LIONEL 3662 AUTOMATIC MILK CAR, 55-60, 64-66

The Automatic Refrigerated Milk Car No. 3662 was produced from 1955 until 1960, and was also available from 1964 until 1966. This car was one of the very few that were issued during the Post War period that was actually O scale (1/48). Early cars would have bar-end trucks with either magnetic or tabbed couplers. Later editions would have early or late AAR trucks equipped with disc couplers.

The car body consisted of two pieces molded separately and assembled. The roof and car ends were colored in various shades from MAROON to CHOCOLATE BROWN, and the sides are WHITE that have BLACK heat-stamped lettering.

As with other previously issued milk cars, the seven supplied non-magnetic milk cans were manually loaded through a hatch in the roof and were unloaded on to the platform with the use of a No. 6019 or UCS track section that was placed on to the platform.

The operation of the unloading of the milk cans was much slower than previous issues of this car. This may be the reason that the cans that were included, Part No. 3662-60, were non-magnetic. These cans were housed in envelop No. 3662-80 that is pictured to the right. A plain WHITE envelope that was rubber-stamped "No. 3362-79" was included with the 1964-66 variation and contained only the milk cans themselves without the instruction sheet.

There are four variations:

Variation A: WHITE painted body that has "NEW 4-55" printed on the sides and came with Type 7 bar-end trucks. 1955 production.

Variation B: The WHITE body is unpainted that has "NEW 4-55" printed on the sides and Type 7a bar-end trucks. 1956-59 production.

Variation C: The WHITE body is unpainted that has "NEW 4-55" printed on the sides and came with early AAR trucks with disc couplers. 1960 production.

Variation D: Has an unpainted WHITE body with no "NEW 4-55" printing on the sides. Equipped with operating AAR trucks with disc couplers. 1964-66 production.