Tangent B-50-28 & -31 Custom Decalled to Match Owenyo Prototypes

I always like modeling off prototype photos, both in the way it actually frees me from inventing weathering and finishing, and it also gives me a specific target to measure the modeling against.  Now that Tangent has produced these huge (over 8000 cars since 1946) and typical classes of SP's post-war cars, I could now easily add these models to my fleet for the Jawbone Branch.

My first Tangent B-50-28 that I picked up to review after renumber and the second unlettered car with decals.

One minor problem for my personal preference of modeling prototype cars that has been nagging me since the arrival of SP 102176 from Tangent is that I would prefer it to be a car that actually was seen on the Jawbone Branch.

The Inspiration - Prototype Photo

This car's a fun project to try to match a specific prototype.  Having the great end-view of the car is nice as well.  In this photo in Joe Dale Morris' book Slim Princess in the Sunset: 1940-1960 the caption says that the car's full of bagged Talc products.  The stacked load appears to be pushing four feet tall, which would suggest that the car's loaded to its 50-ton capacity.

SP 102856 post-war B-50-28 boxcar SPNG Owenyo Transfer Dock 1954 - Southern Pacific photo - owensvalleyhistory,com s-l1600_ebay01_sml (Cropped)

Another set of photos show many of boxcars at the Owenyo transfer docks after 1950 show 7ft single door boxcars from both SP, T&NO, and foreign roads being loaded by a small industrial forklift with a front-loader bucket with soapstone.

I'd been wondering about why these quite new 7ft door boxcars were being sent to Owenyo for loading, but it seems that they wanted these cars for the ease of loading with the mechanical assistance.  So the two Tangent boxcars that I have will probably represent the soapstone service.  I don't have very many other models which have larger than 6ft doors.  I have a couple of Branchline Blue-Print series PRR boxcars which could be used to represent the foreign cars showing up.

The 1937 AAR 10ft high boxcar B-50-21 as modeled with Branchline Yardmaster series model.

Older 6ft door SP cars also showed up at Owenyo for transfer loading too, so I'll continue to plan to have the older cars spot for loading with the hand-trucks.

SP 102856, The Plan for Renumbering a Factory Tangent B-50-28

So I have a couple options, one is to renumber the review sample that I bought (SP 102176) to be the SP 102856 (built in 4th quarter 1950). 

SP 102176 being renumbered to SP 102856.

The basics of changing lettering can be done in several ways.  While any use of liquids are best to be able to test them before working on the majority of the visible model.  On this model, I want to replicate the car as it was only a couple of years old (built 1950, and I model before 1954), which means that I can't use weathering to hide any problems from the renumbering.  I settled for abrasive lettering removal.  

Close-up of renumbering of SP 102176 to SP 102856.

While I often use fibre-bristle brushes to lightly scratch away the pad-printing, I opted for the control of a single edge of a sharp No.11 X-acto blade for this model.

End lettering change on SP 102176 to SP 102856.

The end lettering was a bit more challenging, but also came off easily, some of the small flakes are still loose around on the end of the car in this photo.  These flecks were easily removed with a small brush.

New numbers from Daniel Kohlberg's decal set (which I cover on the second car SP 106272 below)

The easiest "85" that I could get to match the 'as-delivered' Pullman lettering on the B-50-28, to snip them out of the number jumble and then reverse them, cutting the "58" after it was wetted.  Then the two numbers were placed carefully on the car-side and Micro-Scale 'Micro Sol' with a small brush.

A quick view of the right side of SP 102856.

I also applied a routing and a grading cards from OwlMtModels 1220 decal set on the smaller lower tack-board.

A close-up of the routing & grading cards.

More Perspiration - Decalling an Unlettered Tangent B-50-28 as B-50-31

Tangent B-50-28 Unlettered version (23107-01)

In October 2023, I picked up a second B-50-28 in the painted, unlettered form at the Bridgetown RPM show.  I decided that the second car will be modeled from another photo at Owenyo (Joe Dale's book, pg 179), SP 106272, which also has Youngstown doors being in the first series of the B-50-31 class, built during the first 9 months of 1952 by SPE company (SP Sacramento Shops).  In the photo of 106272 also there is also a T&NO B-50-32 (1953 built, with 5-panel Superior doors) in the background that I can't see the number on!  So these cars were quite common around Owenyo in the 1950s.

The Decal Set

Contents of SE-28 SP Post-War 40' 7' Door Boxcars 1950+ by Daniel Kohlberg.

Along with the unlettered Tangent boxcar I bought a SE-28 SP Post-War (B-50-28,29,31,32,33) 40' 7' Door Boxcars 1950+ set of decals by Daniel Kohlberg (website: www.icgdecals.com).  This set has enough decals to do three cars, including multiple sets of class data and reporting marks.  There are also two sheets of instructions and placement diagrams to supplement prototype photos that I am using to model the specific cars.

Lettering SP 106272 Model

Right side of unlettered car with basic left-side lettering applied.

The top of the road name is aligned with the top of the end-panel joint and the middle-rib on the door centered on the large tack-board.  The road number top is aligned with the upper left grab-iron.  The lower grab is aligned between the LD LMT and LT WT lines.  These alignments I could see from the photo, where as the right data and herald sections weren't really visible in the photo, so I had to go off the supplied lettering plan drawings from the decal sheet.

Here's the car with the new-build tare date, data panel, class, and build date applied.

One interesting point to bring up on just the set of weight data for B-50-31 #106988:
CAPY        100000
LD LMT    124800

LT WT         44200

.. is slightly too wide to fit between the panel rivet lines, the others in the decal sets are slightly narrower and will fit well.  I ended up cutting out about 1/32" between the left and right columns and making the parts of the decal work.  The "LD LMT" & "124800" have to be nearly touch.

The decal set provides black disk for the herald background, also repack data is applied.

The two stacked layers for the heralds each need to snugged down over the rivets with Micro-Sol.

Finally the white portion of the herald is applied.

I also wrote a small chalk mark "bulk" with the GellyRoll 05 white pen that I described using a couple months ago.  

The end reporting marks were cut out and removed the last three digits to be replaced with "27 2"

The special numbering for this model requires me to cut out the "988" from the end reporting marks section and trim out "27" and "2" from number jumbles and other numbers from the decal sheets.

In Closing

I want to point out that these two cars show the changing of the lettering applied to the new boxcars ordered from Pullman and SP Equipment Company from 1950 to 1952.  The Pullman cars of B-50-28 were delivered with the white bars above the road name and below the road numbers, while the SPE cars from 1952 had already dropped the bars, although I believe the SP changed the repainting of the in-service cars in 1953 to this standard.

Time to compare the lettering details of "as-delivered" B-50-28 and -31 classes.

I'm planning to give both models a light over-coat to seal the decal changes in.  Chalk marks and routing cards will be adjusted and some 1-3 year old light weathering to bring the -31 up to my standard for having basic running weathering to run on the Jawbone Branch.  Someday I'll be looking forward to recreating the prototype photos of these two cars at the Owenyo transfer platforms.

SP 102856 after some light weathering to match prototype photo.

I'll be doing a follow-up quick post after the weathering is done on these two cars, detailing the techniques.  This sneak-peak at SP 102856 has some general dusting, but specific paint failures around the herald and darker dirt or corrosion already starting to catch on the panel seams.

Jason Hill

Related Articles:

Modeling SP B-50-series Boxcars (Part 2) - Post-War All-Steel

New Tangent SP B-50-28 and T&NO B-50-32s - Review

Anthony Thompson's Articles: B-50-28 series blogs search results.

Modeling the Owl (Part1) - Post-WW2 to Korea

Let's look at the 1946-1950 consists of the Southern Pacific's Owl between Oakland and Los Angeles (No.57 & 58).  Most of my information comes from the SP Trainline (SPH&TS Magazine) and from the research that the Operations Dept at La Mesa Model Railroad Club has dug up over the years.  I'm also cross checking this data against that provided in SPH&TS's five fabulous volumes of SP Passenger Car books.

Links to my blog posts on the following related topics:
SP Heavyweight Passenger Car Models in HO Scale
Thoughts on Golden Gate Depot Harriman Cars
Modeling the Shasta (Nos.327/328) Consist in 1949 & 1952
Modeling the Tehachapi Mail (Nos.55/56) Consist
Kitbashing Pullman 16-Section Tourist Car (Part 1) TC 4242

No.58 lead by SP 4255 slips by in the night towards Los Angeles with a long string of varnish.

The Owl traveled the flat San Joaquin Valley from Oakland, north around the San Fransisco Bay to Fresno via the Mococo Line, then south to Bakersfield.  In Bakersfield the smaller engine used from Oakland would be changed out for usually at least a big AC-class, cab forward, and usually a point helper of some type, often the point engine was another AC-class engine.  Heavy 16 car Owl consists required big engines to move it over the 4000ft Tehachapi Summit and then over the Mojave Desert to Vincent Summit, south of Palmdale.

After the arrival of dual-service EMD F-unit sets in around 1952, the run between Bakersfield and Los Angeles was dieselized.  Steam lasted in the Valley, north of Bakersfield, until about 1956, when pairs of dual-service F-units took over that run as well.

In this first part, we will focus our look at the consists changes over the years between 1946 and 1950.  The post-1950 and dieselization will come in following posts.

1946 - Consist of No.57

Coaches, like this 60-C-9, were common on the SP passenger trains until replaced by chair cars.

Older coaches like this 60-C-4, made up most of the coach-class cars on the post-war Owls until A/C Chair cars took over.

BP Oak-Fresno (Probably 30ft Apartment) - to 2nd 60 at Fresno (Possibly entrained between the baggages and the coaches)
Baggage/Express Oak-Fresno
B/E Oak-LA
B/E Oak-LA
Partition Coach
Coach (News Agent)
Coach
Coach
Pullman Tourist Car (STD 16-Section)
Pullman Tourist Car (STD 16-Section)
Diner
Pullman STD 6-2-Lounge ("Mission Dolores" and "Mission Santa Ynez")
Pullman STD 12-1
Pullman STD 10-Sect Lounge-Observation

March 10, 1947 - Consist of No.57

An option for modeling a Postal Storage Car, ex-RPO SP 4261, now a Storage Car.

This is the standard consist planned for the Owl after March 10th, 1947.

Postal Storage
Baggage/Express
Baggage/Express
Baggage/Express
RPO Bag/RPO (30ft Postal Apartment to rear)
Coach - Partitioned
Coach - News Agent
Coach
Coach
Diner
Pullman STD - Tourist 16-Section Sleeper
Pullman STD 6-2-Lounge (Mission-Series)
Pullman STD 10-1-1 Sleeper
Pullman STD 14-Section Sleeper

The consists in this film is very interesting:

This is the consist as best as I can make out.

SP 4228 (AC-10 class engine) working as "road engine" between Bakersfield and LA on No.58 Eastward at Saugus after point helper was cut off, probably at Vincent after going over the Tehachapi mountains and over the Mojave desert.

An example of a MDC 60-B-9 & -10 baggage-express cars like SP 6043 in the consist below, note the large left door.

SP 6114 Storage Mail (60-B, ex-60-P-4)
SP 6043 Baggage-Express (60-B-9)
SP 6320 Baggage-Express  (60-B-1) (hard to read the last number)
SP 6336  Baggage-Express (60-B-2) (Very hard to read number)
SP 5076  RPO-Baggage (69-BP-30-2) (working RPO - Apartment to rear)
Pullman Tourist Car 2281 (ex-Schuykill, STD 12-1 non-A/C Sleeper) - Acting as Dormitory Car (Might be PC TC 2381, ex-Pennell)  - Not shown in regular consist
SP 2165 Partitioned Coach (60-C-9 Ice A/C floor)
SP 2500 News Agent Coach (Ex-ADL-Coach "CHAIR" 60-CC-1)
SP 1365? Coach (60-C-5,6,7,8,9,10 Ice A/C'd) - Number doesn't match up with historical data
SP 2306 Coach (60-C-5 Ice A/C roof end)
SP 10107 Diner (77-D-4 with A/C)
Pullman Tourist Car 4000-4200-series STD 16-Section Sleeper Tourist - usually US Military personnel returning from WW2.
Pullman "Mission Dolores" STD 6-2-Lounge - After 1948 to SP ownership regular on Owl until 1956
Pullman "Palouse Falls" STD 10-1-1 Sleeper - Regular with Prior Lake (10-1-1) on the Owl until 1954 or so.
Pullman "Overdale" STD 14-Section Sleeper

Pullman 16-Section Tourist sleeper, Kitbashed from a Walthers 14-Section model.

June 17, 1947 - Consist of No.57 Wrecked at Lerdo

SP 2701, a stand-in model for a non-A/C'd 60-CC-1, like SP 2512.

The consist was pretty much the same when the Owl derailed at Lerdo (in the San Joaquin Valley) on June 17th 1947.  Records of wrecks always include the involved cars.

SP 4376 (MT-5) - working between Bakersfield and Oakland

SP 6064 B/E (70-B-7)
SP 6073 B/E (70-B-7) Later * Baggage
SP 6457 B/E (70-BA-5) Later * Baggage (probably working TBM car)
SP 1836 Partitioned Coach 60-C-3
SP 1362 Coach 60-C-3 - plain Coach
SP 1084 Coach 60-C-3 - plain Coach
SP 2512 Coach 60-CC-1 ("old" Chair car)
PC TC 4246 - Tourist 16-section - For US Military personnel
PC TC 4242 - Tourist 16-section - For US Military personnel
SP 10107 (77-D-4 with A/C)
PC "Mission Dolores" STD 6-2-Lounge
PC "Prior Lake" STD 10-1-1
PC "Overcot" STD 14-Section
PC "Mt. Breckenridge" STD 10-Sect-Lounge-Obs

Old Walthers metal 10-Section Lounge-Observation, Similar to the Pullman Co.'s Mt. Breckenridge in the Owl consist above

It looks like on that ill-fated run the train was running the extra 10-Section Lounge-Obs, but no RPO or dormitory car listed.

February 27, 1950 - Consist of No.58

SP 2312, a 72-C-2, rebuilt with A/C and plated over transom windows as it would have appeared in 1947.

Note the changes in the consist as the chair cars replace the coaches.  These Chair cars were most likely arch-roofed 72-C, clerestory roofed 73-C, or 74-CC Heavyweight A/C'd "Deluxe" Chair cars after this time.  Also note the now standard Tourist sleepers behind the Diner.

RPO - Oak-Fresno (30ft Apartment)
Postal Storage - Oak-Fresno
Baggage-Express - Oak-Fresno
Baggage-Express - Oak-LA (ex-Tuesday, Storage Mail & Magazines)
Baggage-Express - Oak-LA (ex-Sunday)
Chair (probably a News Agent Car)
Chair
Chair
Chair
Diner
Pullman STD - Tourist 16-Section Sleeper - For US Military personnel
Pullman STD - Tourist 16-Section Sleeper - For US Military personnel
SP "Mission-series" STD 6-2-Lounge
SP "Night-series" STD 14-Single Bedroom ("Night Fern" and "Night Mantle" - later rebuilt into Baggage Dorms SP 3500 & SP 3501)
SP STD 10-1-1 "Prior Lake" & "Palouse Falls" regularly assigned
SP STD 12-1 - SP Pool 12-1s no specific cars assigned.

Sept 24, 1950 - Consist of No.58

SP 2337, a 73-C-1, is another example of a 48-seat "Deluxe Chair" car used on the Owl.

Note the movement of the RPO to stay with the train now.  No Fresno setout car now.  Also the last consist showing 16-Section Tourist Cars regularly assigned.

Postal Storage Oak-LA
Baggage-Express Oak-LA
Baggage-Express Oak-LA
RPO Oak-LA (30ft Apartment)
Chair (probably a News Agent Car)
Chair
Chair
Chair
Diner
Pullman STD - Tourist 16-Section Sleeper - For US Military personnel
Pullman STD - Tourist 16-Section Sleeper - For US Military personnel
SP "Mission-series" STD 6-2-Lounge
SP "Night-series" STD 14-Single Bedroom ("Night Fern" and "Night Mantle")
SP STD 10-1-1 "Prior Lake" & "Palouse Falls" regularly assigned
SP STD 12-1 - SP Pool 12-1s no specific cars assigned.

Feb 15, 1951 - Consist of No.58

This consist changes in a number of ways: 1. RPO car is now through LA-Oakland. 2. Pullman 16-Section Tourists replaced with standard 12-1s, possibly Pullman Pool cars. 3. Introduction of first regular Streamlined car to train, STD 6-6-4 sleeper, alternating with HW 8-5 "Clover"-series car.

Baggage-Express Oakland-Bakersfield
Baggage-Express Oak-LA
Baggage-Express Oak-LA
Postal Storage Oak-LA
RPO Oak-LA (30ft Apartment)
Chair (probably a News Agent Car)
Chair
Chair
Chair
Diner
SP STD 12-1 - PC/SP Pool 12-1s no specific cars assigned.
SP STD 12-1 - PC/SP Pool 12-1s no specific cars assigned.
SP "Mission-series" STD 6-2-Lounge
SP STD 6-6-4 "SP 9150-series" or STD 8-5 "Clover-series" on alternating consists
SP "Night-series" STD 14-Single Bedroom ("Night Fern" and "Night Mantle")
SP STD 10-1-1 "Prior Lake" & "Palouse Falls" regularly assigned
SP STD 12-1 - SP Pool 12-1s no specific cars assigned.

SP 12-1 "Los Angeles" brings up the rear of a very late running No.58 at Caliente.

That pretty much does it for Modeling the Owl (Part 1), stay tuned or follow to be notified when the next update is posted.

Jason Hill

Follow these links to other related posts on my blog.
SP Heavyweight Passenger Car Model Index in HO Scale
Thoughts on Golden Gate Depot Harriman Cars
Modeling SP Trains 55/56, the Tehachapi Mail
Modeling SP Baggage cars with MDC/Athearn 60ft "Harrimans"
Modeling the Shasta (Nos.327/328) Consist in 1949 & 1952
Modeling SP 1005 (Part 1), Soho 60-C-5.
Modeling SP 2701 (Part 1), Model Power 60-CC-1.
Modeling Pullman Mt.Nebo (Part 1), 10-Section Lounge-Obs from old Walthers metal passenger car

SP 65ft Mill Gondolas (Part 1) - Overview

Tonight I will talk about Athearn's R-T-R 65ft mill gondolas.

The Prototypes

The 65ft mill gondola with drop ends started being built just before WW2.  The drop end doors were fitted for carrying loads longer than 65ft that were in high demand in the steel industry for structural shapes and other long items from the "rust belt" during the early part of WW2.  These cars were also built unusually narrow, around 8 feet wide.  As the length of the cars grew, the standard clearance plates for curves meant the cars also had to get narrower to be able to fit around the same curve a 10' wide 40ft box car could without sideswiping any track side obstacles.

PRR 440703, a G26A, is one of the Pennsy RR's huge fleet of 2600 65ft mill gondolas.

Above is one of the PRR G26/G26A cars that Athearn produced.  These cars run so well I am happy to have some minor differences in the ends of the model car compared to the 2600 prototype cars of this type that the PRR owned!  These models are also reasonably accurate for many other prototypes as well.

In this post we will focus on the four classes of SP cars, totaling 305 cars.  SP bought their cars to cater to heavy lumber industry interests in Northern California and Oregon and also some of their other customers around the system including 50 cars for the Texas & New Orleans.

G-70-2, 15 cars blt 1941

G-70-4, SP 40 cars & T&NO 50 cars blt 1942

G-70-6, 100 cars blt 1950

G-70-9, 100 cars blt 1953

The Models

First produced around 2005-2006, these are one of my favorite models in terms of mechanical setup.  In 10 years of regular running at the club of nearly 20 of these cars, I don't believe there's been a single car derailed from a cause I can track to the mechanicals of the car itself.

Top view and interior of Athearn 65ft mill gondola with drop end doors and steel floor.

The mechanical construction of these models is rather unique in HO scale.  They have a die-cast metal underframe and floor.  The sides and drop end doors are cast plastic,  While these cars only weigh about 3.25oz with all-metal wheelsets (Intermountain), they have a Center-of-Gravity test of 120 degrees and a rollablity of 1%.  Yes, the car can be nearly inverted on its back and still right itself to its wheels!

Underbody of Athearn 65ft mill gondola - The whitish marks are chips in the paint revealing the cast metal floor.  Also notice  the areas behind the 'fishbelly' sides is not packed with weight!

This combination of VERY low CG and better than average rolling qualities means, according to the LMRC club standard that the car meets the adjusted weight standards.  In a future post I will talk more about these standards and how we quantify them.  It is enough to say here that mixed car type trains of over 100 cars can easily be operated without any issues when cars are properly built and adjusted.  The couplers on these models were replaced with standard Kadee No.5 head, whisker-type couplers.

SP 160550 - G-70-9 

This was the first car of the G-70-9 class.  For some reason so far Athearn has only issued painted models for the G-70-9s built in 2-53.  Hopefully in the future they will make some of the earlier class cars as well.

SP 160550, G-70-9, Built 1953

SP 94296 - G-70-4

To round out my other 65ft SP mill gondola cars I have redecalled two models to backdate them for G-70-4 and G-70-6.  I decided not to number any of my cars for the G-70-2, as only being 15 cars,

SP 94296, G-70-4 Built 1942

The SP 94296 I wanted to try a new weathering technique on.  I had the chance to collect some powdered rust.  As this car would have seen heavy service during WW2 and in total about 11 years of service I decided to try some rust powder.  The inside of the car has steel floor plates as well.  I tried first dusting on the powder like chalks, then over-spaying with dullcote.  However like most chalk weathering and dullcote the sealing coat tends to dull the effect of the chalks.  Also the car body being nearly rust color originally as well didn't help!

I tried a different technique then.  Spray the inside of the car with a fairly heavily with dullcote and then pour some rust powder into the wet clear dullcote.... using an old brush I quickly swooshed the powder around the interior and the lower sides sticking it into the tacky paint.  This worked perfectly and ended up giving a large variety of colors from the same rust powder.

SP 160023 - G-70-6

SP 160588, a G-70-9, before I renumbered it to become SP 160023, a G-70-6.

The SP 160588 was the number on my third G-70-9.  Deciding that I wanted to backdate it to a G-70-6, I redecalled it as the SP 160023, built in 1950.

SP 160023, G-70-6 - The car's been renumbered, but I've not yet redecalled the tare year or class number.

This model was lightly weathered with a mix of PollyScale paints roughly the same color as the car body.  I use similar colors when I want to knock down the brilliance of the white lettering on a car that has been around a while, but other weathering such as rust hasn't really started to set in yet.  I also like doing a coat of road grime and dust along the lower car body to varying levels.  I also tend to use slightly different colors for this as these cars will have been coming from different parts of the country and seen yet more variety of climates and weathering conditions on previous trips.

In Closing

That will wrap it up this time for these very nice operating 65ft Mill Gondolas.  When I get some other photos together of the removable loads for these cars, such as the one above, I'll make another posting.

Jason Hill

Related Articles:

Ex-EPSW 40ft Ballast Gondola

Ever wonder if those cheap old models at the flea-market actually make into good and accurate models of anything?  Well, have a look at this car...

Left side of SP 45752, Model by Jason Hill

It's based on an old Mantua 40ft gondola.  The prototype is an Ex-EPSW gondola which had sides that VERY closely matched this model.  Photos of this car in Tony Thompson's SP Freight Cars Vol1., pg 87 shows a car with minimal lettering.  One bit of lettering I've not added that shows in the photo is the "When Empty Return to Melrose" plaque which is mounted on the extension boards above the reporting marks on the left most panel.

B-end view of SP 45752, model by Jason Hill

The ends of the Mantua car were different, but that's easy to fix with styrene and small L-beam styrene strip.  This end photo shows the simple construction of the flat end of the car.  The original end sill was kept from the Mantua model.  New end sheets were made from 0.015" or 0.020" sheet styrene and 0.04" L-girder from Evergreen Plastic was used for the exterior vertical and internal horizontal bracing.  Separate Tichy wire grab irons were mounted in holes drilled for them.  The original cast-on grabs were cut off and wire grabs installed on the carsides as well, so the new ends weren't as obvious.

The original underframe and floor was scrapped.  Sheet lead was used to bring the car up to club standard weight of 3.25 Oz.  I think this car might be slightly heavier.  A new second hand Athearn 40ft boxcar underframe was used to supply the rough underbody brake details, bolsters, and draft gear boxes.

Empty interior of SP 45752, model by Jason Hill

The interior of the car was pretty much correct.  The edges of the 8 drop doors were scribed into the floor as shown in the photo above.  Thru holes and the tips of the screws for the truck bolsters and couplers can be seen in this photo.  As long as the tip of the screws are close to even with the floor of the car, painting them will hide them from most viewer's casual glance at the car.

Removable ballast load, model by Jason Hill

The load was made from a Bowser plastic coal load for a 4-bay PRR H21 hopper that they make.  Woodland Scenic fine light gray ballast was glued to the top of the plastic load.  The load is removable by up-ending the car and dropping the load out.

Paint was Floquil (Boxcar) Freight Car Red and decals were Microscale SP freight cars, probably from the 87-911 set meant for 40ft USRA (B-50-13/14) boxcars.

Right Side of SP 45752, Model by Jason Hill

The damage seen on this model happened during 15 years of service at the club.  I recently (2016) reglued the side board extensions and will soon replace the brake wheel with a new brass one.  New second hand Red Caboose T-section trucks replaced a set of destroyed Walthers sprung T-section trucks that it had before while in service.  The trucks and new wheelsets will get a coat of paint and weathering.

In looking at the prototype photo again, there are a few things to add.  One is the car should have repacking data stenciled on just above the right side truck.  there should also be slight saw-tooth look from the bolsters and needle beams connecting below the side sheet.

I'm not going to worry too much about the saw-tooth look, as that is more work to scratch build than I want to do on this model.  I probably will add some repack data and then give the car some light dusty "ballast" weathering.  Once all is well with the car again, a light spray of dullcoat will knock down the gloss of the glue around the side boards and the car will go back into regular service.

I hope you all enjoy seeing what can be done in a few hours with a cheap flea-market car.  All told a car like this could be kitbashed for about $10-15 if you find the right parts at a meet... which is less than even a new Athearn R-T-R freight car!
Jason Hill

First Steps - A new modeling blog posting.

Well now, it's been about 8 or so years since I last worked on my old GeoCities website when they shifted it to a pay-site and I closed my accounts there.  A number of people have asked me to repost the pages and information from the old site.  I plan to use this blog to do that and also post new projects and prototypical kit-bashes that I'm working on for myself or some of my customers that wanted a model done.

A set of dual-service F7ABBAs lead No.57 between Ilmon and Bena at La Mesa Model Railroad Club

Current Posts: Fall 2016

For starters click on the following links to these build blogs:
SP 5199, a SC&F 69-BP-30-3 (Part 1), (Part 2), (Part 3), (Part 4), (Part 5), (Part 6)

Modeling SP HW Coach & Chair Cars (Part1, SP 1050)
Modeling SP 1050, Decals & Windows (Part 2)

Passenger Consist Modeling:
The Shasta, a Pike-Size Passenger Train Reprised 

Freight Car Modeling:
SP 65ft Mill Gondolas
Ex-EPSW 40ft Gondola Kitbashed from Mantua Model

Reference Pages:
Index of SP Passenger Car Models

Future Projects

Among the posts I hope to repost in the future under the kitbashing category are the following:

Engine Modeling and Kitbashing

1a. Kato/Atlas RSD-5s - Making a family of engines that might not be totally "right" but don't attract attention to the compromises.
1b. Reposting my old how-to on Rebuilding Intermountain AC-class models for heavy operations.  Generally I feel that this project was a failure as none of the rebuilt engines survived more than 6 years of regular service at La Mesa Model Railroad Club (Tehachapi Pass).

Caboose & Rider Car Modeling and Kitbashing

Caboose and other rear-end cars - What makes a caboose and how where they used?  Modeling of
various 'cabooses' and other rider equipment.

Freight Car Modeling and Kitbashing

Various freight car kitbashing articles - both new and reposted old ones.  Most of these are surprisingly simple to do and make 95% accurate models, perhaps stand-in models - until something better is made commercially.  Some of these are also used where 20-40+ cars are needed for an operational plan, so the old and cheap models are a better starting point than a $200+ brass model you'll be lucky to ever find more than one of!

Passenger Car Modeling and Kitbashing

Various passenger car models, again pretty easy kitbashes, some more involved than others to make accurate (or as close as is reasonable) models of certain SP, Pullman, UP, ATSF, etc cars.

Passenger Consist Modeling

Hopefully this will bridge over into more complete consist discussion of affordable and accurate modeling options for certain signature passenger trains using models built in the above series of articles.  These consist posts will likely include SP trains such as:
San Joaquin Daylight (Nos.51/52) - The lowest of the Daylights, the San Joaquin Daylight is an interesting Cinderella story of a train that always sacrifices so her step-sisters, the Morning Daylight, Noon Daylight, (later Coast Daylight), and Shasta Daylights looked their best!
Sacramento Daylight (Nos.53/54) - Everyone seems to have a WSM 3000/3001 4-4-2, but what are you supposed to pull with it?  This should give you a great little "pike-sized" train consist for your 4x8 or garage-sized layout!
Tehachapi Mail (Nos.55/56) - This should also cover the weekly fluctuations in the consists, day to day.
Owl (Nos.57/58) - I hope to cover modeling options for consists from 1946-to-1956
West Coast (Nos.59/60) - The West Coast I plan to mostly talk about the post-1949 era with some discussion of earlier thru Portland connections too.

Hopefully this will be an educational and productive new blog.

Jason Hill