As other freight cars came on the market with better-operating trucks and couplers, the Atlas cars faded from the scene. Their fine level of detail, however, continued to make them popular at swap meets.

Enter Andy Petersen of Petersen Supply sensing a market for two of the former Atlas body styles that no one else was manufacturing as full-scale cars, Andy once again began importing 52' gondola and the cattle car. However, he has made two improvements to upgrade these cars into first-class rolling stock that is truly ready-to-run: Weaver trucks and couplers, and concealed metal weights.

A plastic plug has been inserted into the large hole in each truck bolster (which formerly held the snap-in truck pin), enabling Weaver trucks to be attached with a normal screw.

The old Atlas cars had a plastic piece in the underframe that represented wooden flooring. Since this was visible only when the car was upside down, the realistic effect of the flooring was somewhat wasted. The Petersen cars have a sheet metal weight instead of the plastic flooring. Combined with Weaver trucks, this produces a car with rolls freely yet is heavy enough to really hug the rails.

I've stated the minimum radius as 031 because both cars easily negotiate 031 curves and standard post-war Lionel 022 switches. However, you can get these cars through 027 curves at moderate speeds, and the cattle car just barely clears the current production Lionel 027 switches. The gondola, however, because of its length, will not clear the Lionel 027 switch machine.

Appearance
The level of detail on both the cattle car and the gondola is very good, on the same level we've come to expect from Weaver, MTH and others. Side and end ladders are separately applied detail parts, as are the end brake wheels and brake wheel platforms. Rivet detail is abundant and nicely done. The underbody brake riggings is more detailed than other brands of ready-to-run cars, and on the cattle car this is quite visible if you're at eye level with the car. On the gon. this detail is hidden by the lower side panels.

The gondola has wood grain molded into it's interior floorboards. The cattle car has its doors molded in place, enabling the door tracks to be scale size; an operating door often requires an oversize door track to work easily (and I suspect few modelers would really use an operating cattle car door). Our sample cattle car did arrive with a slight hump in the roof walk - a condition that was easily remedied by popping off the press-fit roorwalk and removing a small bit of flash around one of the roofwalk mounting holes.

Although these cars are manufactured in Austria, assembly and painting are handled by Crown Model Products in Massachusetts. The paint and lettering on our samples was up to Crown's usual high standards: Lettering was crisp and opaque, even with white or yellow letters on a dark red or brown gondola. Paint was evenly and flawlessly applied. On our Union Pacific cattle car with yellow sides and silver roof and ends, the masking between the colors was very crisp. This particular car, by the way, is a special run available in six road numbers exclusively from O Scale West, 704 Lakebird Dr, Sunnyvale CA 94089 (see ad in Run 152, April 1997). Other Petersen cars available in three road numbers per paint scheme.

The cattle cars do have end numbers, although the car in our photos does not because it was rushed to us for a photo session. The gondolas, however, do not have end numbers because they are too long to fit in the lettering press used by many O scale manufacturers.

Prototypes
Both gondola and cattle car are models of cars manufactured in the 1940s and `50's. A Union Pacific publicity photo from the 1950s shows a train of 40' stock cars in the yellow and silver paint scheme, led by a pair of yellow FA diesels. Similar cattle cars ran into the 1960s, usually in solid trains on tight schedules, to protect their live cargo, which had to be periodically fed and watered at rest stops. Cattle cars are nearly gone from the rails today, as are the massive stock yards in Chicago and other midwestern cities that were their destinations.

Gondola carts have fared better. Although cars like the Petersen model would be found mostly in work train service today, more modern versions of this body style are still at work hauling almost anything that doesn't need to be in a covered car. The long 52' version represented by this model is sometimes referred to as a "mill gon," because it was often used to haul craps and such to steel mills.