Anyone know if a diner from the Silver Meteor exists in N Scale, preferably phase VI? Here's a photo: http://www.railroadfan.com/gallery/albums/userpics/10012/021_21.JPG Kato makes the entire train except this car.
The only way to get a slab side diner like what you have linked to is to use the Brass Car Sides NP Budd dining car side set. The Concor ATSF coach can serve as a core though the roof vents would not be correct for this sort of car. I would recommend that you use sheet styrene, cut to size and scribed to match the slabs etched in the side since they should protrude slightly and use the same to create the distinctive trim along the bottom of the letterboard. Conversely you could take a California Zephyr dining car, remove all the skirting and paint it to match. While a bit quicker of a way the Burlington dining cars were what Amtrak decided to replicate when they started rebuilding their diners with HEP. Would be a bit easier to do though you would have a corrugated car instead of a slab-sided car. The N-scale Varnish Passenger Car User's Guide is a great resource that can help you to determine what cars might fit for such modeling. There you can find a lot of cars listed that could be modeled.
What Jerry said, although another 'close enough' option might be the diner out of the old Kato 4 car sets. My personal inclination would be to use one of these or the CZ diner, suitably repainted. Adrian
8507 is one of the ex-NP Budd diners, heavily rebuilt. See http://www.on-track-on-line.com/amtkrinf-diners.shtml You can see some of the basic work that is in common to all of them; Budd diner, kitchen windows covered over, skirts long gone, windows updated, etc. Since there were several different diners used as base material, you can start with a Kato Budd and see where it gets you. Jerry's got the best plan. I'm really going to miss these cars. I deliberately used to pick the Lake Shore Limited just to be able to eat in one. They were literally the last cars standing from the original 1971 Heritage Car fleet that actually were vintage cars for people (i.e. not baggage cars).
Isn't there a possibility that the ex-GN full dome car "Ocean View" be the last heritage car remaining in use?
It's certainly looking that way. That car has been retired, and unretired, several times, but still keeps showing up on specials and sometimes on the Adirondack. Look at the 7th car, this is on Feb. 18: The other ones that are 'originals' are the Pacific Parlor cars, which were the El-Cap lounge cars, and those have recently been removed and supposedly coming back Mar. 1, maybe, I hope. See http://www.pacificparlourcar.com/
Thanks for all the help! I found this ConCor Budd 72' Fluted-Side Diner Amtrak #8503 at Hobbylinc: Not a perfect match, but at least it's unmistakably a diner and in Phase IVb livery.
"TroveStar currently has 14 different Diner Cars from Kato and MTL. You can see the list here: http://www.trovestar.com/generic/index.php?Collection=4&Variety=Diner This list is not complete as it does not have any Con-Cor listings, but we hope to add those soon."
But none of them bear any resemblance to the diner requested. The listings are all of MT Heavyweights or Kato Superliners which only covers 2 body styles. It doesn't even include the Kato stand-ins suggested above. Adrian
A very similar Budd diner equipped the Lakeshore Limited I rode on just last August 2015. Here's a photo of it at Schenectady. Rick
