james penglase says:

Two very good sources for detail parts for both American steam and diesel are Walthers. Website walthers.com. They have a large selection from many manufactures. Another source is Bowser. Bowser now produces the CalCan lost wax castings for both steam and diesel. Hope this helps

Newman Atkinson says:

John Most of your car and engine manufactures have drawing sheets and parts lists. You should be able to contact that MFG such as Athearn or Bachmann and see if they have that part. Your other choice is to go to train shows especially the smaller show where there is an abundance of used cars and engines. There you can find the same engine or car and use parts from yours or the one you get at the show to make a good one ( say a tank car) part one out to fix the other and make a tank scene with the other like a water tank to hold oil at a plant or water for irrigation or something like that. With MFG’s building only ready to roll stuff they don’t want to inventory lots of parts. They just want you to buy more new unfortunately. Freight trucks, wheels, couplers are easy to get new and sometimes used. As far as details as Ron said Details West is a good source and there are a few others. There again used stuff can turn into a great parts store in many cases. I went to a modeling clinic at an NMRA event recently and they were showing us how to form metal parts such as the plow on your own right out of metal stock from your hobby shop. A little bending, curling, sanding and filing and WA-LA you have a part. They even showed us how to heat treat it so it is not soft when your done. (and the part was your own work. from Newman