a "casey Jones" 4-6-0.   

Atlas was made by Roco in Austria.    So it says POLA on the body, it is not Atlas.    Atlas had a more modern 40 ft boxcar, a 52 ft gondola, a plugdoor boxcar they call a reefer, and an Ore car.    they had a bobber caboose and a wide vision modern caboose.    they also did small switcher based on a US Plymouth, and they did the common F9 A unit.    The Atlas freight cars at least are now in the modern Atlas O train man line.   I don't know about the cabooses.    Atlas in that era, never did a Flat Car.

The santa fe boxcar in the photo above looks to me like a POLA/AHM product.    Atlas cars all had stirrups on the ends, that car does not.    It could be broken off.    However, the Atlas car has sort of a unique roof with a diagonal panel reinforcement formed in each panel.   That car does not appear to have that.    The atlas car is also a little taller since it represents a newer prototype.  

So given the photos and the reference to a flatcar in the group, I am guessing the cars are from the AHM line which came out about the same time.

I bought 5 older atlas cars off Ebay, mostly for kitbashing, but two of then are worth doing more with, I would like to re truck then for Lionel couplers, and I have a older set of Lionel trucks but the center plate on the bolster sits to high and the car does not look prototypical.  One is a flat the other is a gon  so changing trucks is the easy way, with truck mounted couples   Ideas and thoughts

Peterson Supply in Oregon used to sell plugs for the old 1970's Atlas AHM cars. You then can use Weaver/MTH bolsterless trucks with the 2/56 screw.

On mine (I have about 10), I used the same truck as the wheels worked for the hi-rail track.  Then I cut off any non-claw hook couplers and designed my own that I printed out.

If you go this route, the STL for printing is located in the 3D Printing Repository under the Miscellaneous Forums Section in the  Parts - Conversions, Upgrades, Unavailable section -> Coupler by C&O Allan

I can also send you the .stl directly if you need it.

To:   PRRJIM   All 5 cars have Atlas and made in Austria molded in the plastic frame with what I call hook / horn couplers like HO with a large knuckle that does not open.  I like the idea of the self centering coupler, if it would just work with my Lionel and the cheep wheels I can change on the Atlas trucks 

To: PRRHORSESHOECURVE     i LOOKED AT MTH and WEAVER TRUCKS, BUT 30 TO 40 BUCKS IS OUT OF MY PRICE RANGE.  i HAVE A COUPLE OF MENARDS CARS AND I THINK THEY MIGHT WORK, 20 FOR A SET OF TRUCKS IS MY LIMIT, BUT I WILL CHECK OUT PETERSON'S

TO: JOHN23        i WILL KEEP YOU IN MIND       



BILL

Here's a thought - keep the old plastic Atlas trucks. Really good-looking, and their dummy couplers mate with standard 3RO couplers dependably, and they "operate" as well as some of the "operating" 3RO couplers (Weaver plastic, for example; heck, some Weaver die-cast examples) do in actual practice. I do snip off the vertical uncoupling rod, as it is useless in my environment.

The cars are light; weigh them down a bit.

I actually use the Atlas plastic trucks to upgrade old 2RO to 3RO, or get rid of the high-bolster, low-end plastic 3R trucks. 

@D500 posted:

Here's a thought - keep the old plastic Atlas trucks. Really good-looking, and their dummy couplers mate with standard 3RO couplers dependably, and they "operate" as well as some of the "operating" 3RO couplers (Weaver plastic, for example; heck, some Weaver die-cast examples) do in actual practice. I do snip off the vertical uncoupling rod, as it is useless in my environment.

The cars are light; weigh them down a bit.

I actually use the Atlas plastic trucks to upgrade old 2RO to 3RO, or get rid of the high-bolster, low-end plastic 3R trucks.

I do this too.

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