Model Railroading > Prairie Shadows NAHX 5150cuft PD Hopper

Prairie Shadows NAHX 5150cuft PD Hopper built in 1982. Finally have a decent replacement for the Walthers Thrall PD5000. Prairie Shadows is doing three versions of the car, the original NAHX built up till 1987, and then the Thrall early and late versions. What I had not realized is how long the car is, about 6' longer than a ACF 5000cuft Pressureaide PD hopper and is a similar length to more modern 5660cuft cars of a similar design. I'm impressed by the model and it rolls very well. Coupler height was spot on. It came with Kadee scale head couplers, but after seeing the end data mentioned shelf couplers, I swapped them for Kadee SBE couplers that I dry brushed with some iron oxide paint. I also painted the wheels. But since I didn't shake the paint pen nearly enough, it left the paint with a glossy coat instead of the desired flat appearance. So I will need to redo the paint on the wheels which is not a big issue. The car comes with a little baggie that contains the very small AEI tags and a document holder. I wasn't going to apply the AEI tags since those only came late in my modeling era, but it would sure be nice if the model manufacture's would add a page to their websites showing where to attach the parts to the car with images. This has been a repeated issue with add-on parts supplied with high end models from virtually all of the manufactures. "Here are a bunch of parts, but we won't tell you what they are or where they go." The only issue I have with the model is they added several parts after painting, and there are glossy glue patches all over the model. That will go away with some weathering.

Ted Curphey
Ontario, OR



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/17/26 00:13 by funnelfan.

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Your photo of the car end shows some very finely rendered details. Love it.