My latest column in MRH

Again in the issue for April, Model Railroad Hobbyist’s “Running Extra” segment contains one of the multi-author “Getting Real” columns by me. This one is about Southern Pacific maintenance-of-way equipment, or as SP designated it, “MW.”

One reason for my having a particular interest in MW equipment is that I provided a spur track for it on my layout. At various places around the railroad, SP designated certain tracks as “outfit” tracks, meaning that the equipment of an MW gang could be located there during a work period, whether a track gang, signals gang, or bridge and building gang. 

This offers an interesting facet of layout appearance and operation: various models of MW equipment may be found on such a track from time to time, and not only may this equipment move to and from the outfit track, but also carloads of tools and materials (termed “T&M” by SP) can be set out and picked up there. 

The photo below shows the outfit track in my layout town of Ballard, and it contains, at left,  two boarding bunk cars, as they were called (one obviously converted from a Pullman car), as well as an empty ballast car being picked up at right.

Modeling of the cars in the photo above has been described in previous blog posts: for the conversion of the Rivarossi Pullman model, see: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2023/11/small-project-sp-boarding-bunk-car-pt-2.html ; and for the Class W-50-3 ballast car at right, you might wish to see: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2020/09/building-dry-creek-ballast-cars.html . The middle bunk car is described in the MRH article.

The cars in the photo represent two of the three types classified by SP. Those were “boarding” cars, meaning cars that employees (and in some case their families) would live, eat sleep or ride in; “roadway” cars, meaning cars carrying T&M for the gang’s work; and certain types of cars in revenue-service number series, mostly ballast cars, that could also carry revenue loads.

Below I illustrate an MW roadway car, which were usually revenue-service cars that had completed their lives in that service and handed down to the maintenance forces. Usually these were give modest repairs and repainted into an MW scheme, but sometimes they were simply “patch painted” with their new reporting marks, even leaving intact the railroad emblem from the previous paint scheme.

 Another topic of the MRH article was to describe modeling a few of the revenue-number-series ballast cars. I recently showed in a blog post my completion of paint and lettering for one of the “Bruce’s Train Shop” resin hoppers, sold assembled, as a representative of SP’s more modern steel ballast hoppers. Shown below is one described in a blog post (see it at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/05/another-sp-ballast-hopper.html ). 

Finally, I have enjoyed building the two Class W-50-3 ballast cars from Dry Creek Models, as I’ve described in blog posts. The most recent one was chosen largely so that I could build a load of rail for the car, as I’ve presented fully (see the post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2025/04/a-rail-load-for-my-dry-creek-ballast-car.html ). 

I concluded my article by mentioning that these various MW cars can be included in the work of an operating session by using appropriate waybills to direct their movement, in many cases to and from the outfit track. My experience on many layouts I’ve visited is that MW equipment is simply a static display, maybe on a back track of a yard, and isn’t moved as part of operation. But it’s something I’ve enjoyed doing on my own layout.

Tony Thompson

An Athearn “Blue Box” tank car, Part 4

In previous posts on this topic, I have been describing a project to model a Shell Chemical high-pressure tank car, starting with an Athearn “Blue Box” tank car. Athearn has usually labeled this as a “chemical” tank car, though that term conveys nothing specific. The background and prototype photos for the project is in the first post of the series (you can view it here: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/07/reworking-athearn-blue-box-tank-car.html ). 

In the previous post, Part 3 of the series, I showed how I modeled the tank hold-downs, with their distinctive turnbuckles (that post is at this link: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/08/an-athearn-blue-box-tank-car-part-3.html ). Meanwhile, I was also adding wire grab irons at each corner of the tank, using brass wire. The tank has already received a coat of blue-gray primer.

Next I turned to the Athearn underframe. As I showed in the first post in this series (see link in top paragraph above), the extraneous extra outlet pipes have already been removed. Now I reworked the coupler pockets, which I modify so that the coupler box lids are separate from the underframe, and are fastened with screws (see, for example, this post: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2019/05/fixing-athearn-tank-car-coupler-pockets.html ). 

The Athearn power hand brake arrangement is wrong for nearly all transition-era tank cars. I fill the hole in the running board meant to accept the Athearn brake stand, and drill a hole to insert a brass wire with brass brake wheel soldered to it (as shown in previous posts, such as: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2023/05/small-project-replacing-brake-wheels.html ). Finally, I added wire to represent brake rodding, which you can just see below. 

Another part of the project requiring attention was the dome platform, which I confiscated from a Broadway Limited high-pressure tank car. This required several modifications, the first of which was to enlarge the opening in the platform to accommodate the diameter of the Precision Scale brass valve bonnet part. Here is a photo of the platform temporarily in place, prior to painting.

Next the two halves of the tank body, and the platform, could be painted. I used Tamiya “Haze Grey” (TS-32) for this. The paint has a semi-gloss finish, quite suitable for decal application. Below I show how they look at this point (the dome platform parts other than the deck will be hand-painted black later). The frame hasn’t had its black paint touched up.

With this work complete, all parts are ready for assembly and lettering. I will turn to those topics in a future post.

Tony Thompson

An SP steam switcher, Part 2

A few weeks ago, I posted a commentary on Southern Pacific steam switchers, focusing (as did SP) on the 0-6-0 wheel arrangement. I concluded that a 1950s SP modeler would likely want to model the later switchers with piston valves, and might well choose Class S-12, a large class of 38 locomotives built in SP shops during 1918–1923. That post is located at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2025/02/southern-pacific-steam-switchers.html .

 This consideration was inspired by an acquisition, a couple of years ago, of a rather ancient brass model, imported by M.B. Austin, of an HO scale SP 0-6-0. I know from the late John Glaab’s Brown Book (3rd Ed.) that this was a run of 400 models, built by KTM in Japan and brought to the U.S. in 1960.

Whether to modify and/or upgrade it, and what to do about its elderly worm-and-gear drive and open-frame motor, were challenges. But I had been attracted to it because of its distinctive tender, one of SP’s 70-C class cars with cut-down oil bunkers for visibility, as I showed in the post linked in the paragraph above. Here’s the model as it came to me:

This view of the right side of the model shows that it has the forward window on the cab side still open, though many S-12 switchers had these forward windows plated over by the late days of steam. To illustrate a plated-over window area on a Class S-12 engine, below is a Stan Kistler photo of SP 1254, taken at Oakland in April of 1953. Note the cross-compound air compressor on this left side of the engine, and the 70-C tender.

But a few engines continued to have windows in this location, including SP 1284, seen below in a Paul Jansen photo of the right side (Clark Bauer collection), working at Bayshore Yard on Coast Division. It too has a 70-C tender at the time of the photo, of a slightly different design. As I mentioned in that previous post on this topic, only the oil bunker was cut down, so the class definition of these tenders, their 7000-gallon water compartments, was unchanged.

Note in both these photos that the smokebox sides are slightly gray relative to the boiler jacket. Applied as a graphite compound, these areas darkened in service from their initial medium gray color.

Before leaving the topic of the prototype switchers, I should mention that tenders were not permanently assigned to engines, but were swapped as needed at major shoppings. Often tender work would be completed before its former engine, and some other engine ready for release would receive that tender. 

My friend Mark Schutzer consented to take on the task of modernizing the drive of this model locomotive, replacing the gear box and adding a can motor (for those interested, Mark’s website, including links to his clinics about re-powering brass locomotives, is at: https://markschutzer.com/ ). 

The original open-frame motor was rather small and as was customary in early days, directly driving its worm on the main axle gear. 

Mark’s first task, after disassembly of the mechanism, was to fit a Northwest Short Line 28-1 gear box to the frame, and add a NWSL universal coupling and a brass mount for the new motor.

With that working all right. a torque arm between gear box and motor was added, and the mechanism reassembled for test.  (both photos, Mark Schutzer)

With this much completed on the mechanism, the next steps were a better locomotive weight, and of course a decoder and sound. I’ll turn to those aspects in a future post.

Tony Thompson

Small project: an old brass tank car

I have in my collected brass items, a Soho “1920 tank car,” so called, with two compartments. I first acquired this model way back in 1979, when it was not very old. I once painted it black and lettered it for a Union Tank Car prototype, UTLX 289, a prototype that was much the wrong size, being only 6000 gallons, distinctly less than the size of the Soho model. This has always kind of bugged me, and I decided to do better.

First, let’s find out how big this model tank car really is. The volume of a cylinder is of course easy to calculate, as we’ve all learned, but you then need to convert your cubic inches or cubic feet into water gallons. I explained and showed how to do this in a tank car post some time back (see it at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2012/10/naperville-tank-car-handout-part-2.html ). 

For the model being considered, here are the dimensions. The diameter is 96 scale inches, the length 384 scale inches. This is a volume of 12,300 gallons. The usual allowance for the internal bulkheads of the two compartments is 10 to 15 percent, making the net volume about 11,500 gallons.

Here’s a view of this model, repainted a “muted black,” Tamiya “Rubber Black” (TS-82), to cover the old lettering. The elbow safety valves are kind of oversize, and the steel “diamond tread plate” running board a little unusual for a car of this age, but I going to live with all of that.

There happen to be Tichy decals for a two-compartment tank car of about this size, Tichy set 10360, for a SHPX car leased to J.M. Huber printing inks. The decals offer several car numbers, but only one of them, SHPX 91, is for a prototype two-compartment tank car. I decided to letter the Soho model for this car. It needs to have route card boards added underneath the running board, located at the lefthand body bolster on each side, made from scale 2 x 6-inch styrene.

I have discussed the Huber ink company previously on this blog, and have even shown a prototype photo of SHPX 91 (see that post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2012/10/small-modeling-project-huber-tank-car.html ). The real SHPX 91 was a smaller and more slender-proportioned tank car, but I will accept the Soho model as a stand-in.

Since I have a printing company on my layout, I have a destination for this car to be switched. I already have a model of another Huber car, SHPX 6031, as was described in the post linked in the preceding paragraph. For that car, I created artwork for custom decals, following the prototype photos shown in that post. But here is the Soho tank car with the Tichy lettering.

Note that the lessee’s information is centered on the tank, instead of toward the right end of the car side, as was commonly seen. But that right-end location is common on single-compartment tank cars, because it locates that information away from any spills from the dome. Here, the centered location accomplishes the same avoidance of any dome spillage.  

Having protected the new decals with a coat of clear flat, I weathered the tank with my usual acrylic washes, added route cards with canopy glue, and included a few chalk marks. The appearance is now definitely not merely a black tank car.

As I mentioned, I do have a layout industry to which this car cab suitably be switched, and below is an example of that in progress.

This has been an interesting upgrade and, I think, improvement of an old brass tank car model, despite its shortcomings as an accurate depiction of a prototype. I will enjoy seeing it being switched on the layout.

Tony Thompson

Another foreign-road Pullman car model

As part of my deadhead passenger equipment movements in operating sessions, I have enjoyed including an occasional sleeping car from a foreign railroad, that is, other than the home road. I’ve written about this before (see the prior post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/08/operating-off-line-passenger-cars.html ). Now I am  including one more example. 

I’ve always found it interesting that some railroads painted a few of their passenger cars in the paint schemes of other railroads in order to participate in those railroads’ trains. One striking example is the Pennsylvania Railroad, which painted a number of its cars in that way. Naturally my primary interest is cars of the PRR which might show up on the Southern Pacific. Among them was the subject of the present post.

In the fall of 1950, the Pennsylvania took delivery of 14 new sleeping cars from American Car & Foundry, all of them of the 10-6 floor plan (10 roomettes, 6 double bedrooms). These were in the Pullman Rapids name series, and two of them were painted in Two-Tone Gray for service in the San Francisco Overland train between Chicago and San Francisco. One was named Blue Rapids, and is shown below (AC&F photo, Blardone collection). The car remained in this paint until 1956.

The Rivarossi streamlined sleeping car, which models the 10-6 floor plan which was very popular after World War II, is a fine starting point for modeling cars like this. But it does have a number of shortcomings, most of which are simple modeling projects to correct. I’ve posted about that before: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/06/modeling-sp-passenger-cars-part-20.html . 

As it happens, Rivarossi at one point did produce this model in the exact scheme shown in the AC&F photo above, the PRR Blue Rapids car. I couldn’t resist picking one up when I saw it for sale. I promptly started work on it, as outlined in the post just cited. My first step was view blocks, since it should be impossible to see through this all-room car.

The colored view block is the wall of the aisle alongside the double bedrooms. The color is Star Brand “Sea Foam Green” (STR-08). The dark gray view block covers the roomettes, which should be dark and not seen through from either side.  The aisle view block is dark gray on the other side.

Next I turned to installing couplers and trucks (see the post cited above for details). First, I attached the styrene pads as in the previous post, then drilled holes and tapped for 2-56 screws.

With that completed, I could install Kadee no. 158 couplers in their own boxes, and the same Central Valley no. 139 metal trucks (rebuilt with Northwest Short Line wheelsets) as described previously (see post linked previously: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/06/modeling-sp-passenger-cars-part-20.html ). 

Once those underbody components were added, the car could rest on its own wheels, and I installed the car weights, a pair of 5/8-11 steel nuts, attached with canopy glue, in the vicinity of the truck locations. The nuts had been painted the same dark gray as the view blocks, prior to installation.

Then I could turn to a representation of diaphragms and stabilizer bars (see my post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2021/06/passenger-car-diaphragms-part-3.html ). I used 0.030-inch brass wire for the bars, then added diaphragm face plates. Here is a view of one end of the car, with its nut weight evident also. The nuts naturally are far less visible when the roof is in place.

Finally, I could install the roof/glazing part, and add a little rust to the diaphragm face plate. This is the aisle side of the car.

The car is now ready to join one of my Coast Line deadhead passenger movements, a long-time feature of my layout operating sessions, since I don’t have sufficient staging length for a realistic complete passenger train.

Tony Thompson

The 2025 PCR-NMRA convention

The annual convention of the Pacific Coast Region of NMRA was held during March 27–30 this year, in San Luis Obispo, California. PCR is the NMRA’s oldest region, having been founded in 1940, and continues as one of the most active regions in the country. I have been attending its conventions for over 30 years, and this one had the usual high level of interest and enjoyment.

Historically, San Luis Obispo was the mid-point of Southern Pacific’s Coast Route between Los Angeles and San Francisco, and for 30 years hosted the justly famous Daylight trains. Accordingly, the choice of a convention name and logo was entirely natural and appropriate. Of course, for me as an SP modeler, it was especially attractive.

I presented two clinics, as I often do, and enjoyed the usual camaraderie around the hotel, meeting rooms, and the bar. In addition, San Luis is an attractive town, greatly enlivened by nearby Cal Poly University, with lovely weather much of the year. All in all, a nice event. And attendance was decent, about 200 in person and, interestingly, 80 for a remote (virtual) program.

A high point for me was an operating session at the San Luis Obispo Railroad Museum, housed in the former SP freight house just south of the depot. You can learn more about the museum at: https://www.slorrm.com/ . Part of the museum is an ambitious double-deck model railroad, the Central Coast Model club, depicting the SP in the San Luis area, and including the Pacific Coast Railway narrow gauge, part of the scene until its rail was taken up in 1942. 

Though not a great image, this plan from the museum’s website shows the overall scheme. The three lobes at the bottom, with two decks, allow a long run. San Luis Obispo is at the top of the drawing for the lower level. It’s evident how a really long run has been achieved. The narrow gauge is in an adjoining room.

As it turned out, this was the first organized operating session on the layout, which has a number of very promising scenes and a few near completion, but much work in progress. Their session planning was good, and eight of us really had fun operating in a layout like this, headed for prototype excellence and already running well. Naturally there were a few growing pains, but nothing serious.

One scene that is essentially compete and quite attractive depicts the early days of oil extraction in Price Canyon. I thought this was very nicely done.

Another very interesting and challenging scene is a depiction of the sugar beet unloading facility at Betteravia. The prototype was well photographed, and thus the model has to meet a high standard, and what has been done so far certainly is up to that standard.

And a signature part of the SP’s climb over Cuesta is the Stenner Creek viaduct just below Horseshoe Curve. Here is the train I was operating, heading over this very nice model bridge. Interestingly, the view here is southwestward, away from the mountainside, not what most modelers would have chosen, but very effective.

Lastly, I should show a view of the narrow-gauge pier at Avila, and the hotel at its foot. We weren’t operating the narrow-gauge part of the layout, but this modeling really is stunning. This somewhat distant view doesn’t do justice to the impressiveness of the exhibit.

This operating visit really made a nice feature of the convention for me. I’ve been interested in San Luis Obispo during the transition era for many years, and actually operating it was really fun. And I heartily recommend a visit to the museum if you happen to visit San Luis Obispo.

Tony Thompson

 

Layout ideas and design

I was stimulated by conversations at a recent modelers’ get-together in my local area to reflect on how layout designs evolve and how they depend on the owner’s intentions — and how those intentions evolve. Many layout owners concede that they began without much idea of the final goal, however much they might have been inspired by what they saw in the model magazines. 

I should immediately mention that I realize a certain fraction of modelers are really inspired by building scenery, or structures, or complete layout scenes, without any particular interest in operations. They may well run trains here and there as part of the scenes, but without an interest in what a prototype may have done. That’s perfectly okay as a hobby, and some superb modeling has been done in this mode.

There is another subset of modelers who are interested in the locomotives and cars of railroads, and are engrossed with building superb, even museum-quality, models of them, without much interest in operating them in a prototypical manner, or necessarily even building a layout. Here again, it’s fine as a hobby, and the resulting models can be stunning.

On the other hand, there are modelers interested in operation before scenery and structures and rolling stock. I have often mentioned to friends, my experience in the Chicago area, years ago, visiting a layout which was entirely plywood track supports, Homasote track bed, and track. Not a hint of scenery or structures; stations were named with small cards at each location. But complex trackage was complete and running perfectly. We had a busy and interesting and challenging operating session because of the busy schedule, operated by timetable and train order (T&TO).

So where would my preference lie? I appreciate both extremes in layout and modeling choice. But my mind can’t escape recollections of Tony Koester’s comment (in the Foreword to CJ Riley’s book, Realistic Layouts), that modeling railroading implies that we model not only the material objects and environment of professional railroaders, but also “the actions they take to get cargo and people safely and efficiently from A to Z.”

This resonates with me. My own layout choices are primarily aimed at trying to reproduce what the actual railroading job of a local freight crew was like. I have tried to achieve as many components of that as possible, recognizing of course that a visiting operator who has never seen the layout before is in a quite different place from the prototype train crew, who in most cases did that same job every day.

But when a model railroad operating crew, following waybills and other paperwork, spot a box car at an loading dock, they are to some extent doing just what a prototype crew would have done. The photo below, from my layout, is the kind of thing I mean. 

The same goes for other actions that a crew might do in the course of their time on duty, such as spotting freshly loaded reefers at an ice deck to receive the first icing before departing on their journey (the tariff language for this is “initial icing”).

Of course, for a fair number of layout designers and builders, it’s also important that we direct our work in model operations with realistic paperwork, that is to say, prototypical paperwork. I won’t say more on this topic here, since I expanded on my ideas in this direction in a blog post last fall, part of a three-part series on “realistic operations” (see that post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/12/realistic-layout-operation-part-2.html ). The point here would be that layout design doesn’t much turn on paperwork, except in the sense that a layout builder may wish to include space for operators and a dispatcher.

It’s a well-worn piece of advice, to think carefully about what you really want to accomplish in a layout you are designing (or only dreaming about). But inevitably goals and desires evolve with time, and layouts can change with them. I would just encourage layout owners faced with such evolving ideas to grit their teeth, and modify the layout as needed to achieve those goals. You”ll certainly be happier in the long run.

Tony Thompson