The AAR had a standard 70 ton rib side hopper, however New York Central made changes to the AAR design in 1956, and their variation became popular with more railroads than the original AAR standard. These cars were lower and shorter than later 90 and 100 ton cars but had more ribs (making for 14 full length panels.) Thirteen of the fifteen ribs were welded in place instead of riveted. These cars were built by a number of builders from 1956 through the late 60s with many serving through the 1990s and perhaps beyond...

 Pittsburgh & Lake Erie was known as “The Little Giant” and for good reason. This 233 mile railroad generated so much traffic that they required a freight car fleet of more than 25,000 cars - that’s 107 cars for every mile of mainline! P&LE had over 6,000 of these hoppers with this group arriving from Bethlehem in the Spring of 1957. P&LE was controlled by New York Central and these cars carried the familiar “New York Central System” oval logo. NYC successor Penn Central would sell off their interest in P&LE after the creation of Conrail. P&LE became independent until 1993 when they were acquired by CSX. This roadname will be available in 6 road numbers.

Features:

?Friction bearing or roller bearing trucks as appropriate for each road name
? fully molded air tank and valve with piping, slope sheet braces
? body mounted brake hose detail
?separate brake cylinder, rod and lever detail (a first on an N scale open hopper!)
? body mounted magnetically operating couplers
? coal load
? diecast slope sheets and center sill
? and injection molded plastic sides, ends and hopper doors

All runs will be available in multiple road numbers (a single and one of each of the multi-packs gives you one of each road number available.)

Reserve Before December 10,2010

For May 2011 Delivery