Reviews

NSW CDY – NOCY open wagons in HO scale by Auscision Models, PO Box 1791, Castle Hill, NSW 1765. Phone: 0425 866 442. Email: information@auscisionmodels.com.au Web Site: www.auscisionmodels.com.auPrice: $300.00 per four-pack (plus P&P if purchased by mail order).

A single photo can provide a lot of inspiration and capture the ‘feel’ of an era. For me, a photo in one of Train Hobby’s pictorial books of a lone 48 class diesel locomotive hauling a fairly new CDY and a well-worn, four-wheel S wagon, trailed by a venerable FHG guard’s van on the Batlow branch screams ‘PTC era.’ While the Tumut and Batlow lines are now a distant memory, the arrival of Auscision Models’ CDY open wagons enables the modeller to obtain everything on the train in that photo in ready-to-run form.

Prototype

In late 1974, the NSW PTC awarded a contract for 200 open wagons to Electric Power Transmission at Marayong in western Sydney to help cater for a growth in demand for such wagons. These were built over the period 1975–76, with the first 12 wagons entering service on NSW rails in July 1975. Although the wagons were delivered with ridgepoles to support tarpaulins when used in superphosphate traffic – intended to be retained with the wagon at all times – prototype photos of CDY wagons from the 1970s and early 1980s suggest that the ridgepoles parted company with their assigned wagons relatively quickly. Following the introduction of four-letter coding in 1979, the wagons were recoded NOCY and some received a new SRA red livery.

The wagons hauled all manner of freight, from hay to superphosphate, ore, ballast, bagged cement, and general freight including shipping containers as this traffic increased from the late 1970s.

The creation of National Rail in 1994 saw some wagons transferred to the new rail operator and re-coded ROCY and used in container freight traffic. Those wagons repainted at this time received a National Rail grey livery, with some receiving the blue Seatrain livery. Some wagons had their doors welded closed later in their lives, and the door release handles were removed accordingly at that time. Many variants of the CDY are still in use to the present day.

Reviewed Model

Auscision released the CDY/NOCY/ROCY models, in ten different liveries covering