SPH&TS 2023 Convention at Bakersfield

Need to cool off and kill 90 minutes?  Stop in at the "Tehachapi Loop" at Walong Siding's over-view.

Driving from Nevada down to Bakersfield was nice, but I stopped for a bit at the Loop because I was actually running ahead of schedule.  It was great to get out of the toasty car and cool off in the stiff breeze which regularly flows over the Tehachapi mountains.  The day was pretty clear and in the 70F range, which was extremely pleasant.  After about 20 minutes, it was back to the road again and following the back roads down into Bakersfield to Kern Jct.  Then over to the Santa Fe on Truxtun Ave to Oak, and up to the Double Tree, which was the convention hotel.

Vendor Room & OwlMtModels Table

The afternoon was filled with registration and setting up for the convention.  I enjoyed the clinic given by Mike McGinley on the SPMW, which was very interesting to hear his experiences 'working on the railroad.' 

OwlMtModels Table at 2023 SPHTS Convention.

Much of the rest of my time was spent in the Vendor Room chatting with all the fellow modelers and SP aficionados, something I've missed over the last 4 years not being able to attend the convention since 2018.

Tony Thompson's photo of the Vendor room with me surrounded in the middle - linked from his blog covering the SPH&TS 2023 Convention.

The vendor room was pretty full, and was quite busy at times with the 140 attendees to the convention.  The room also became quite loud at times with all the conversations!  Ah good times.  My throat felt this for the next couple of days after the meet, but it was certainly worth the later discomfort!

San Luis Obispo Roundhouse

San Luis Obispo Roundhouse by Bob Schrempp of Prawn Designs, LLC.

A very impressive work-in-progress is this SLO Roundhouse model in HO-scale.  There was an accompanying note book full of photos and research materials on the table with it.  It will be very nice to see this model completed!

1:1 Scale Headlight!

Very nice Pyle Sunbeam Headlight made by PLA 3d Print by Peter Savoy

Peter Savoy made this very nice full-size replica of a classic SP headlight and smokebox front mounting bracket made from PLA plastic, a form of 3d printing larger items.  I first saw this model at the RPM in Reno earlier in 2023, so great to see it again here!

Dismantled for transport!

I was able to snap another photo when he'd disassembled it for transporting after the show.  It certainly looks nice when it's all put together at the shows!

Saturday - RPM Room

Beautiful PNW Resin Boxcars in the RPM Room by Gary Laakso

I'm impressed with Gary Laakso's very nicely finished resin boxcars, mostly from the GN and NP, which I harbor some interest in modeling from the interchange perspective with the SP's lumber trains.  While I don't believe any of these are interesting truss-rod steel cars that lasted well into the 1940s and maybe even early 1950s, they certainly are great examples of cars from these roads!

Westerfield, I guess 40ft USRA Double-sheath

Classic double sheathed boxcars from the early 20th Century, very nicely molded with the late side-view goat herald.

Westerfield, I guess 40ft USRA Double-sheath

A slightly earlier car with the more front-facing Mountain Goat herald.  Also notice the interesting Andrews-style trucks under these two cars.

GN 50ft door-and-half car from Westerfield

While not a full double-door car, this is a more proper example of the correct bracing on a GN 50ft single-sheath car.  Unlike my Walthers DD stand-in cars I talked about last month.

NP 36ft fishbelly side-sill from Westerfield

Interesting that the NP still had these cars wandering around, while similar to the SP's earlier B-50-series cars with the pressed-steel fish-belly side sills, but with NP's classic radial roof.  The car also has the interesting trucks, I wonder if these are the NP-style trucks from Tahoe Model Works?

Westerfield 36ft Southern DS boxcar.

While from the other end of the country, these 36 Southern boxcars are certainly interesting.

SP&S Double-Sheath from Westerfield

And not to be outdone by the other bigger roads, here's a very nice SP&S boxcar with periods, suggesting pre-1931 era lettering.

Dave Maffei's Beets & Lumber Loads!

Dave took up two tables with his wonderful 1960-1970s SP freight train consists.

Seeing Dave again after the Bridgetown Meet and BAPM meets earlier this year was a treat!

Dave's done a couple clinics on the beets in the SP's extended side (post-1957) "Beet Racks".

The "Beet Racks" continued the legacy of calling them "Racks" from the Blackburn Racks 70 years earlier.  Basically, he's modeling what I do, but about 20 years newer in era!

Golden Empire Visit

Beautiful scratch-built Ice Machines on the Golden Empire HO-layout.

I also made a detour Sunday morning to visit the Golden Empire HO-scale club in Bakersfield.  They had a couple of very nice scratch-built Mechanical Ice Deck Machines on their Santa Fe style Ice-Deck.

Dave Maffei caught a short video of our trains meeting.  I put together a train with many of the OwlMtModels Lumber Loads on it, which turned into quite the sight rolling along behind a double heading "Hog" and "Deck."  Thanks to the guys at the Golden Empire club for hosting the running session on Sunday!

In Closing

In general, the trip to visit the SPH&TS Convention in Bakersfield was great fun, and a wonderful chance to visit with friends who I've not seen since the last convention I attended in 2018.  An additional bonus was stopping on the way home at Owenyo to wander through the remains of the SP transfer station with the narrow gauge.  I posted about that experience in my SP Jawbone Branch (Part 39) post.

Jason Hill

Related Articles:

SP Jawbone Branch (Part 39) - A Ferro-Equestrian Archaeology Field Trip - Messing around in the back country of Iyon County to get more first-hand research for my layout construction.

A Month Away - Modeling on the Road - My visit to the SPH&TS 2016 Convention in Palm Springs, CA.

Bridgetown 2023 RPM Meet - GN Plywood & Unlettered Tangent B-50-28 Boxcars for the Jawbone Branch

SP 4230 leads OCM-7 through the snow approaching Oakridge with a heavy consist of open lumber laden gondolas and flatcars. - Bob Zenk photo

I want to just do a quick report on the Bridgetown RPM meet in Portland, Oregon this month.  I enjoyed visiting with everyone who attended.  Thanks to Bruce Barney, Rod Loder, and the rest of the crew that was able to get the event set up at the Airport Shilo Inn at the Portland airport.  As always, conversations were fast and everyone seemed busy!  I was last able to attend the first Bridgetown RPM meet in 2018.  So after 5-6 years it was great to be able to visit friends again in the greater Pacific North West area.

The second consist I brought is a Valley extra freight with a classic "Deck" & a work consist with a 2-8-0 and a couple SPMW bunk cars, covered previously in early October 2023. - Bob Zenk photo

The models I brought to the meet included a ~40 car OCM lumber train with about 80% of the cars loaded with OwlMtModels Modular Lumber Loads.  The other consist pulled by SP 3666 was a San Joaquin Valley consist with three OwlMtModels Blackburn Sugarbeet Racks on F-50-series flatcars, a Red Caboose composite GS gondola, and the NC&StL Accurail 36ft Fowler boxcar kitbash I recently posted about here.  Unfortunately, I ran out of time during set up to pull out another 10-15 cars which I've been posting on the blog here, which would have included the NP 11661 double-sheath boxcar, a couple of UTLX tank cars, etc.

As my Jawbone Branch really isn't set up to show, let alone photograph, full freight consists of 40-50 cars, it was nice to get out and see some big consists again.  I'm hoping to remember my tripod so I can photograph the full consists at the SPH&TS convention in Bakersfield later this month!

Bob Cromwell's F-50-2 with OwlMtModels Lumber Loads

When I was able to go walk around the other vendors tables and model display tables I found Bob Cromwell's SP F-50-2 (printed by one of his friends many years ago) with a partly built up OwlMtModels 3004 lumber load on it! - Looking good Bob!

I look forward to seeing how Bob wraps this one up with all the stakes and bracing!

Bob's other models included a large number of tank car models from the 1920s and 1930s, all very nicely finished.

Remember that RPM meets are for you to bring your incomplete models to discuss and chat with others about.  It's not all about bringing "finished" models to show.  But like so much in the hobby, there's still stuff to do on the models.  This aspect is one of the main reasons I highly prefer attending RPM meets over any form of 'contest'.  Many of those that come to the RPM meets could and I'm sure have easily one 'contests' that they've entered.  And quite frankly, winning isn't worth it if you don't have friends to share it with.  So RPMs are a place to enjoy, and leave the competition outside.  The only one you're truly competing with in modeling is what kind of modeler, what kind of a person you can become.

GN "Plywood" Boxcar

For the last couple years I've been keeping an eye out for GN Plywood boxcars after seeing the photo below at Little Lake (Consist Photo Analysis (Part 2) - Owenyo Local, Circa 1950), with the train pulling a couple of GN boxcars near the rear of the consist.

SP 2751 at Little Lake 1950  by Serpico (little_lake003_sml) - Owens Valley History,com - Cropped & Enlarged Consist

While the model doesn't have the Superior-hybrid door of the newer announced IMRC run, which I think is what's in the photo at Little Lake, it was on sale for 50% off from Portland Whistle Stop!

GN "plywood" boxcar with Youngstown doors by IMRC.

I like the oddity of having a bright orange boxcar in regular service able to add some "spice" to the fairly 'boring' consists expected on my Jawbone Branch layout.  Yes, occasionally PFE reefers show up, but this adds a bit as foreign boxcars can roam around in the high desert too.

The red and white herald over the orange side is certainly interesting in the lack of contrast normally associated with the GN's paint schemes.

This car is shown in the new scheme from 1947 "as-built".  I may decide to dig up some black reporting marks and put some on, as the 'new' version doesn't appear to have any tare data, expecting anyone needing it to look at the right side data block for the build date.

This 3/4 view shows the A-end's post-war style of Dreadnaught end and plain rectangular panel roof.

I'm not sure how much weathering I'll be wanting to put on this model.  Maybe just enough to highlight the screw details at the panel joints to show that it's not the normal riveted construction.  As my modeling era targets 1946-1954, this car's 1947 build date keeps it mostly in the first few years of the car's existence. 

Left side view of GN 10784 with basic weathering that I'll show in the upcoming blog post using AppleBarrel acrylic paints and some Gel-pens. - Still subject to some revisions and adjustments to the weathering!

Thus the paint shouldn't be 'falling off' yet by any means.  Although I could do a little chipping here and there along the edges of the plywood panels.  I'm sure I'll cover a weathering post specifically on GN 10784 when I get to working on this car specifically.

SP 102856 - Tangent B-50-28 Unlettered - Youngstown Door Boxcar

SP 102856 Bags of Gypsum Owenyo CA Transfer Docks - owensvalleyhistory,com - (sp_narrow_g44b_sml)

Owenyo is certainly the focal point of my Jawbone Branch layout, with probably 80% of the freight traffic heading to or from the transfer platforms or the transfer trestle.  These two photos from 1954 show the three year old car starting to weather some, notably the herald is starting to have some paint failure.

SP 102856 post-war B-50-28 boxcar SPNG Owenyo Transfer Dock 1954 - owensvalleyhistory,com (s-l1600_ebay01_sml) - (Cropped to show only boxcar)

Tangent has offered painted, unlettered versions of their RTR B-50-28 boxcars.  I was able to get one to do the car above.  The car should be the focus of a future blog post when I get around to doing it.

Painted SP FCR version of Tangent's B-50-28 boxcar with 7ft Youngstown Doors.

In my first review blog of Tangent's new B-50-28 boxcars, I introduce these models. New Tangent SP B-50-28 and T&NO B-50-32s - Review

This is the info for the unlettered version of the boxcar I've picked up for the SP 102856.

B-50-28

Built 9-12/1950 thru 6/1951 *
SP 102100-103599, 1500 cars <- Tangent's current offerings - 2023.
SP 104100-105099, 1000
SP 105100-105599, 500
T&NO 59750-60249, 500
T&NO 60250-61249, 1000

Modeling SP B-50-series Boxcars (Part 2) - Post-War All-Steel - Roster including SP 102856

SP Post-War 7ft Boxcar Decals by Dan Kohlberg

Daniel Kohlberg was holding down the Tangent Models table and on the side his selection of decals for use on the unlettered Tangent B-50-28s.

Daniel Kohlberg's catalog of decals he offers - Page 1

It was enjoyable to talk with Dan for a few minutes while I was away from the OwlMtModels table.

Daniel Kohlberg's catalog of decals he offers - Page 2

I picked up his set for various SP B-50-28+ series cars for $12 and will be looking forward to decalling one of my unlettered Tangent B-50-28s.

Dan Kohlberg's SP Post-War boxcar decal sets.

Reverse side of SP Post-War boxcar decal set, which shows lettering diagrams.

I look forward to sitting down and finishing the RTR-pre-painted, unlettered B-50-28 as the car in the photo.  I like having a prototype weathering/details photo to aim for.  I feel it actually makes modeling the 'typical' prototype easier when you have a specific target to make yours look like. - Maybe I should finish other projects I've already started first?

In Closing

One of the Proto:48 modelers at the RPM brought a Fowler 36ft CP boxcar.  I'm building a Westerfield one in HO, so you'll find inspiration in other scales too!

I would encourage all modelers to are interested in prototype modeling to attend one of your local RPM meets, which are held all over the USA on regular basis.  They are not "contests", but more a forum where fellow modelers can get together and share the hobby, discuss modeling techniques, products, skills and help one another become better modelers.  If nothing else, bring your cell phone camera and take pictures of weathering and interesting things that you might like to model someday.

As one of the attendees (railstiesballast) posted on TrainOrders.com recently:

"A fun day, with great clinics and awesome modeling on display.
As an SP fan (and former employee) I could not resist getting a couple of Tangent's new SP B 50-28 40 ft. cars with 10-foot wide doors, with their distincive yellow stripe. (See their photo on their thread.)
Here is one of the more imaginative models, an Owl Mountain Models lumber load that has shifted during transit. I have see a lot of these, but simply never thought to make a model of it.
I wish I had recorded the name of modeler who shared it, can anyone comment?
I highly recommend attending these gatherings, they always explore new territories in the art and science (e.g. 3-D printing) of model railroading, and offer a great time to catch up with friends."

SP 79934, F-70-3 kitbash in-process, photo of my load just after I finished it last month.  Railstiesballast's phone-pic was of this car & load.

He posted a photo of one of my shifted OMM 3001 Lumber Loads on a not-quite-finished kitbashed F-70-3 60ft flatcar.  I'm not active on Train Orders, but the community jumped in and answered the question.

"Thank you for the info, and well done Mr. Hill.
I have several of his kits, but have lacked his imagination, my stacks are straight.
What is not obvious in the first photo is that it was a part of a 40 (?) car SP lumber drag with many open loads, being pulled by a Cab Forward.
An excellent contribution to an Oregon modeler's meet."

It is good to see 'railstiesballast' has received some inspiration to up his game of modeling what he saw for years working on the SP, not be limited to "what the instructions say" on the box!  I hope we all can keep our modeling fresh and dynamic, and visiting with fellow modelers will certainly help do that!

Jason Hill

Related Articles:

Consist Photo Analysis (Part 2) - Owenyo Local, Circa 1950 - featuring GN "Plywood" Boxcar

Modeling SP B-50-series Boxcars (Part 2) - Post-War All-Steel - Roster including SP 102856

New Tangent SP B-50-28 and T&NO B-50-32s - Review - My first review of Tangent's new B-50-28 boxcars

Open Loads (Part 7) - Shifted Lumber Loads - Modeling unique shifted lumber loads - Think outside the modelers box, but inside what the railroaders every day experiences were.

Walthers 50ft Auto-Boxcars (Part 2) - Renumbering GN Cars to Correct Series

In the first installment of this series, I just did a general survey of the various Walthers 50ft Auto-Boxcars that I had.  Sadly many of them aren't correct, but in this post, I want to address one of the simpler fixes to get a couple of the cars into more 'historically accurate' number series.

One of the nearly completed Great Northern 50ft OB Auto-boxcars by Walthers, from the early 2000s.

These cars needed a bit of work, so lets look at what's involved with updating and correcting a couple of issues with the stock model.  I'm not going to get into the odd brake equipment arrangement in this post, as I don't think it's the first think I look at on a freight car like this.  Even if the model is going to be a stand-in, I would like the primary exterior visible parts of the model to be mostly correct, i.e. roof, ends, sides.

Edit: Doug Polinder pointed out in a comment to me that: "the model is a Howe truss. GN's cars were Pratt."  So at best these cars are really going to just be 'stand-ins' for the GN prototypes.  Sadly this is one aspect that the ORER fails us, using it as the only research material.

Historical Data

Pre-relettering look of the car in the GN 41700-series.

To find out if the car's even existed and had the right door arrangement, I turn to my Westerfield Models CD of ORER 1950 fleet data.  Under the Great Northern, I can see that they do not have the stock model road number listed.

Clipping from 1950 ORER - No 41000-series cars active on the GN this year.

Great Northern's entry in ORER 1950 does not show the 41900-series is empty by 1950.  However, don't give up hope on your model yet.  Search the rest of the company's roster.  There may be another series, or the original road number may have been changed during a rebuild, etc.

However looking at 43500-series we find double-door 50ft boxcars which should match closer to the Walthers model.

 The ORER does show 43500-43899 series show steel frame, 12ft staggered-doors. The 43900-43999 are similar, but also show full end door. The Walthers models come with end-doors as an option in the kit, so it would be possible to model either series if some minor decalling and renumbering was done.

Renumbering

So I'm doing some renumbering of the GN cars that I have into the 43k series, which should be easy to change the 1 to a 3.  The 43500-43899 and 43900-43999 show as XM (General service boxcars) in the AAR Mechanical classification column.

Removed the "1" with a No.11 blade scraping carefully.

I started the renumbering work with a No.11 X-acto blade carefully scraping the surface just down through the pad-printed ink of the "1".  If I go too far, a small drop of darkened FCR paint works to fix it, although the new "3" will be covering most any scratches that happen.

The new decal in place with a bit of water still around.

I'm keeping the renumbering simple with Micro Scale's Block Gothic Alphabet and Numbers, White #90051.  The 9" lettering is what I'll need to change the side road numbers.  If your decal collection has a more "GN" standard lettering style, then obviously it's better to use that.

Buckled End Joints

One of the problems of putting the optional ends on is getting solid joints in the corners.

Given that I built these models about 20 years ago and some of them saw years of service, getting knocked around, the ends were starting to come loose.  So I wicked in some Tamiya Liquid Plastic Glue, which is lower viscosity than water into the corners of the ends.  Then I carefully pushed the end in to get the mitered joint to close.  

After closing the end up with liquid plastic glue to secure it.

The end looks much better after closing the openings.  A little bit of plastic actually squeezed out from this process, but that's easily cleaned up.  I did a little wash with water and AppleBarrel 20512E Burnt Umber to dull down the new white decal to match my previously weathered numbers on the cars.

Adding Tare Station & Date

I also need to add some basic 'tare dates' to the cars.  This is a station code, month-year stenciled onto the side of the car, usually in the panel just inboard of the car's weight data block to show when the car was last weighed to 'zero' it.  This allows the clerks working the car scales to be accurate within 200 pounds of the car's loaded weight when billing cargo by weight.  The weighing also allows the railroads to detect over-loaded cars which are a safety hazard and could cause additional wear and tear on the engines, infrastructure, and bridges.

The Great Northern has a very odd system of station codes, using an alpha and sometimes a number as well.  Some of the great past researchers of railroad history have documented these codes and what they station they represented, so I'm able to 'build' plausible station tare date codes for my models.  One GN car that I've done already has A-1 on it.  I made it out of some spare 3" stencil white decal "A" and a "-1" from the January month of a decal tare data set.

Operations Notes

ATSF 140 BK-4-H Cliff Jan 8, 1953, (at LMRC in 2018, Jason Hill photo)

Most of these GN cars traveling to Southern California would be in the lumber trade with finished lumber in these big double door auto-boxcars.  The routing usually would be GN, then interchanged to the WP at Bieber, then to the Santa Fe at Mormon Yard (aka Fresno), before routing to Southern California on the Santa Fe on symbol 'GWS' over Tehachapi.  Eastward routed cars onto the Santa Fe, would be switched over to N-34 or BK-symbol at Bakersfield to Barstow, then they would be worked into the eastward symbols from there out of San Bernardino.

If it was heading to a Southern Pacific destination, the car may have be interchanged at Bakersfield to avoid additional congestion in the LA basin.  So this ends up being more of a Santa Fe-centric modeling post for today, but the skills are good to learn for any prototype modeler that needs to do renumbering of the freight cars.

Open Doors or Closed Doors?

GN 43741's Left side with doors closed, representing a loaded car.

One of the nice aspects of the Walthers model is the option to model the car with the doors open.  While normally, you don't want cars running around loaded where the stuff inside can fall out or be stolen, often the empty car doors wouldn't be properly secured.

While the Right side of GN 43741's doors are modeled open, for returning empty towards home.

This lead to a tendency for the doors to open themselves with the slack action in the trains.  On layouts with reversing loop staging, it is possible therefore to set up one side of the car as the "Loaded" side, and the other as the "Empty" side.  At La Mesa Model Railroad club, this trick is really only visible in two places (Caliente-Tunnel 2 and at Walong on the Loop).  

More Tricks!

For discussion during a video shoot with TSG Multimedia, I cut down a couple OwlMtModels 3004 lumber loads to make a lighter weight faux load for the Walthers boxcar.

In one of the TSG Multimedia videos I filmed a number of years ago on the new OwlMtModels 3004 lumber loads, I talked about putting them inside of boxcars in a cut-down form.

OwlMtModels 3004 Lumber Load inside Walthers DD boxcar.

So that's always an option too if you want to show an open door as the load and claim the closed door is empty!

SP 67789 with a stash of 3004 lumber loads hiding inside at King Lumber in Bakersfield, at LMRC. Jason Hill photo circa 2018.

Another option is the photo below, where I staged a photo at King Lumber to show the car being unloaded.

Pondering future options, it might even be possible to put magnets inside the lumber load to remotely move them back into the ends of the car to hide them. - Although, I've not actually tried this --- yet.

In Closing

The majority of my cars are now in good shape residing in the 43000-series!  However, one now has a new problem.  Next time I'll be having a closer look at the 43900-series cars which need end-doors.

Redecalled GN 43952 with tare date added.

This car is now renumbered to the correct 43000-series from the 41000-series, however now the 43900-series should have end-doors.  Not a problem as these cars came with the option for end-doors.  So I'll be digging out the old spare parts from 20 years ago to rebuild the A-end of the car, seen at left in the above photo.

Jason Hill

Related Articles:

Modeling Auto-Boxcars (Part 1) - Walthers 50ft Double-Door Single-Sheath Auto-Boxcars - An Overview

Weathering NP 11661 - A Rapido Double-sheath Boxcar - Some basics of weathering with Acrylics on double-sheath boxcar.

ATSF 129872 WWII War Emergency Boxcar Weathering with Pencils and Acrylics - Continuing the weathering on a single-sheath boxcar with Acrylics.