ATHEARN IS JUST about my favourite model railway manufacturer in the world at the moment. Not only are its ‘HO’ scale locomotives top notch but it is one of the few companies that is paying serious attention to producing high quality freight cars. The 30,000gal ethanol tanker that it produced earlier this year, which came in for a little gentle criticism for being so modern, will be joined by another recent tank car (although thankfully a few years older). This is a Union Tank Car-built 16,000gal kaolin slurry car in the fourth quarter of 2006.

Athearn UTC 16,000gal kaolin slurry car

See here for PDF link to the first run release and here for the JPEG version of the same flyer.

These tank cars are perfect for my New England modelling scenario (of which more later), being used for carrying kaolin to the many paper producers in the North East of the USA, complementing the Atlas ACF-built vehicle, so I’ll be purchasing just about all the differently numbered models that I can get my hands on.

Apparently, this basic prototype is also good for a 15,200gal molten sulfur tank with only minimal modification, mainly to the saddle and filler areas, so hopefully Athearn will be releasing this version in the future too.

Prototype pictures here:
16,000gal kaolin tank - ENGX15180
16,000gal kaolin tank - UTLX301722
15,200gal molten sulfur tank - PPTX3455
15,200gal molten sulfur tank - PPTX3501