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| SP 4352 leads No.51, the San Joaquin Daylight west out of Bakersfield. - Eddie Sims Collection |
As many of you regular readers know, I'm interested in modeling the Southern Pacific in the San Joaquin Valley, and on of my on-going projects is making a 'budget' San Joaquin Daylight for the 1948-1952 era. This means having a consist of cars which still have their skirts and Full-Width-Diaphragms. Also I want a consist not so late that it would require having one of the 80-BP-60 rebuilt horse-baggage car RPOs, which are hard to come by and need work when you find them.
One of the cars that is more difficult to get are the SP's 1937 Diner and Coffee Shop cars. At least Soho has made both these cars in 'budget brass', which most of us can afford and are comparable to buying a new plastic passenger car ($75-125 range). I'm also interested in the Coffee Shop cars because they were one of the 'signature cars' regularly assigned to the 'Starlight', which could have detoured over Tehachapi during my modeling era. Also the Starlight is a very nice consist to make a reasonable model of, which could fit most medium-sized layouts.
History
The Southern Pacific's new Daylight passenger train of 1937 was so popular that almost immediately the SP's traffic department and marketing department began schemes to increase the available equipment and adjust the accommodations on each of the $2 Million Dollar trainsets!
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| SP 10200 running on Second 60 at Walong, LMRC TT/TO session, circa 2008. |
The original 1937 Diners (SP 10200 & 10201) & Coffee Shop-Taverns (SP 10310 & 10311) were proving to be insufficient for the demands as ridership increased. Second sections of Nos.98 and 99 were being run to soak up the extra passengers, this was requiring more 'Heavyweight' Equipment in both chair cars, food service, and lounge/tavern space. Some passengers were noticeably leery of climbing onto a string of "Old Heavyweight" cars, when they'd just bought the premier tickets to the "Daylight".
Plans were set in motion to shift chair cars from the Texas & New Orleans Sunbeam/Hustler to the Pacific Lines' Daylight. The decision was also made in 1937 to have Pullman build four new food service and lounge cars, but in separate services in each car, unlike the combined service in the Coffee Shop-Tavern (SP 10310/10311). The The new SP 10400 & 10401 Coffee Shop cars would be classed as diners (77-D-11), and able to be used as diners if the need arose. The new 77-D-11s would take much of their design from the T&NO 77-DL-1s (Diner-Lounge 'Observations') which were built for the Sunbeam/Hustler, but without the rounded rear observation-lounge section. The new Coffee Shop cars would therefore roughly double the space in the 'Coffee Shop' meal service on the 'Daylight', and eventually the 'Morning Daylight'. The older SP 10310 and 10311 would be bumped to the second section of the 'Daylight' and later be assigned to the 'Noon Daylight' in 1939. The two new full Taverns (SP 10312 & 10313) of class 77-T-2, would replace the SP 10310 and 10311 on the 'Daylight' and 'Morning Daylight', about doubling the Tavern-lounging capacity of the train. The SP 10400 and 10401 were delivered in January 1938, truly a 'rushed' order!
The SP 10400 and 10401 weren't at the top of the SP's Premier train consist lists for long. Soon with the arrival of the new 1939 'Triple-Unit Articulated Diner-Kitchen-Coffee Shops (SP 10250-10255) for the new 'Morning Daylight'. One of the odd things about how the SP and Pullman came to the 3-unit diner-kitchen-coffee shop arrangement is by looking at the SP 10200 and SP 10400 cars when coupled kitchen to kitchen, they very closely replicate the configuration of the new 3-unit cars!
The SP 10200 and 10201 were bumped to what had been the regular 'Second Section' of the Daylight, now officially christened the 'Noon Daylight'. SP 10400 and 10401 went into SP's 'Extra Pool' of food service cars, with primary use as protection for the 3-unit cars and run on second sections of the Daylights until the arrival of the 1941 Morning Daylight equipment. The onset of WWII meant the 77-D-11s would be very busy on any war-time passenger train on food service assignments, including protection service for the Daylight and Coaster.
Plans were set in motion to shift chair cars from the Texas & New Orleans Sunbeam/Hustler to the Pacific Lines' Daylight. The decision was also made in 1937 to have Pullman build four new food service and lounge cars, but in separate services in each car, unlike the combined service in the Coffee Shop-Tavern (SP 10310/10311). The The new SP 10400 & 10401 Coffee Shop cars would be classed as diners (77-D-11), and able to be used as diners if the need arose. The new 77-D-11s would take much of their design from the T&NO 77-DL-1s (Diner-Lounge 'Observations') which were built for the Sunbeam/Hustler, but without the rounded rear observation-lounge section. The new Coffee Shop cars would therefore roughly double the space in the 'Coffee Shop' meal service on the 'Daylight', and eventually the 'Morning Daylight'. The older SP 10310 and 10311 would be bumped to the second section of the 'Daylight' and later be assigned to the 'Noon Daylight' in 1939. The two new full Taverns (SP 10312 & 10313) of class 77-T-2, would replace the SP 10310 and 10311 on the 'Daylight' and 'Morning Daylight', about doubling the Tavern-lounging capacity of the train. The SP 10400 and 10401 were delivered in January 1938, truly a 'rushed' order!
The SP 10400 and 10401 weren't at the top of the SP's Premier train consist lists for long. Soon with the arrival of the new 1939 'Triple-Unit Articulated Diner-Kitchen-Coffee Shops (SP 10250-10255) for the new 'Morning Daylight'. One of the odd things about how the SP and Pullman came to the 3-unit diner-kitchen-coffee shop arrangement is by looking at the SP 10200 and SP 10400 cars when coupled kitchen to kitchen, they very closely replicate the configuration of the new 3-unit cars!
The SP 10200 and 10201 were bumped to what had been the regular 'Second Section' of the Daylight, now officially christened the 'Noon Daylight'. SP 10400 and 10401 went into SP's 'Extra Pool' of food service cars, with primary use as protection for the 3-unit cars and run on second sections of the Daylights until the arrival of the 1941 Morning Daylight equipment. The onset of WWII meant the 77-D-11s would be very busy on any war-time passenger train on food service assignments, including protection service for the Daylight and Coaster.
In 1945 the SP 10400 and 10401 were transferred along with the of the Daylight Parlor-Observations to work on Train Nos. 329 & 330, the Rogue River in Oregon. This was to give the VIP travelers on those trains a suitably 'plush' ride after the Pullman sleepers were removed by ODT General Order 53, removing all short-haul Pullman routes during the massive transfer of troops from the European theater to the Pacific and also returning them to home as the war was concluded a couple months later. The restriction on short Pullman assignments was released a year later in June 1946, which saw the four cars immediately transferred to the new Sacramento-San Joaquin Daylight service! No rest for the weary food service cars!
The SP 10400 had a more 'colorful' life, as it was involved with the wreck of the San Joaquin Daylight, which hit a gasoline truck in Kingsburg in 1947, removing it from service with several other cars. During the repairs SP 10400 received some new fluting, and minor changes appeared around the kitchen door, with the fluting now passing under the door. Also T-roof vents were applied, replacing the 'old' style kitchen vents with the 'wind-vein' style rotation feature. Once SP 10400 was repaired, it went to the City of San Francisco (CoSF)'s 'protection pool' in 1947. One interesting question on the SP 10400 is if the car received the 'high speed betterment' for the triple-bolster trucks for the CoSF 'protection' assignment like the SP 10200 and 10201 did during it's regular assignment to the new 'daily' CoSF consist? If not, this is probably due to the 10400 being a floating car for the CoSF, and not regularly assigned.
Times again changed in 1949, when the 'Noon Daylight' was dropped in favor of a new night chair train, the upgraded 'Coaster', which was renamed the 'Starlight'. This change in equipment assignments resulted in the SP 10400 and 10401 being reunited as their assignment moved to the 'Starlight', oddly in this assignment one of the 77-D-10 (SP 10200-10201) cars was assigned as the 'protection' car! Just as a side note: During this time, the SP 10250-10255, which were working the Morning Daylight, went to the Noon Daylight in 1941, and then to the San Joaquin Daylight in 1949.
Coffee Shop Service
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| I made this artwork from photos of the SP's Coffee Shop tables without table cloths for my MTH Coffee Shop 3-Unit set. |
The Coffee Shop cars could be changed over to working as as 'full diner' between runs by changing the menus and supplying them with table cloths, this was often done when the cars rotated out into protection service for the diners (10200 & 10201) or were put into specials or extra passenger train service.
Modeling the SP 10400 or 10401
Notice with the SP 10400 and 10401 that the number of tables is nearly double that of the Diners (SP 10200 & 10201). The kitchen section was reduced in size, as was the pantry space for the smaller and 'easier' to fix items on the Coffee Shop menus.
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| Left side of Soho SP 10400/10401 as I acquired it with media blasted finish. |
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| Right side of Soho SP 10400/10401 as I acquired it with media blasted finish. |
This model I acquired a few years ago. It was already media blasted and ready to go to paint. A new basic plastic underframe was also ready to start adding detail parts and equipment to. I decided to go ahead and paint the underframe black, as I can easily scratch through the paint to layout the machinery placement.
Painting 'Daylight'
The I painted the body a couple years ago now with Daylight Orange.
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| MTH Full-Width-Diaphragm, as seen applied to SP 5069. |
Checking the paint on the Full-Width-Diaphragms (FWD) I'll be using from MTH. (I saved these diaphragms from the MTH Parlor car I sacrificed a couple years ago during my "Daylight Confetti" Build of SP 10251 and SP 3301.)
Orange
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| Left side of SP 10400 with third coat of Daylight Orange window stripe applied |
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| Right side of SP 10400 with third coat of Daylight Orange window stripe applied. |
I then masked the orange window stripe to match the pre-painted diaphragms with Tamiya 6mm masking tape. This required a bit of compromise because of Soho body dimensions and the spacing of the stripes on the MTH diaphragms. I decided that the roof line, where the roof meets the sides will be the key measurement. This will dictate where vertically I mount the diaphragms later on.
With the window stripe masked, I shot the Daylight Red paint for the upper and lower stripes. I also painted the car-ends Daylight Red, although this will eventually be somewhat hidden by the FWD's being installed.
Red
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| Left side of SP 10400 with Daylight Red applied. |
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| Right side of SP 10400 with Daylight Red applied. |
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| MTH 79-C-1 with red car ends inside the FWD's, this area was notoriously hard to clean, so I've weathered with grease and grime. |
I'm not too worried about over-spray at each step, as I'm working from the lightest color up to the darkest.
Black
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| Left side SP 10400 with all stripes masked over to paint the black. |
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| Right Side SP 10400, the roof and skirts are peeking out to get painted last. |
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| Left side of SP 10400 painted with masking removed. |
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| Right side SP 10400 painted with masking removed. |
Decalling
The next step is decalling, which I'll cover in more depth next time. For now I'll say, I'm again using MicroScale 87-208 Sunset letterboard decals for the "SOUTHERN PACIFIC", Thinfilm makes the decals in SP Lettering Gray, but that didn't start till after the era I plan to model with this car.
To Be Continued - - -
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| No.52, the San Joaquin Daylight stops for 7 minutes at Bakersfield, before charging out to attach the Tehachapi's. |
As with most of my modeling projects in 2019, I'll be coming back to this model in the future, hopefully sooner than later to show updates.
Jason Hill
Jason Hill
Related Articles:
Modeling SP 3301, (Part 1) - Daylight Confetti - Making the 1937 Baggage-Chair car combine for the San Joaquin Daylight.
Modeling SP 10250-51-52 (Part 1) - Diner-Lounge - Modifying MTH 3-Unit Diner to 1949 San Joaquin Daylight configuration.
Modeling Index - SP Lightweight Passenger Cars. - Modeling overview of SP's historical lightweight "streamlined" passenger cars, what are good "budget" models?
Modeling SP 10250-51-52 (Part 1) - Diner-Lounge - Modifying MTH 3-Unit Diner to 1949 San Joaquin Daylight configuration.
Modeling Index - SP Lightweight Passenger Cars. - Modeling overview of SP's historical lightweight "streamlined" passenger cars, what are good "budget" models?
MTH Daylight Passenger Cars - Review and Modifications - What do I do mechanically to all the MTH cars I work on?
Interestingly enough, both the 10400 and 10401 are still with us today. Got to go through the 10401 when it was in wreck train service as part of the Carlin derrick. It still had many original features intact. We tried to add it to the collection at Rio Vista Junction but it did not come to pass.
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