Athearn HO Scale: 57' Trinity Spine Car - BNSF

MODEL FEATURES:

• Decorated models fully-assembled and ready to run out of the box

• Highly-detailed, injection-molded body

• Precision die-cast metal spine structure

• Etched metal walkways

• Separately applied brake piping

• Highly detailed customer applied trailer hitches

• 53’ trailer and container are perfect loads for the 57’ spine car

• Fine ladder detail

• Weighted for optimal performance

• 33” solid nickel silver wheels with RP25 contours operate on all popular brands of track

• McHenry scale knuckle spring couplers installed

• Window packaging for easy viewing plus interior plastic blister safely holds the model for convenient storage

• Machined metal wheels

• Minimum radius: 20”

PROTOTYPE AND BACKGROUND INFO:

Intermodal transportation requires specialized rail equipment which is, on occasion, too specialized. To allow more flexibility in loading containers and trailers at terminals all-purpose spine cars were developed. These cars can be configured to allow loading of trailers of varying lengths, from 28’ pups to 53’ high capacity units. With the trailer hitches collapsed containers can also be loaded. 40’, 45’ 48’ and 53’ containers call all be accommodated on these cars as well as 20’ models provided they are mounted to a chassis.

The prototype for our model is based on a Trinity-built car owned by the TTX Company. These 70-ton cars (TTX class RAF30A) numbered TTRX 360817-361116 first appeared on the rails in the late 1990’s. The Athearn model is faithful to the prototype allowing modelers to load a variety of trailers and containers.