Modeling the Owl (Part2) - Korea to 1960

In this part of discussing the Owl (Nos.57 & 58), I will look at the changes that happened to the Owl from 1951 to 1960.  After which point the Owl was on the slide to being annulled, leaving only the San Joaquin Daylight running between LA and Oakland.  Follow this link back to first part of Modeling the Owl (Part 1).

SP 4255 leading No.58 between Bakersfield and LA.

Southern Pacific in the Bay Area, by George H. Drury, page 89 shows the regular Owl (No.57) at Martinez, nearing the end of its run on April 22, 1950.  The shot shows the headend of the Owl, with an RPO right behind the engine, a 80-BH-1 horse baggage, and SP 6114 (60-B, ex-60-PS-1 4402).  The lower photo of the same day shows the middle of the Owl with one of the 72-C-1/2/3/4 class "Deluxe Chair" cars , but no number is visible.

Most of the consist info shown below is from the SP Trainline No.74 from Winter 2000, with some data extracted from the commentary in the article on the Owl by Sheldon King.  I want to thank Brian Black and James Salkeld for letting me use their fabulous photo collections taken by their family members during the 1950s.

Consist 1951

No.58, eastbound at Ravenna - James Salkeld Collection (used with permission)

The last consist I showed in Part 1, shows Feb 15, 1951, but to avoid making readers flip back and forth, I'll relist the consist here.

No.57 Feb 15, 1951
BG Oak-Bakersfield (returns on No.57)
BG Oak-LA (Storage Magazine - Tuesdays only)
BG Oak-LA (Ex-Sunday)
PS Oak-LA Postal-Storage
RPO Oak-LA (Working)
Chair (probably News Agent)
Chair
Chair
Chair
Diner
STD 12-1 (Replaced 16-Section Troop Car)
STD 12-1 (Replaced 16-Section Troop Car)
STD 6-2-Lounge (Mission-Series)
STD 6-6-4 (LW) or STD 8-5 "Clover" (Alternating Days, one of each assigned)
STD 14-SBR (Night Fern & Night Mantel assigned)
STD 10-1-1 (HW Car)
STD 12-1 ("Regular" 12-1 sleeper)

By November 1st the two 12-1 sleepers behind the dining car were moved to the rear of the train.  Also an additional partitioned coach was added on Mondays and Fridays.

Nov 1, 1951
BG Oak-Bakersfield (returns on No.57)
BG Oak-LA (Storage Magazine - Tuesdays only)
BG Oak-LA (Ex-Sunday)
PS Oak-LA Postal-Storage
RPO Oak-LA (Working)
Partitioned Coach (Mon & Fri)
Chair
Chair
Chair
Chair
Diner
STD 6-2-Lounge (Mission-Series)
STD 6-6-4 (LW) or STD 8-5 "Clover" (Alternating Days, one of each assigned)
STD 14-SBR (Night Fern & Night Mantel assigned)
STD 10-1-1 (HW Car)
STD 12-1
STD 12-1
STD 12-1

A 3D Printed model of the News Agent space, used on some of the SP's Chair Cars. - OwlMtModels 4052 shown.

I'm not clear if the leading Chair car remained as a News Agent car or if the assignment of the partitioned coach could have been a News Agent car.  Generally, I would think the NA car remained the leading Chair Car.

SP 4251 with No.58 at San Fernando - James Salkeld Collection (used with permission)

Steam continued to be the regular assignment over the Tehachapi Pass until 1952.  Before about 1950, the ACs received MT-class or GS-class helpers over the Tehachapi Pass between LA and Bakersfield.  After 1950, enough AC's were being displaced by diesels that they could afford to let them double head on the Owl.

In the San Joaquin Valley, the Owl was assigned Mt or GS class engines between Bakersfield and Oakland.  On occasion P-class engines can be seen working lighter sections of the Owl, when Pullman traffic overflowed what the Owl's normal consist could handle, or the schedule of the extra traffic didn't make it possible for the extra passengers and cars to be worked into regular trains.

Consist 1953

SP 3501, converted to Baggage-Dormitory service. To the left is T&NO 141 a recent transfer from the Sunbeam.

In 1953 the SP rebuilt the 14-Single Bedroom sleepers Night Fern and Night Mantle to be Baggage-Dorm cars SP 3500 and 3501, which were regularly assigned to the Owl consists.  These cars are not easily modeled from standard Pullman sleepers without a large amount of window changes.

Typical Consist for 1953
BG Oak-Bakersfield (returns on No.57)
BG Oak-LA (Storage Magazine - Tuesdays only)
BG Oak-LA (Ex-Sunday)
PS Oak-LA Postal-Storage
RPO Oak-LA (Working) - Usually 70-BP-30-1/2/3 or 69-BP-30-2/3 as seen above in some of the photos.
Bag-Dorm - (SP 3500 & 3501 assigned once rebuilding was complete)
Chair
Chair
Chair
Chair
Diner
STD 6-2-Lounge (Mission-Series)
STD 6-6-4 (LW) or STD 8-5 "Clover" (Alternating Days, one of each assigned)
STD 10-1-1 (HW Car)
STD 12-1
STD 12-1
STD 12-1

It should be noted also that during 1953 the ex-SSW American Flyer" Osgood-Bradley chair cars were assigned to the Owl, among other Pacific Lines trains, it wasn't uncommon to see at least one of the Chair cars on the Owl being one of these unique cars.

Consist 1954

Kitbashed model of SP 3503 starting from Rivarossi 12-1 sleeper

I've decided to model one of the next two cars the SP rebuilt in this way, which were the 1954 rebuilt Pecos and Sunburst Rose, which started as Pullman 12-1s, and also became Baggage-Dorms SP 3502 and SP 3503 receptively.  Follow this link to see how I chose to Model the SP 3503.  I chose the 3503 because I had an extra pair pf Walthers Pullman 242 trucks, and the SP 3503 retained those trucks when rebuilt.

No.57, April 9, 1954
BG-Express Fresno-Oakland (Ex-Mon) return on No.58 unless noted
60ft RPO Mail Apartment (SP 5044 & 5045, 77-BP-60 - ex-77-D-6 diners with new 60ft Apartments)
PS Mail Storage (Ex Sat & Sun)
BG-Express
Bag-Dorm (usually 3500 & 3501)
Chair (News Agent)
Chair (Fri, Sat, Sun)
Chair
Chair
Chair
Diner
Lounge (Full Lounge or Tavern car)
STD 6-2-Lounge (Mission Series)
STD 8-5 "Clover" series HW Sleeper (Now two cars assigned, LW 6-6-4 dropped)
STD 10-1-1 "Palouse Falls and "Prior Lake" regularly assigned
STD 12-1
STD 12-1

The changes to the 1954 Owl include the new 60ft RPOs (SP 5044 & 5045) rebuilt from 77-D-6 dining cars.  The balance of the space in the 77 foot body was assigned as baggage-express space.  These newly rebuilt cars had ply-metal doors, as did most of SP's rebuilds after 1953. (see the door style on the SP 3503 model above.  One of the three 80-BP-60 (SP 5217-5219) rebuilt Horse-Baggage turned RPOs protected the San Joaquin Daylight and the Owl.

Late in 1954, the SP began experimenting with "Hamburger Grill" cars, rebuilt from HW Diners.  The 10502 and 10503 were the first two regularly assigned to the Owl in January 1955, replacing the full dining cars.

Also late in 1954, the STD 10-1-1 HW sleepers were withdrawn from service on the Owl.

Consist 1956

In 1956, the steam assignments of GS-3s and GS-6s between Bakersfield and Oakland finally came to an end.  Often two-unit sets of F7s (A-B pairs) took over the assignment.

SP 6383 with two B-units leads No.51, the San Joaquin Daylight, in the Valley in the late 1950s. Brian Black Collection

In September 1956, the use of the remaining Heavyweight sleepers in the Owl's regular consist came to an end.  The Mission-series 6-2-Lounges were retired to MW service and LW 6-6-4 sleepers became the regular accommodations for all Pullman passengers.

The 6-6-4 sleepers replaced the old HW Dark Olive Green and TTG sleepers, here SP 9161 in 1953 Golden State colors.

Consist 1957

By the end of 1957, the Owl, No.58 was down to the following cars:

BG Bag-Express (Ex-Sun)  - Oak-Fresno (Return on No.57)
60ft Mail Apartment  - Oak-LA (SP 5044 & 5045 regularly assigned)
BG Bag-Express  - Oak-LA
BG Bag-Express  - Oak-LA

Chair  - Oak-LA

Chair  - Oak-LA

Chair  - Oak-LA
HW Hamburger-Grill  - Oak-LA
STD LW 6-6-4  - Oak-LA
STD LW 6-6-4  - Oak-LA

The end was coming for the Owl, even with the discontinuance of the (Tehcahapi) Mail Trains (Nos.55 & 56) in 1954/55, there wasn't a lot of mail and express traffic left for the Owl to handle.  1956 also saw the end of HW Pullman sleeper use on the Owl.

In Closing

The marker on a UP 6-6-4 brings up the rear of the Owl.

The end for the Owl was still several years away, during those years the food service would again see a step down to "Automat" service in March 1962, basically a rack of drink and snack vending machines and cold sandwiches to eat.  The "Economy" Baggage cars would start showing up in 1960-1962.  Towards the end, even UP 6-6-4 LW sleepers would be seen on the Owl as there were not enough SP 6-6-4s to cover all the assignments.

UP "American Captain", a 6-6-4, similar to the pair seen in a photo of the Owl near the end.

The last trip was made on April 13, 1965, with barely any notice by the public or the news media.  Fewer than 33 passengers road No.58 on the last trip.

Jason Hill

Related Links and Articles:

Modeling the Owl (Part 1) - Post WWII to Korea

Modeling Mail Trains Nos. 55 & 56, The Tehacahapi Mail

The Shasta, a revised "Pike-Sized" train from 1987

Modeling SP Road Engines (Part 4) - Articulated Steam

MDC/Athearn 60ft Baggage (Part1) - Mechanical

I've hinted at the process for upgrading the Athearn/MDC (35 year old tooling) Harriman Baggage cars before, but let's have a more in-depth look at these cars that still can be made to look and work very well.  For more information on what models are available and other classes of cars check out my blog page Modeling SP Heavyweight cars here.

SP 6047, one of my 60-B-9/10 class cars made from a MDC/Athearn Harriman Baggage

Like many of the models that I'm discussing in this blog, the models that I'm looking at are upgrades of models I've had for a long time and occasionally a new model as well.  The SP 6233, T&NO 611, and SP 6190 were all built in the late-1990s with very sketch information about numbering.

Here's an MDC kit still in the box

Let's look at the old Roundhouse or Model Die Casting (MDC) kit for a minute.



These parts assemble into a car that looks something like this below...

Note the truck are short and WAY too far from the ends of the car compared with the corrected car below.

Here's my 2016 rebuilt SP 6233, with correct trucks and bolster centers.  (I've not installed the diaphragms in this view).

Let's look at the prototype cars briefly -

Prototype History

Southern Pacific and Union Pacific during the early 1909 began upgrading their head end express baggage cars with all-steel cars.  These arch-roofed cars became generically known as "Associated Harriman Lines" cars in general even though cars built after 1913 would technically not be "Harriman" cars because of the breakup of the Associated Lines.

Here's a typical SP Mail Train with a mix of Harriman 60-Bs, ex-EPSW 70-B, and an RPO, followed by two 60-C coaches.

The orders for new all-steel baggage cars included about 487 cars by the end of "heavyweight" car construction in the mid 1930s.  The orders for 60ft cars amounted to 300 new steel baggage cars with several more being converted back and forth between different combinations of Baggage, RPO, and RPO-Baggage.

60-B-1 thru -8 (60ft Baggage, 1st thru 8th Class) - about 233 cars built

My original kitbashed MDC 60-B-1/8 class Baggage car before repainting in 2016.

In 1909 the SP's first of eight classes of 60ft baggage were built to almost the same standard.  Externally these looked almost identical, except for the roof fittings, conduits, etc.   SP controlled the orders for the Central Pacific and the Oregon & California in addition to itself during this time.  That is the reason the SP's baggage cars are scattered over 3 number series for the same class of car.  In the late 1920s the SP consolidated the reporting marks (O&C and CP) under SP marks.  Thankfully the number series were originally planned so there were no conflicts in doing this.

Of the SP's 300 60ft baggage cars built, over 85% of cars had this arrangement of two 4'-10" doors on each side.  Only 37 cars were built to the MDC/Athearn standard of one large and one small door, and 5 of those were rebuilt as RPO cars.

While my model of the SP 6190 is a kitbash and works out pretty well, the main problem is that only using MDC parts you can only make one of these from two kits.  The second can be turned into parts for other things.  So to replicate the 85+% of the 60ft baggages on the SP and get a good represeation of the headend fleet a fair number of Southern Car & Foundry #1003 resin models will be needed.

60-BD-1, -4, -6 (60ft Baggage-Dynamo) - 15 cars built

The SP also ordered several classes of 60ft Baggage-Dynamos with generators for the early use of electric lights in the passenger trains.  These were later phased out when all the cars in the trains had their own battery boxes and axle generators on-board each car.  The 60-BD-4 and 60-BD-6 were built off the 60-B-4 and -6 standards respectfully but with partitions and the generator installed at one end.

The 60-BD-6 cars had a single window at one end on each side for light next to the generator.  Most had differing ventilation designs in the roof that changed the look from the standard 60-B-1 class cars.

60-B-9 & 60-B-10 (60ft Baggage, 9th and 10th Class) - 37 cars built

SP 6233, a 60-B-10, built almost out-of-the-box MDC kit from about 1995.  Repainted and detailed 2016.

The last two classes of SP 60ft Baggage cars built with arched roofs were the 60-B-9 and -10.  Again these two classes were spread between the OC, CP, SP and two for the T&NO.  These cars only account for about 12% of the SP's 60ft baggage car fleet.  Actually less because of rebuilds of other types of car to follow the earlier door design and the rebuild of 5 cars to 60ft RPOs of 60-P class.

Unfortunately while these models are easy to come by, only about 1 car in 10 should be of this class on the SP.

Other Road Cars - UP, C&A, IC

UP 3008, MDC/Athearn RTR, modifed - not correct because it should have 4 of the single doors & none of the double ones.

Several of the other Associated Lines ordered baggage cars of the Harriman 60-B-1-type design, or modified the designs to suit their needs after the breakup in 1913.  I will not be covering these in this post.  The mechanical and detailing aspects of course will transfer to cars of other paint schemes.

What Cars to Model?

I quickly didn't like the colors that MDC offered the cars in during the 1990s.  While it actually wasn't a bad color, it didn't match at all with the other colors I could paint other cars.  This first batch of cars were repainted several times over the years.

SP 6233 in MicroScale decals & Floquil before repainting in 2016.

My early cars (SP 6233, T&NO 611, 6190) addressed this based on the SPH&TS's reprint of the 1933 SP Passenger Car Roster & drawings book.  These were VERY rough reprints of the rough dimensions of the various SP passenger cars in service as of 1933.  They did not cover the upgrades in the mid-late 1930s with A/C being installed, many cars still had gas lighting, and only a few had electric lights at that time.

T&NO 611 after "weathering" attempts to correct Floquil Pullman Green to SP Dark Olive.

It turns out that T&NO 611 is a bad number for me modeling 1940-1955.   My research now shows the T&NO 600-604 would be better numbers for a 60-B-9/10 T&NO car.  As of October 2016, I'm not sure exactly where I got the T&NO 611 number even.  The MLT (T&NO) had Nos 113 and 114 both as 60-B-10s, and no other cars until the 600-604 group were reassigned Pacific Lines cars in 1931.

Another example of modeling with what data you have was SP 6190.  Everything was fine with that car in 1933 according to the SP Roster...  It turns out that it was wrecked and written off by the mid-1930s.  So for my 1946-1955 modeling date, this number doesn't exist anymore.  As far as I can tell no other baggage car rebuild or renumbering placed another car in the SP 6190 slot before 1955.

As of this writing, I've not yet decided a new number for the 6190.  T&NO 611 is to be repainted as the SP 6236 and one of the future MDC cars, sister to the SP 6047 will become the T&NO 601 to keep my Texas Lines modeling up!

Basic Mechanical

Again I feel I should mention that the majority of these models I'm discussing were started about 20 years ago.

All of these cars have Kadee Couplers mounted to the body.  I would highly recommend following my descriptions on how to install Diaphragms first before installing the couplers.  Because these models were either built a long time ago (20 years) or acquired from other people, they don't reflect my current standards on order of assembly regarding passenger car couplers, diaphragms, etc. but is meant to show options of how to rebuild the truck mountings.

Mechanical Changes - Option I - 1990s Modeling Choices

The cars as offered by MDC had a wheelbase between truck centers that was too short (based on a design for a coach with end step wells).  So that is the most offensive thing I've seen in the "stock" models.

I redrilled a new bolster hole outboard about 8ft from the ends (at the corners) of the car.  This helped but the shorter MDC "Harriman" trucks - really more of an Express Truck - with a 7th wheelbase looked really WRONG.  The longer 8ft wheelbase was really needed.

I then retrucked the cars with ECW 8ft Pullman trucks.  These trucks lasted less than 5 years before they were worn out and dropping wheelsets.  The trucks were made of plain styrene and not engineering plastics.  While they kept the cars running I was looking for replacements by the early 2000s.

Mechanical Changes - Option II - Walthers I

Walthers 920-2124 Pullman 8ft Truck

The next option that came up was Walthers' new 8ft Pullman 4-wheel trucks (now 920-2124).  These look great, and roll well... but have a funky bolster design to match the Walthers plastic HW passenger car line.

Here's the rebuild bolster on SP 6190 with a Kadee No.5 Box Lid and Evergreen tube bushing. (Note the old bolster)

The early mechanical rebuild for these cars worked converting to the Walthers trucks.  I added a strip of styrene about 0.100"x0.188" to the center of the underframe and redrilled the bolsters.  New slices of Evergreen styrene tubing where used to form a bushing for the much larger Walthers bolsters screw hole and a telescoped tube inside to keep the 2-56 screw.

Wheel clearance patches ground down with burr tool in my Dremal - This car doesn't use the Kadee Lid bolster.

On one of the cars, I guess the plastic was thinner or something, but I needed to grind away some of the floor as I could see rubbing marks from the flanges of the wheels and the car wouldn't roll.

Assembled Walthers Truck under T&NO 611 after repaint into SP 6236 during 2016 rebuild.

I didn't like the fact that I had to use a Kadee fiber washer to keep the larger holed truck on.  This was not a design I've repeated after I found the newer methods to do this better.

Here's an overview - or underview of SP 6236 (ex-T&NO 611) showing 15 year old underframe strip styrene

While the simple strip styrene underframe beams are rudimentary, they do work mechanically and can be upgraded later with additional brake and underbody detailing.  Also as you can see, these Walthers Trucks have been in service now over 10+ years and have nicely polished wheel treads.

Mechanical Changes - Option III - Walthers II

SP 6047, a 60-B-10, finished except for Diaphragms & Stirrup Steps.

The SP 6047 is an example of a newer model.  I acquired this model from a friend who build a new underframe from scratch in styrene.  I usually don't go to this effort as it's not visible during operations and sometimes if not planned correctly can later hurt car performance.

If I were assembling a kit today or rebuilding one of the R-T-R Athearn models I would probably heavily gut the underframe mechanically and build a simple one like the SP 2701 Chair car has on my blog from a last month.

Underframe rebuild & weighting on SP 2701

Walthers Truck modified with block of styrene for SP 1005 Coach on the MDC Baggages I use 0.02-0.03" Styrene Sheet

The above photo shows a truck modified for use on SP 1005 and on SP 2701, where I needed a thicker block of styrene on the truck.

Mechanical Changes - Option IIIa - Walthers IIa

Some underframes need deeper centersills than others.  One of the options that I'm using concurrent with the above option is keeping the sheet that I glue to the Walthers 4-wheel truck thinner, only 0.025-0.030" thick and building up the underframe more.  I don't have a handy photo for this technique on a 4-wheel truck, but imagine the same as above mixed with the look of the SP 5199 Bolsters, but with a thin sheet on the truck bolster instead of a 0.080"-0.100" thick block of styrene.  I will add a few picture the next time I build this thinner version.

SP 5199 Bolster

New "Thick" bolster being installed on "old" Walthers Metal passenger car underframe for customer.

On the SP 6047 car, a new bolster was built that was designed to use the current version of how I build the bolsters.  Instead of using the large hole and trying to get a bushing for it.  Instead I glue a plate of styrene over the opening.  Then mark a center point with my Carbide Scribe and then drill for clearance over the screw and Kadee No.5 lid.  These lids make great bolster hat bushings ready made if you can afford the extra 0.02-0.025" hight in the bolster.

Athearn's R-T-R Models - a Brief Overview

Athearn R-T-R Model, slightly modified, still with original Express Trucks. As far as I know, no 60-B-9 or -10s were ever painted in Daylight.  The only 60ft baggages were Daylight were the earlier 60-B-1 thru -8s with two smaller 4'-10" doors.

The prior owner of the newest Athearn cars I acquired modifed the underframes enough that I can't really show what the new Athearn underframes look like stock.  They're basically a dressed up version of the original MDC floor, but with substantially new tooling on the details and bolster bosses for truck placement... however they still didn't fix the truck center issues!

On my stand-in UP 3008 (I know, I don't have a photo of it handy) I was able to fix this by reversing the 6-wheel trucks that car was rebuilt with and made it look pretty much correct mechanically.  Athearn actually did their homework on that and put 6-wheel MDC trucks under the car!  The other car, UP 908 that they offer in the TTG scheme, I think I basically used one of the coupler pivot holes and made a new frame/bolster block to accept the Walthers Truck as on the SP 6047 and SP 2701.

Correct Walthers 8ft Pullman Truck 920-2124 (Left) and Athearn 8ft Express Reefer Truck (Right)

Here is a quick look at the differences in the trucks.  On the left is the replacement Walthers Truck, on the right is the R-T-R Truck that comes with the Athearn model now.  The Athearn truck is really belongs more under a 50ft wooden arch-roof express reefer.... which is another build altogether.

Roof opened to show the neat magnets to snap the roof on!

I like the magnetic attachment of the roof.  However on models I'm going to do complete rebuilds on, they're too hard to make line up again after splicing the bodies and roof sections.  Also I am usually using cheap E-bay MDC kit parts not new $40+ Athearn R-T-Rs for kitbashing fodder.

Closing

The Mail Train heads off to deliver the mail and express to points far and near, rider cars are SP 1005 and SP 2701.

 I will leave the MDC/Athearn 60ft Baggage Cars (Part 1) - Mechanical upgrades here.  When we rejoin this project we will look at installing the diaphragms, remounting the couplers, and other upgrades to underbody detailing and the roof vents in Part 2.

Jason Hill

Mistakes in Modeling - Part Oops!

Well, we all make mistakes...

Can you see the mistake?  I bet you'd never know.. but now that I know... it's REALLY ANNOYING!

A few weeks ago as I was finishing up a PSC 60-P-5 model of SP 4261 for a customer.  I reviewed the various RPOs I was working on to see which ones might need the 3D printed interiors.  I was looking forward to designing one for the 4261, as its unique interior layout would show off the double letter case on each wall between the windows!  I was reviewing the car's history in SPH&TS SP Passenger Cars Vol.3 and came to the horrifying realization that I had made a mistake in the car!

Car Backround

The SP 4261 was the only car in SP's last class of 60 foot postal cars.  Her sister cars were sent to UP, and for some reason the SP ordered one car following the style of those cars.  The SP 4261 has its letter cases mid-car, with the windows towards both pairs of side doors.

One can only assume that it was because this car was the odd ball, but it was retired from active RPO service in 1936, while most of her older sisters stayed in service many more years.  The car was then placed in Storage Mail service.  When RPOs were stricken from the fleet of active RPOs and stripped of their working capacity, i.e. Catcher Arms, Sorting Racks, Letter Case, etc. they would pretty quickly have their "US MAIL RAILWAY POST OFFICE" lettering painted over.  Baggage cars usually had lettering for BAGGAGE and RAILWAY EXPRESS AGENCY on their sides to indicate what service they were in when the RPO lettering was painted out.  Cars in dedicated Storage Mail service would have "US MAIL STORAGE CAR" lettering applied in place of the RPO lettering.

The Error

The 4261 in 1936 would have been in Gold Leaf lettering "SOUTHERN PACIFIC LINES" when last lettered as an RPO.  The model that I'd finished lettering was done for the post-1946 "SOUTHERN PACIFIC" style lettering.

The SP 4261 should look something more like this picture of my in-progress SP 4404....

The Fix

Well, the customer wants the car to be the way it should look in the 1950-1953 era for operations.  So there's only one thing to do.  Not wanting to try to strip the car and repaint the whole thing, I masked off the carside where the offending lettering was.  I placed the masking vertically near a rivet line, so any stepping of the masking edge would be hidden or look like a joint in the car siding.  I shot a fresh batch of StarBrand SP Dark Olive and covered the overcoated decals.

I've tried stripping or just lifting off the bad decals in the past.  If they've been properly applied and set completely, and then overcoated and sealed they're is NO WAY it's coming off without completely messing up the rest of the paint job on the car.  It's better to patch over completely finished and sealed decals.  These decals are extremely thin and I will be placing new lettering decals over the area, so I'm not worried about anyone "seeing" the old lettering... even if they did it's prototypical!... The real car probably still had "RPO" lettering under there too!

It took an afternoon to reshoot the car and a few days of drying between the painting and glosscoating.  I have plenty of extra Storage Car decals laying around, as most models I've done are using the "BAGGAGE" and "RAILWAY EXPRESS AGENCY" lettering for baggage-express cars.

Back on Track!

All better, Storage Car 4261 will soon be ready for service!

Here's the relettered and corrected model of SP 4261.  While I'm sad that I don't get to do a car with all the cool interior and full length lighting to show it off... at least this unique car will continue to be a very unique car in Storage Mail service on trains like the Owl (Nos.57/58). - (Link to Modeling the Owl - Part 1)

I'm sure this won't be the last model that I'll have to do something to "Fix" so I thought I'd share this. I hope that this encourages everyone out there to not be afraid to change your models to keep up with the new research that is available to us now!

Jason Hill

Golden Gate Depot's New "Harriman" Cars - Thoughts on the prototype cars

Golden Gate Depot

Recently, Sunset Models' affiliate Golden Gate Depot announced that they're taking reservations for a selection of "Harriman" arch roof to be imported and made in injection molded plastic.  This is great news for those of us that have been wanting to expand our SP fleets of passenger cars without going into budget brass or working with resin kits.  Not that I'm saying either of those two options are bad, but I know many people will like the ease of R-T-R plastic passenger cars!

I am not affiliated with Golden Gate Depot (GGD), but there's certainly been a big buzz about this project lately.  I've been asked repeatedly by various people what the prototype cars for the planned models were, where they're used, what they're painted like in various eras, etc.  I'm going to try to answer some of these questions...  I will put this disclaimer here, that I only know of what they're planning to do from their posts and a few emails.

So I'll assume based on the photos of the cars what classes they're planning to make, and then comment on those prototypes.  So, until we actually get the GGD models in our hot little hands this will have to do.

Paint Schemes

First a quick comment about paint schemes... GGD is taking reservations for a whole host of railroads to have these cars painted for.  I did some poking, at at least as far as I can tell UP didn't have any 70-Bs instead going with 69-Bs.  I also don't think they had any RPOs exactly like the 70-BP-30, although I don't have a lot of materials on the UP.  So let's look at the SP paint schemes that are offered.

One thing to remember is that general painting of SP heavyweight cars into TTG didn't start until 1954. - So basically any headend cars until 1954 (unless for special assignment) should be SP Dark Olive Green.  Some head-end cars did stay with "SOUTHERN PACIFIC LINES" on the letterboard until about 1951-1952.  The RPOs and other first class cars were repainted within about a year or two after the 1946 change to "SOUTHERN PACIFIC".

The coaches seem to have lasted longer in the pre-1946 scheme than almost any other type of car.  There are some pictures of a few cars in 1951-1952 still with SPL on the letterboard.  My guess is the cars freshly repainted just after WW2 in the SPL Scheme and then in late 1946 the new SP letterboard scheme was only applied to cars that hadn't been repainted yet.  This left those cars in the SPL scheme that had not been repainted to SP, started being repainted in 1954 to the TTG.  Also a good number of the non-A/C'd coaches that were mechanically shot were downgraded out of passenger service before the TTG scheme was introduced.  Many Dark Olive SP coaches and chair cars lasted until 1960 or so before being repainted into TTG or retired.

Remember that a good number of the coaches have lived on at various tourist railroads around the country.  I know of at least two people that are considering buying a few of these cars for their modern layout's tourist operations!  Some cars were also sold to various Mexican railroads over the years as well.

Let's look at what they're offering... (I will also be subbing in photos of models I've taken as examples of the classes of car I'm talking about.)

"Baggage 70 ft - Harriman" 70-B-series

SP 6444, a 70-B-1/9 from a Soho model

These look like the standard SP 70-B-1/9 series of cars.  There have been models made by Soho and several other brass manufactures of these cars, and also the beautiful resin model kits from Southern Car & Foundry, which you can see under construction on my blog pages here.

SP rostered a total of 75 70ft arch roof baggage cars in the 70-B-series.  The SP had 20 additional cars of similar design with Autodoors at the A-end of the car.  The T&NO rostered an additional 42 70-B-series cars and one 70-BA-class Baggage-Auto car.  This gives a combined total of 138 cars intermixed in the SP 6000-6500-series and the T&NO 100 & 600-series.  Many T&NO cars eventually made their way to the SP numbering system eventually.

Six 70-B-series cars were modified with streamlining, moved truck centers, changed roof profiles, etc for use on premier trains.  Two of these were painted for the San Joaquin Daylight in the early years, but quickly were moved to the Noon Daylight and then the Starlight.  The other two were for the Lark and then two more converted when the Cascade was started in 1950.  -  I would personally start with a SC&F baggage to do these cars, the same way I'm building the SP 5069 (RPO car) as I don't feel as bad cutting up an undecorated kit, rather than a R-T-R model with all the finished details to not destory.

This is a very SP signature car, and welcome.  Pairing a few of these with some MDC/Athearn 60ft Baggage cars would be a great start at an SP mail train from almost any Division of the SP.

"RPO 70ft - Harriman" 70-BP-30 (rebuilt)

SP 5148, a Soho 70-BP-30

The photos on GGD's announcement show a car in the 5145-5154-series, which were rebuild from 70-BP-15-3s between 1946 and 1951 to class 70-BP-30.  They're unique from the SP's other series of nearly identical 70-BP-30-3 class cars in that the 70-BP-30 cars had the closest windows on each side to the RPO door blanked out when converted to 30ft RPO Apartment cars.  This I don't believe would be an easy thing to change back.

The rest of the 70-BP-15-3s were being converted to Baggage-Express cars, and having the RPO apartment removed between 1941 and 1954.  Often this just meant the RPO lettering was painted over.

SP 5130, a 70-BP-30-1, along with other cars kept it's 4th RPO window into the 1960s.

The nearly identical class of SP 70-BP-30-1 SP 5129-5138 and 5161-5163 kept their 4th RPO window.

This isn't a bad RPO to choose, as each signature group of SP 70-BP-30-series cars were a little different, and there were never more than about 10 or so cars in any one group.  This class is a fairly good choice as it was used on many secondary passenger trains (Owl, etc) during the 1950s.

"Coaches 60ft - Harriman" (60-C-5, and later classes)

A Soho 60-C-5, SP 1005, as refitted in 1943 as a chair car with transom windows and end windows intact

According to the reply from Golden Gate Depot that I received last week, they said these will be 60-C-5 class cars.  This is good because about 40% of the SP's 60ft coaches were of this body style.  These cars had paired windows, originally under a transom window - but later painted over or plated over after WW2.  Check your photo collections and you'll see a few transom-window cars lasted until about 1952 with them intact or only painted over.  These were probably the "crumbiest" of all the 60-Cs that the SP didn't think were worth rebuilding and probably ended up in MW, caboose, or express rider pool within a few short years.  Follow my build of the SP 1005 (Part 1) here.

I've not seen any photos of cars with transom windows after about 1954 at the very latest.  I would say that any transom window car after about 1950 would be very rare.  Most by 1950 would look the like the 2178 shown below.

A Soho 60-C-9, SP 2178, with plated over windows and June 1946 lettering applied.

The following classes of 60-C-6, -7,-8,-9, & -10s had various changes to the roof, mainly changes in the type, location, and number of vents.  The first ten cars of class 60-C-6 had square "utlity" vents and the 60-C-7 cars returned to using "Globe" vents.  The later cars of class 60-C-6s and 60-C-8/9/10 had square vents.

Some 60-C-5s were down graded and renumbered into the 2800-series for use as express rider cars, some were also assigned to various Overnight LCL trains.  There's one nice photo of one marked for the Arizona Overnight out of LA.

Caboose SP 998 started as a MDC 60ft coach, which can stand-in for either a downgraded 60-C-3/4 or 60-CC-1.

Lastly, you could of course use them as the next lower rating of non-passenger service as a "CABOOSE".  About 20-30 cars were downgraded and patched as cabooses.  Some were fully repainted into Freight Car Red (FCR).

Here's a very weather beaten model of SP 973, a stand-in model using a modified MDC as a 60-C-5 used in local service.

The ultimate fall from grace were the 60-C-series cars that were downgraded to MOW service.  These were often repainted in the standard MW paint scheme of the era, either FCR (pre-1958), or light gray (post-1958).

Good models of SP 60-C-5 will be a nice addition to the selection of available models!  T&NO and NWP had a number of these cars as well.  Even if you're not modeling the San Fransisco Commute pool, these cars made up the backbone of SP's third rate mail train rider cars, any remaining branch line passenger service (Mexico! SPdeM, etc), they would also see use as express train messenger cars and Banana Messanger cars. - I will cover some of those trains in more detail at some point soon.

The 1910-1930s era modelers would be hard pressed if these cars do have plated over transoms.  Most SP modelers between 1940 and 1960 could probably find a use for this car somewhere on their layout if they have plated over transoms.  Modern modelers after 1960 could probably justify 1-4 of these in their tourist trap train behind some old diesel switcher, steam engine or GP.

"Lunch Car 60ft - Harriman" 60-C-3 & -4 ADL

Ken Kidder 60-C-3/4, showing what the ADL's were converted from.

The ADL's started life as 60-C-3 and -4s, such as this model of SP 1190.

Non-Kitchen side of 60-C-3/4 ADL coach - This is not changed from the standard 60-C-3/4s.

Kitchen side of 60-C-3/4 ADL coach.  Notice the far left window is modified with the standard diner kitchen window.

The photograph of the Golden Gate Depot CAD model on their advertisement suggests one of the 60-C-3/4 that was rebuild for All-Day-Lunch (ADL) service for coach passengers in certain trains.   The 60-C-3/4s differ from the 60-C-5s in that they have the longer "picture" windows, with one small window at one end and a pair of single windows at the other.  I am not clear on if they're doing the SP 10517 and SP 10518 that received A/C and were regularly assigned to the Suntan Specials in the San Fransisco-San Jose-Santa Cruz service - or if they're doing some of the non-A/C coach-ADLs that worked around the SP in the 1930s and early 1940s.

Many ex-ADL cars were converted back to coaches in the years between 1935 and 1937, some would keep a the ADL space and become News Agent Coaches.  Most of these without air conditioning.  There are some consist sheets calling out a News Agent Coach on the 1946 Pacific Limited between Ogden and Oakland, I don't know if those were air conditioned cars.  There were also a good number of A/D'd 60-CC-1s that were converted to News Agent cars during 1944 as well.

By the post-war (1947-1949) time frame, SP was upgrading the rest of their secondary trains on the main routes to full "CHAIR" cars with A/C and the more spacious seating.  The Owl (Nos. 57/58) consists show the coaches from the 1947 consists replaced by chair cars in the 1950 consist lists.  Usually this meant 44, 48, or a max of 64 seats per car, where as a coach of the same size would seat between 64-80 people with much less legroom!  News Agent Chair cars were regularly assigned to these secondary trains, which had A/C and Chair configurations.

This means that the coach ADLs were downgraded to News Agent/Coaches by this time, still basically serving cold sandwiches and soda drinks and coffee to coach-class passengers.  The question then becomes - "Where did the extra News Agent Coaches get assigned?"  I'm still looking into this, but it would appear that the non-Suntan assigned cars were back in the regular coach pool, perhaps in the Commute Pool around San Fransisco?

I am going to get one or two of these and see if I can back-convert it into a non-ADL 60-C-3/4.  Basically I think this will involved rebuilding one window where the SP installed a "Diner Kitchen" style high window, back to a standard coach-type window.  I'm not at all sure how this will go... I sense another blog about that in the future!

I would say these would so up after 1960 about the same way the 60-C-5 Coaches would, for your local tourist railroad behind steam and early diesel.  After all you got to have that on-board snack and memorabilia car selling stuff!

"Business Observation 60ft - Harriman" 60-O-1

SP "Redwood" NWP's Superintendent's car.  (model and photo by John Ruehle 2016, used with permission)

These would be 60-O-1s primarily build for the T&NO and rebuilt as Business cars for the Superintendents of certain divisions along the SP.  After rebuild these cars had a "home" and would usually not wander too far from that assignment.

The classic 60-O-1 that everyone thinks of is the Business Car "Redwood" assigned to the Northwestern Pacific.  This photo above is John Ruehle's lovely kitbashed and super detailed Soho model, photo used with permission.

In Closing

The second to the left most window is the higher "Kitchen" window, not completed in this photo is the mid-window bar.

I think it will be very interesting to see the GGD passenger cars, and I'm looking forward to seeing them in person!  I hope they'll fill a very much needed vacancy in many modeler's rosters.

As always, for more information on these cars I highly recommend looking into the Southern Pacific Historical & Technical Society's series of books on SP Passenger Cars, Vol.1-6.  Specifically for these cars Vol.1 Coaches, Vol.3 Head End, and Vol.6 Business cars.  I believe they've been sold out of Vol.1 for several years now.

I'll probably start referencing these cars in my consist posts for various trains.  Pairing these with Walthers HW Pullmans and MDC or SC&F 60ft baggages would be the foundations for some good lookin SP Heavyweight trains!

Jason Hill

Related Links:
Review - Golden Gate Depot (Part 1) - 60ft Harriman Coaches

Review - Golden Gate Depot (Part 2) - 60ft Harriman Business Car

Review - Golden Gate Depot (Part 3) - 60ft Harriman All-Day-Lunch

Review - Golden Gate Depot (Part 4) - 70ft Harriman Baggage, RPO-Baggage, & Conclusions

Other Blogs with SP Harriman Coaches:
SP 1005 (Part 1) 60-C-5 from Soho Coach

SP 2701 (Part 1) 60-CC-1 from Model Power Coach