My latest “Getting Real” column

Most readers know by now that I am one of a group of columnists who, in rotation, write the “Getting Real” column about prototype modeling in the on-line magazine, Model Railroad Hobbyist, or MRH. My most recent column has just appeared in the November issue. In recent years, MRH has been published in two parts: one that remains free to read on-line or download (visit www.mrhmag.com ) and in a second section, called “Running Extra,” which carries a fee, either for single issues or via subscription (cheaper per issue). The “Getting Real” columns have been appearing in “Running Extra.”

My new column is about modeling Southern Pacific flat cars. The idea to do that was stimulated by a question I was asked recently about the SP fleet of such cars, but also has a background in a talk I used to give some years ago, entitled “SP cars you can model,” emphasizing commercial models of the most common SP freight cars. Maybe that talk should be updated and revived. But that’s another story.

(For a full background on SP flat car history, my source is my book, Volume 3 in the series, Southern Pacific Freight Cars, Signature Press, 2004, covering automobile cars and flat cars.)

In the column, I began at the turn of the 20th century, with the first fully standard SP flat cars with steel underframes in any numbers, and the first to carry Harriman-standard class numbers, classes F-50-1, -2, and -3. The “F” stands for flat car, the “50” means 50-ton nominal capacity, and the last number is the individual class. Since those earliest cars were mostly gone from the fleet by the year I model, 1953, I have not modeled one.

But following those cars, SP adopted a flat car design that would be followed, with only minor changes, for over 20 more years and a dozen more flat car classes. This design originated in the Harriman era and thus is rightly called a “Harriman flat car.” Below is a good photo of one of the later classes in service at San Diego, Class F-50-8 car SP 38892, photographed by Chet McCoid on September 26, 1954 (Bob’s Photo collection).

The important things to notice about this car are the straight side sill, the blocking between the stake pockets which supports the wide deck reaching out to the outer edge of the stake pockets (called an “overhanging deck”), and the fishbelly center sill. All these features are well captured by the Owl Mountain Models kit for these cars (see my review of this nice kit at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2017/09/building-owl-mountain-flat-car.html ).

After World War II, SP turned to American Car & Foundry, and adopted their flat car design for several car orders. I went into some detail about these in the column. The most important cars were the 53-ft., 6-in. long ones, classes F-70-6 and -7, the latter a class of 2050 cars. Both classes are well represented by the Red Caboose HO scale model (dies now owned by the SP Historical & Technical Society, or SPH&TS, who have done a few re-runs of this model). 

Among the most characteristic loads carried by these flat cars in the 1950s was lumber, as part of a nationwide building boom. Shown below on my layout is a Red Caboose Class F-70-7 car with an Owl Mountain Models lumber load (for more on my building of this load kit, see: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2014/08/open-car-loads-lumber-from-owl-mountain.html ).

I also described a few details about modifications to these flat cars by SP. An important modification was the addition of bulkheads for plasterboard service. In 1949, SP began adding low bulkheads to some of its new flat cars, and the SPH&TS has offered a really nice kit to duplicate these bulkheads (see my review at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2012/07/modeling-sps-bulkhead-flat-cars.html ). Here is a Red Caboose flat car with these bulkheads, being moved by a Baldwin road-switcher on my layout.

Loads in the earliest days were usually tarped rather than wrapped, but by 1953, wrapped loads were appearing. Here is my bulkhead flat car with a load made by Jim Elliott. Incidentally, loading plasterboard to the height of these bulkheads did amount to a nominally 70-ton load, the capacity of the cars, so there was a reason for the low bulkheads.

In 1953 and later, SP also converted dozens of Class F-70-7 flat cars for introduction of piggyback service, which began in June 1953. I showed prototype photos and some models, comparable to a recent post in this blog, which is at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/10/sp-piggyback-part-4-progress-on-3d.html .

Finally, I briefly covered some of the SP heavy-duty flat cars, the F-125 depressed-center cars and the F-200 four-truck cars. As those have been covered in some detail in my blog posts, I won’t go into them here. If you’re interested, the following posts can be consulted, along with the MRH article:

F-125: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/05/an-sp-class-f-125-1-flat-car-part-2.html

F-200: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2020/05/sp-200-ton-flat-cars-part-5.html

It was interesting to review prototype information and modeling resources to write a summary about SP flat cars of the early 1950s. I hope it was of some interest or value to MRH readers.

Tony Thompson

Model operations with SP cabooses: Conclusion

In this series of posts, I am describing the variety and assignments of cabooses for my layout operating sessions, which are set in 1953. I began with some Southern Pacific caboose history, and showed my model of a “temporary caboose,” a box car conversion, in Part 1 (see it at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/09/model-operations-with-sp-cabooses.html ).

The following post, Part 2 in the series, described the very widely used wood-sheathed cupola cabooses, around 620 cars of Class C-30-1, and an additional 80 or so cars of following classes C-40-2 and -3, built through 1930. The overwhelming numbers of these cars throughout the SP system made them a common sight in the era I model. That post is here: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/10/model-operation-with-sp-cabooses-part-2.html .

For additional comments about SP cabooses in the area I model, it may be of interest to look at one part of my long interview with Malcolm “Mac” Gaddis, who first worked at San Luis Obispo as an electrician in September 1951 and remained there through 1954. I posted several parts of the interview; the part with comments about cabooses is here: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2011/05/san-luis-obispo-operations.html .

Thee were two classes of steel cupola cabooses, both built at Los Angeles General Shops. In 1937, 50 cars of Class C-40-1 were built, followed in 1940 by 135 cars of Class C-40-3 (along with 30 cars of that class for T&NO). The most visible difference between the two classes was the hand brake, which was a vertical-staff design on C-40-1, and a geared hand brake on C-40-3. The photo below, taken at Eugene, Oregon in July 1954 (George Sisk photo, Charles Winters collection) has the handbrake visible.

The steel cupola cabooses were also still important in my layout’s era. I almost always assign them to mainline freights. Here’s an example, a freight on the passing track at Shumala, with SP 1026 at the end. The brass model Class C-30-1 caboose is from Precision Scale. Visible here is the primary spotting feature of this class, the vertical-staff handbrake (you can click on the image to enlarge it).

Below I show a mainline train passing the engine terminal at my layout town of Shumala, with a steel cupola caboose of Class C-40-3, SP 1129, on the rear. It’s also a brass model from Precision Scale.

After World War II, SP ceased building its own cabooses in company shops, and turned to commercial builders for additional cars. They also adopted a new caboose design with bay windows instead of a cupola. And of particular note, a new paint scheme was adopted: ends of the cars were painted vermilion, likely a test. I should emphasize that is is not the Daylight Orange applied to caboose ends from 1956 onward.

Below is a photo provided by Joe Strapac, showing two of these cars at Dunsmuir in the lower yard in March, 1953, with a familiar mountain looming in the distance. For more on these cars, those interested can consult my Volume 2 of the series, Southern Pacific Freight Cars (Signature Press, 2002), which is about cabooses.

In model form, these classes have been done by Precision Scale, and I have one of them with correct end color. It is always found on a manifest train in my layout operating sessions. Here SP 1253 brings up the rear of a train entering Tunnel 12, as it departs from Shumala on my layout. It’s a 1947-built Class C-30-4 car.

To wrap up this series of posts about how I use SP cabooses in my layout operating sessions, it should be evident that there is a pattern at work, one I have derived from prototype information and photos. It is just one small part of the prototype atmosphere I try to create on my layout.

Tony Thompson

My latest operating session

Not having hosted an operating session on my layout since July, I planned for and hosted two sessions this last weekend. Preparation for these sessions naturally called for a lot of checking of the state of the layout, and indeed a few repairs proved necessary. One of them was a rail connection that was no longer electrically connecting. This just required a touch of solder, and of course verification with a meter.

I also made a few improvements in scenery and other details around the layout. Some of these, naturally enough, were repairs to things that had gotten damaged or needed to be re-glued, but in a few cases I was able to upgrade something. At left below is the model palm tree that has been alongside my winery for years. The fronds are some kind of fishbowl plant, which has sadly withered and sagged. At right is the upgrade to a far healthier looking palm tree.

When the sessions came along, on the first day the crew was Ray Freeman, Leo Pesce, Jeff Allen and Richard Brennan. All had operated here before, but for widely different numbers of times. For a couple of them, this meant that they experienced something of a learning curve in the session.

The first-day crew that began at Ballard is shown below, with Leo at left and Ray at right. Ray is holding the throttle, so Leo must have been conducting. It looks like he is pointing out the next switching move.

Below you see Jeff (at left) and Richard, who had begun with a shift at Shumala, but now have progressed to take their turn working at Ballard. I believe Jeff was conducting at this point, and appears to be pointing out an industry that was either going to receive a set-out, or one needing a car picked up.

The next day there was a different set of four people to operate, and this time we had a first-time operator, Bob Rosenbauer. He worked with Lisa Gorrell, and they are shown below sorting out the cars in the yard at Shumala, with Lisa at left, who was the conductor here.

Meanwhile, the other crew, Cliff Linton (at left, below) and Steve Van Meter were engaged in switching at Ballard. It looks like Cliff was uncoupling cars for a spot.

These were good sessions, and even with a few glitches (the fear of every layout host), it did go well overall, and everyone seemed to have a good time. I managed to minimize the threat of Host Flaw Hysteria (described in more detail elsewhere: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2023/07/pressure-what-pressure.html ).

Tony Thompson

Small project: old brass baggage car, Part 2

In the previous post on this topic, I showed a heavily tarnished Ken Kidder model of one of the Southern Pacific’s distinctive 40-foot baggage-express cars. The prototypes were built as full postal cars but were rebuilt in 1929 y T&NO into postal-baggage configuration, with a few eventually ending up on Pacific Lines, rebuilt this time into baggage cars. The description of all that, and my start of work to prepare the model for use, is here: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2023/06/small-project-old-brass-sp-baggage-car.html . 

The body had been painted Dark Olive Green. The next step was to mask the body (a good job for Tamiya masking tape, easily flexible to match the end contour at the roof line). This was a simple step, as the fascia strips on sides and ends make an easy masking reference. Then I painted the roof black, along with the trucks (wheel treads were masked). I could now decal the body, using Thinfilm Decals set HO 160-SP. 

It may be worth mentioning that although the postal apartment’s door and window arrangement remain on this car body, it had had the entire postal apartment removed, and was now operationally a full baggage car, which is why it is lettered that way. This mirrors the prototype appearance on Pacific Lines.

With lettering complete and protected by a coat of clear flat, I weathered the body lightly with my usual technique of washes using acrylic tube paints (see the “Reference pages” linked at the top right corner of this post for descriptions and illustrations of the method). 

In the era I model, SP continued to keep passenger equipment fairly clean, so only the lightest of weathering was applied. Sides of SP passenger equipment were washed, less frequently for head-end equipment like this car, but roofs were not washed. Here is the body at this point.

Next I glazed the windows using clear styrene sheet, installed with canopy glue, and that completed basic body work. Next I turned attention to couplers. The original screw hole in the Kidder body for a coupler is quite small. I drilled it out and tapped it for a 2.0 mm screw. The chosen couplers were Kadee no. 36, with its small gear box, well suited to this kind of end mounting. 

 Next I wanted to add at least some indication of underbody equipment. Most photos of these cars don’t show underbody areas well, but there does seem to be some indication of an air tank on the left side (as seen from the postal end) and what is likely a brake cylinder on the right side. The photos mentioned are on pages 73–77 in Volume 3 of the series, Southern Pacific Passenger Cars (SPH&TS, 2007). 

I used a short piece of wood dowel for the air tank, and a brake-cylinder-like part from my stash of passenger car parts. But there is no intention here to do more than suggest this equipment in a side view.

Then came diaphragms. Late photos of these cars on Pacific Lines showed them with what I have called “skeleton” diaphragms, ones with face plates but no side canvas accordion folds. These are discussed in an earlier post (it can be found at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2023/05/passenger-cars-skeleton-diaphragms.html ), and modeling is discussed there too. These are visible in the prototype photo shown in the first post in this series (link provided in the top paragraph of the present post). 

I added a pair of my own versions of the skeleton diaphragm, built out of styrene sheet and strip, to the car with canopy glue. Then trucks could be attached and some weathering added. Here is the completed model.

Though these cars would have been a tiny minority in the SP Pacific Lines passenger car fleet, I have enjoyed researching, painting and lettering the model, and will no doubt include it is an occasional passenger train in future operating sessions.

Tony Thompson

The “literature” of model railroading

What do I mean here by “literature?” I don’t mean novels or other creative literature. I mean it in the sense familiar to any professional or academic: the published work in and about the field. This ranges from professional journals to books, volumes of conference proceedings, and monographs. And in professional fields, having a submitted paper accepted for publication will require it to contain adequate citation of the literature, in the sense just described.

What is the point of this? To give credit to the work of predecessors, to show that you understand where the paper you have submitted fits into that literature, and even to mention viewpoints that may conflict with the one you have espoused in your paper. One becomes accustomed to having the citations in mind while writing or reading a professional paper, and checking submitted or published citations to see if they seem appropriate. Having been both an associate editor, and then editor for five years, of a major journal in my field, metallurgy and materials, this used to be a completely instinctive process for me. My late friend Richard Hendrickson’s professional experience as an English linguist was entirely parallel.

But model railroaders, relatively few of whom are professionals in the sense just described, usually have no such experience and usually don’t even have any idea of the concept. Richard was in fact the one who pointed this out to me, and I immediately understood what he meant.

I guess my professional background died slowly. I’ll give one example. When Jim Hediger reviewed the First Edition of Pacific Fruit Express for Trains magazine, he commented thus: “Here is a superb illustrated history of the company whose name is synonymous with perishable freight. Rounding out the work is the most complete bibliography and index I have ever seen in a rail history book.” 

Having acted as editor for that entire book, and collected references from my co-authors as well as researching those for my own chapters, I can take credit for creating that bibliography (and I indexed the book, too). To me, Hediger’s description was a real compliment, and we included it on the dust jacket of the Second Edition of the PFE book. 

This came home to me more recently when a reader of one of my “Getting Real” columns in Model Railroad Hobbyist noticed a long bibliography, and wrote an email commenting on it. And in fact the same would be found in all volumes of my book series, Southern Pacific Freight Cars. Obviously to any experienced researcher, such bibliographic resources can be a gold mine in pursuing information beyond the publication in hand.

Incidentally (I’ll say more about this presently), nearly all that literature cited in those books is the literature of professional railroading and railroad history. That is obviously part of the literature of our hobby.

But in model railroading itself, what comprises the literature? The most obvious answer combines not only books, such as the familiar Kalmbach Media soft-bound books on practically every aspect of the hobby, but also the magazines: Model Railroader, Railroad Model Craftsman most obviously, but also the defunct titles, such as Mainline Modeler, superb resources with many timeless items of information. Today, we need to include on-line resources such as blogs and museum archives.

Many modelers, of course, discard magazines after having paged through them, much as one would do with a weekly news magazine. That means they have no personal archive of magazines, except maybe an occasional helpful issue or article that is saved. But increasingly, magazine archives are appearing on-line, making it unnecessary to keep your own shelves of old magazines. (Though the on-line material often has been digitized at pretty low resolution, meaning that photographs are a complete loss; and on-line archives have a distressing tendency to suddenly disappear.)

As a single example of something I was able to retrieve from archives and greatly enjoyed and benefited from reading, below is the first page of Frank Ellison’s landmark series of six articles, tellingly titled “The Art of Model Railroading,” which appeared in Model Railroader in the issue for June 1944. And yes, I’m old, but not old enough to have read this when it came out.

In these six articles, Ellison was promoting the idea that operating a layout went far beyond building locomotives, laying track, or creating scenery. Instead, he suggested, it would need to be a coherent whole, not only with all those “construction” aspects, but also having flexible electrical control and above all, a realistic operating scheme. This was a pioneering idea, and tracking it down in the “literature” to appreciate it is part of what I’m writing about.

One more example of a magazine article from the distant past that is still worth reading is Doug Smith’s article on freight car forwarding, published in the December 1961 issue of Model Railroader. Smith not only reviewed a number of proposed systems for car forwarding, he went on to suggest ways to update the Ellison car-card system, ideas which are relevant today. And most important, he emphasized prototype practice as the guide we should follow.

It remains my opinion that there is a literature of model railroading, and awareness of it should be the hallmark of any serious modeler, particularly those who write articles — though I wouldn’t foresee serious lists of literature citations in model magazines. The further literature is that of professional railroading, both operations and history. It too is important to modelers, and I’ll have more to say about that in a future post.

Tony Thompson

An old Shake ’n’ Take project: Conclusion

This series of posts describes a freight car build that originated as a so-called “Shake ‘n’ Take” kitbashing project at the 2015 meeting of Prototype Rails in Cocoa Beach, Florida. Previous posts in the series gave the prototype background, links to project directions, replacement of original car body ends, and addition of details. In the previous post, Part 3, the model had been given a coat of Tamiya primer (see that preceding post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/10/an-old-shake-n-take-project-part-3.html ).

As stated in that previous post, the model was now ready for its final paint coat, and that was applied. The model was also removed from its “paint shop” trucks and give the correct ones that it will operate with. In this condition, it’s shown below. 

Next came application of decals. A very nice decal set for this car was assembled by Steve Hile, and the lettering elements were all well arranged and complete. I enjoy this part of a freight car project, when the model assumes its identity as an individual car. Once all decals were in place, the car was given a coat of clear flat.

Next, the car needed to be weathered. I used my tried and true method of washes made from acrylic tube paints (see the “Reference pages” linked at the top right corner of the present post). Then, after another protective coat of clear flat, I added route cards and a few chalk marks. Here is the completed model.

Incidentally, the black paint patch under the right-hand door is the service stencil for the air brake reservoir (and was only on this side of the car). The black sill patch toward the right of the car side is a repacking stencil, applied on both sides. You can click on the image to enlarge it if you wish.

Just for comparison, here is the prototype photo I relied on in carrying out the project. You will note the same paint patches that were applied to the model, are visible here too, and were the reason they were applied to the model. (Chet McCoid photo, San Diego, Dec. 26, 1954, Bob’s Photo collection)

Finally, I want to wrap this up with an image of the heading for the project directions, appropriately crediting Richard Hendrickson for the original idea of the conversion, along with Greg Martin’s management and Schuyler Larrabee’s editing. Thanks, guys.

This concludes work on my 2015 Shake ‘n’ Take project from Cocoa  Beach that year. As always, an interesting project with some learning aspects, and a distinctive freight car as the product.

Tony Thompson

Personal: Master Model Railroader #772

I recently completed the requirements for the NMRA’s Master Model Railroader (MMR) in their Achievement Program. This program has been around for something like 50 years, and that over 700 people have fulfilled the requirements before me tells you that it is certainly a doable project for plenty of modelers.

Years ago, when I was the editor of the newsletter for NMRA’s Division 2 of Mid-Central Region (Pittsburgh), I wrote a piece about the Achievement Program. In it, I stated that the MMR is doable with patience and dedication, a little bit like deciding to visit all the National Parks in the United States. Yes, it would take awhile and some resources, but it’s entirely possible if you make the effort.

The program has 11 categories of achievement, of which the modeler has to complete at least seven. I had completed four by 1990, when I still lived in Pittsburgh, but then moving and being without a layout for awhile, I kind of lost momentum in the MMR program. 

Recently, though, I read my friend Seth Neumann’s write-up of his meeting the requirements for one of the certificates, Model Railroad Engineer — Electrical, and I thought, “Heck, I’ve done enough to qualify for that.” 

And so it proved, along with two of the “layout” categories, Master Builder – Structures, and Master Builder — Scenery, as part of progress on my layout. That made seven.

One thing that results from receiving one’s certificate of completion is an article in the NMRA Magazine, with whatever kind of biography one wishes to submit. I wrote one up, but was disappointed they didn’t use one photo I sent them, documenting my pretty nearly life-long interest in trains. It was taken when I was rather small, showing me admiring an International–Great Northern (Mopac) Ten-wheeler at Cotulla, Texas, where my parents lived at the time.

Here is the article as presented in the NMRA Magazine’s November 2024 issue, with this cover:

The first page looked like this. If you click on the image to enlarge it, it’s readable (should you wish to do so). They did use this contemporary photo of me alongside the layout.

The second page, including a listing of the seven certificates I completed, was this:

I am glad to finish something I started so long ago, and despite a little embarrassment about the long gap in my efforts, still feel gratified that it finally all turned out. But just the same, it doesn’t make me one iota different as a modeler or a person than I used to be.

Tony Thompson