Re: D&RG Class 3 and 3A Box cars

When Sloan started writing he didn't have copies of the original D&RG equipment drawings. All he had were the folio drawings and some, but not nearly all of the equipment registers. There is often a lot of differences between cars in the same class and folio drawings are not always that accurate. I've extensively measured 2 or 3 of the existing 4000 series boxcars and there are quite a few differences. Even differences show up in the 1924 rebuilt cars. Certainly any cars rebuilt from original class 3 into class 3A would have required new frames. By that time their floors and their board roofs would have been in poor condition too.

Sloan started his research in the days of his column writing for the "Slim Gauge News" and his articles included drawings made from photos, as that and some equipment registers was all he had. Sloan is the one who created the class number system, which he used in his book, as the D&RG never classed their equipment as such.

Everything I wrote is speculation based on my study of the original drawings and knowledge of the roster. The B&S records and drawings do not exist and it seems that all of the class 3 cars were built by the D&RG and probably all but the first class 2 cars were also. Drawings of the D&RG hardware seem to be derived from those first B&S car castings. Note that there should be a height difference in cars equipped with the 24" wheels as compared to those with the 26" wheels. We are fortunate that as many of the original drawings have been saved and preserved, but I don't believe records of the D&RG car building have survived from those early days and that is where the real answers would lie.
Dave