Crop seasons on my layout

As I have mentioned numerous times in this blog, operating sessions on my layout are always treated as being on the same day on which we operate, but in 1953. Among other things, this means that the packing houses on the layout are always shipping the crops of that particular month. I introduced this background some time back (see for example my post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/09/seasonality-of-crops-and-traffic.html ). 

Recently I was asked (again) about the source of the information, and would I please put it all in one place. It’s drawn from the multi-page table on pages 442–447 in the back of the PFE book (Pacific Fruit Express, 2nd edition, Thompson, Church, and Jones, Signature Press, 2000). That table covers all of the SP, with individual growing areas for each crop. Since the area I model is what was known as the Guadalupe–Santa Maria area, I have just chosen data for that area in the tables below.

 These tables, vegetables and fruit separately,  are very useful in that they show peak harvest months in black, with off-peak or “shoulder” harvest months in gray. I usually only choose waybills for peak-month produce in setting up a session for a particular month. The one exception is all-year broccoli, which does get shipped in most sessions. But notice that at least one fruit and one vegetable is being harvested in every month of the year in the area modeled. 

The other point to be made is one about PFE in general. During the peak harvest months over the entire SP and UP systems, June through September, even PFE’s fleet of roughly 40,000 cars was not sufficient for all needs, and reefers of other owners were borrowed. Most of this activity was on SP, which often advertised how much of American produce was loaded on its lines (I’ve show these ads in a number of previous posts, including this one: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2025/05/sps-public-advertising.html ). Here’s an example:

Roughly two-thirds of PFE’s carloadings were on SP lines, with the remainder mostly on UP, with barely five percent on Western Pacific.

In that peak season, scenes like the one below, at a packing house in my layout town of Shumala, were commonplace. American Refrigerator Transit (famously jointly owned by Missouri Pacific and Wabash) was one of the companies from which PFE borrowed extensively.

A scene like this is more relevant at the moment than during much of the year, because I have an operating session coming up later this month.. Scenes like this are, once again, going to fit the 1953 season we will be reproducing.

Tony Thompson 

Reworking a PFE car kit, Conclusion

This is the concluding post in my description of modifying the appearance of an otherwise stock Red Caboose kit for a reconditioned PFE reefer, Class R-30-9. I began with the prototype background of these cars, created during 1938–1940 from (mostly) Class R-30-12 cars built some 15 years earlier, along with some cars of Class R-30-13. 

“Reconditioning” meant a completely new superstructure, with new and upgraded insulation, but without performing work on the underframe and brake gear (other than needed repairs). In the parlance of the AAR and the IRS, in addition to PFE, this did not constitute rebuilding. But because of improved insulation and ice bunkers, they were given a new car class, R-30-9. 

In the first post of this series, I showed a prototype photo of one of these cars (see that post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2026/05/reworking-pfe-car-kit.html ). Here is another image, this time showing a car as-reconditioned, at the Stockton, CA ice deck on July 13, 1941 (Wilbur C. Whittaker photo). It has retained the original T-section trucks, but like all the cars of 95737–98718, has new steel ice hatches. Side lettering says it was reconditioned in April 1940, so the paint is barely a year old; it was originally PFE 20028, built in July 1922.

I wanted to model a car like this. After stripping the kit lettering, airbrushing fresh Star brand paint on sides and ends, and adding steel nuts for weight (shown in that first post), I built the kit sub-assemblies of roof and underbody, as I showed in the second post, along with beginning decal lettering with Microscale set 87-501 (the second post may be found at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2026/05/reworking-pfe-car-kit-part-2.html ). 

Once the new decals had been protected with a coat of clear flat, I assembled the car body (so far without an underbody). This looks good so far.

 Next I completed work on the underbody, adding sill steps and Kadee #158 couplers, along with the kit truck frames. Wheelsets were replaced with superior ones from InterMountain. Here is the completed car, nicely retaining the black side sill of the 1950 scheme (side sills became orange in 1951). 

Next came weathering. As always with PFE, this is difficult to choose in the abstract, because of PFE’s extensive car washing (for data see: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2016/11/appearance-of-pfe-reefers-part-3.html ), along with their practice, until the mid-1950s, of repainting any car with even the most minor repairs. I have chosen to apply a light degree of weathering.

The way I did the weathering was following my usual technique with washes of acrylic tube paint (for description and examples, see the Reference pages linked at the top right corner of this post). After adding a coat of clear flat, a few chalk marks, and route cards, the car looked as shown below, being switched to the ice deck in my layout town of Shumala by SP 1284, a Class S-12 0-6-0. 

This is going to be a nice addition to my PFE fleet, and it will certainly be among the cars switched at my next operating session.

Tony Thompson 

Reworking a PFE car kit, Part 2

As I mentioned in a recent post, I have had occasional suggestions about this blog, that I write about PFE car models more often. I’ve now begun one such description, making changes to a Red Caboose kit. I gave the background, and a prototype photo, in the first post. That previous post is here: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2026/05/reworking-pfe-car-kit.html .

The kit is generally well designed, and I like to build it in sub-assemblies, as I think the manufacturer intended. First is the roof, a moderately complicated assembly, being a reefer. It has 20 parts in all. I show the completed roof below. 

Next, I chose to complete the underframe. I always find the placement of the cross-bearers in these kits a little tedious, and the center sills never seem to fit without some fiddling. I drilled out the coupler box lids so that the entire coupler assembly can be tapped for 2-56 screws. The kit includes K brakes, appropriate for these cars after their 1937–1940 reconditioning, but in 1949–1951, all were reconditioned again, this time getting AB brakes, so I dipped into the parts stash and added those brake parts.  

One can note in the prototype photo of PFE 98444 in the previous post, even with the low angle from which the photo was taken, that brake piping and rodding is invisible, due to the center sill. I chose accordingly not to add any of those details. This is, in practical terms, a layout model.  Even so, if one counts the coupler box screws, the underframe assembly contains 29 parts (before adding the six sill steps).

Below is the completed underbody, with the car body in the background, with its interior now painted to eliminate translucence (Tamiya “German Grey,” TS-4).  

I wasn’t sure the color of the car ends matched the roof (though Red Caboose colors were generally pretty accurate), so oversprayed them with Star “SP/UP Freight Car Red” (STR-30), then applied decals from the excellent Microscale set 87-501, containing Dick Harley’s fine artwork. As you see below, detail parts had not yet been installed on these ends. At the time of the 1950 paint scheme, wood-sheathed ends still received the 7-inch lettering you see here.

The car number was chosen as part of the 97,000 series, as I didn’t have a model in that series. Long ago, I conceived the idea of having about one PFE model car for each thousand prototype PFE cars, a fleet of nearly 40,000 cars at the time I model. I haven’t been rigid about this, but use it as a guideline.

With the amount of detail on the sides quite minimal on this kit (just add grab irons and a ladder to each side), I decided to start applying decals to the sides. I used the Microscale set mentioned above. Many modelers wait until all detail parts are applied and the car completed before lettering, but I often letter at an intermediate state if it suits the model. 

The car is now well along, and I will describe its completion and weathering in a following post.

Tony Thompson 

Reworking a PFE car kit

In response to a recent question I was asked (“Why don’t you write more about PFE cars?”), I will describe recent work on a Red Caboose HO scale kit for a PFE reconditioned reefer, kit RC-4121-3, for a car of PFE Class R-30-12-9. There are a number of things I will choose to do for this kit.

I’ll begin with the kit as it comes from the box. It’s nicely decorated (as they always say in magazine reviews), but it is the 1936–1942 paint scheme, with single railroad emblems on each side. It’s shown below.

The car body above is molded in orange plastic. This is both good news and bad news. It means, on the good side, that lettering can be removed without affecting the background color; but on the bad side, the plastic is translucent, and needs to have the car interior painted a neutral color like dark gray to kill the translucence.  

This paint scheme was rare on wood-sheathed cars by 1950 and essentially absent by 1953, because newer paint schemes after World War II, and very large volumes of shop work in the postwar years, meant that a wood-sheathed car like this would undoubtedly have been repainted by my modeling year of 1953. 

Here is the scheme that is far more suitable for my modeling year, in a George Sisk photo from the Charles Winters collection. As is documented in the Southern Pacific Freight Car Painting and Lettering Guide (SP Historical & Technical Society, Upland, CA, 2016), authored by Dick Harley and me, page 141, this is the 1950 PFE scheme, with all side hardware orange, along with sill steps, and both railroad medallions black and white. Dimensional data and other lettering details differ from the kit lettering, so all kit lettering needs to go.

Since there is no significant part of the lettering worth saving, nor is it particularly well rendered, I removed all of it with Scalecoat stripper, on both sides and ends. I then fired up the airbrush and added a coat on the car sides of Star brand STR-27, “Daylight Orange,” (a color adopted by PFE eight years before the more-famous SP “Daylight” trains). The same paint was airbrushed onto the sprues of side hardware parts (sprues D and G), provided in the kit in black, so they would be ready to be applied to the body. 

Next I assembled the kit. For the most part, this is simply following instructions. But there are a few things that require explication. Some have been presented before, in a report on a similar car kit (see that post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/01/reconditioned-pfe-car-part-2-model.html ).

For features of the prototype PFE cars that were reconditioned — being formerly cars of Class R-30-12, they were re-classed when reconditioned as Class R-30-12-9, then after World War II this was simplified by omitting the original -12, making them simply Class R-30-9 — one can consult Chapter 7 in the PFE book (Thompson, Church and Jones, Pacific Fruit Express, 2nd edition, Signature Press, 2000). A number of details are provided about the 7694 cars of this class, PFE’s largest.

As I do when car weights are not supplied in a kit, I glued two 5/8-11 steel nuts inside the car body, using canopy cement. This gives plenty of weight, and canopy glue is perfect for joining dissimilar materials, as is the case here. 

One last point relates to the roof. In the last group of R-30-9 cars, steel ice hatches were applied and ice hatch platforms removed, cars PFE 95737–98718. And note in the prototype photo above of PFE 98444 that wood running boards were retained; all these cars were reconditioned during 1937–1940, when this was usual practice. I will do the same, as I’ll describe in a future post.

Tony Thompson 

Seasonality in reefer usage

On my layout, I have chosen to model all of 1953, in that each operating session is on the current month and day, but in 1953. So an April 13 session this year would be modeled as April 13, 1953, and a session this fall on September 15 would be September 15, 1953. One reason for this is so that I can mirror the varying crops being harvested; the area I model was in peak harvest for least one crop in every month of the year.

I have shown this crop seasonality before (see, for example, in this post: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/09/seasonality-of-crops-and-traffic.html ), but below is the vegetable crop chart for my modeled area, taken from the multi-page chart in the back of the PFE book (Pacific Fruit Express, 2nd edition, Signature Press, 2000), pages 442–447.  You can click on the image to enlarge it if you wish. Black bars are peak harvests, gray bars off-peak harvesting.

But today’s post is not about accuracy of crops loaded, which in any case only shows up on the waybill. Instead, it is about the cars into which the crops were loaded. At the time I model, PFE had by far the largest reefer fleet in North America, around 40,000 cars. During most of the year, this fleet could handle all of the reefer needs of PFE’s two parent companies, SP and UP, and contract partner WP.

But during peak harvesting in SP, WP and UP territory, July to late September, even PFE’s fleet was inadequate. The table on page 450 in the PFE book shows this by year for virtually all of PFE’s history. In 1953, for example, PFE cars handled 73 percent of that year’s 307,000 perishable shipments in SP territory. 

To solve that problem, PFE borrowed from various other reefer fleets, heavily from American Refrigerator Transport (ART), but also from Fruit Growers Express, the BAR, and others. I’ve discussed this in more detail previously (see this post: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2019/08/foreign-reefers-in-pfe-territory.html ).

So whenever I host an operating session in the July–October period, you will see various foreign reefers being loaded at packing houses on my layout. Of course PFE cars are still the majority in that period, but the foreign cars seen then for loading are rare outside that peak harvest season. Below is a peak-season example, a loaded BAR reefer being picked up at Phelan & Taylor Produce in East Shumala on my layout.

There are other details in seasonal reefer visibility. In late February, through the end of March, strawberries are a sufficiently valuable crop to demand express reefers, and indeed such cars do show up at my Guadalupe Fruit Company for loading in that period. Shown below is an example, with 40-foot PFE Class BR-40-10 no. 909 (an upgraded InterMountain model) at left, and 50-foot Railway Express reefer REX 1227 (a Walthers wood-sheathed model) at right, both spotted for loading. The Ballard depot is behind them.

These cars are normally picked by mainline (non-streamlined) passenger trains at Shumala, and are iced before departure. In the photo below, PFE 928 (with correct Symington-Gould “XL” trucks for PFE 926–950 cars of Class BR-40-10) is being spotted by SP Alco switcher no. 1474 at the ice deck in Shumala, prior to pickup. 

These variations in the reefers that are seen on the layout during operating sessions during particular parts of the year reflect prototype information, and are aspects of layout operation that I enjoy.

Tony Thompson 

Modeling a PFE fleet

I have posted several times about this topic, and over the years have given a number of talks about it, but continue to get questions and comments on the subject. As the principal author of the 464-page PFE book (Thompson, Church and Jones, Pacific Fruit Express, 2nd edition, Signature Press, 2000), I do have resources to try and answer questions like this. And of course the book remains your primary source of information.

Although I personally model 1953, I realize that many people model other parts of the PFE era, so in the material below, will try to cover a range of years. But almost any choice of era will lead to interesting photos, like the one below (Extra 4015 East, Green River, Wyo., Sept. 3, 1955: John E Shaw photo). Which cars are these? Or to rephrase: what mix of cars should I have? And perhaps strikingly, what mix of clean and variously dirty cars should I have?

Following PFE’s dramatic inception in 1906, when E.H. Harriman ordered 6600 new refrigerator cars to create the first PFE car fleet, cars continued to be of wood-sheathed construction, including wood board roofs, until 1920. 

In that year, outside metal roofs became standard for new and rebuilt car construction, but car bodies remained wood-framed and wood-sheathed. The first all-steel cars were built in 1936. But because of the immense number of wood cars in existence in 1936, the steel cars remained a relatively small fraction of the fleet until the middle 1950s. 

As additional classes of steel cars were built, the fleet slowly began to be dominated by cars of that type, though as late as 1960, wood-sheathed cars (by now all rebuilds) remained 60 percent of the fleet. The first mechanical reefers owned by PFE were built in 1953, but even by 1962, they ware only 9 percent of the fleet. But this rose quickly as ice cars were scrapped, and by 1970 mechanical cars were 64 percent of the fleet. All these relative fleet characteristics are well documented in the PFE book.

For a single example of the kind of information in that book, below is a chart made by Dick Harley and contributed to the book (pages 440 and 441). It shows graphically and clearly the evolution of the PFE wood-car fleet over time, including rebuilding. (You can click on the image to enlarge it if you wish.) 

 For modelers of any part of North America, the size of PFE’s fleet is worth pointing out. For quite a few years, it hovered just under 40,000 cars, bigger than most railroads’ entire fleet, as you see below. This graph also shows how many cars were washed every year, and you can see it’s a significant fraction of the fleet each year, except in the depth of the Depression and during World War II, until washing was discontinued in the early 1950s. 

 I show this graph because it has a consequence for car appearance. You can’t weather PFE cars before the 1950s just on the age of the paint scheme, because of this washing. For more about washing and all that, see my earlier post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2016/11/appearance-of-pfe-reefers-part-3.html . 

I have had modelers ask me about PFE underframes. After the first car classes with a heavy and complex underframe, PFE changed to the single-beam Bettendorf design, which they continued to use into the middle 1920s. They then changed to what they called a “built-up” underframe, which was assembled from plate and angles. 

Both are shown below (you can click to enlarge if you wish). The section at right is labeled as a “40-ton” underframe, but thousands of 30-ton cars received this kind of design also, just with a little lighter section. All cars with either underframe were wood-sheathed cars. 

I guess my point is that there are considerable resources to answer questions about the prototype and, by implication, many modeling issues too. But I am always available, via this blog or privately, to try and answer questions.

Tony Thompson

Modernizing a PFE model

Recently a friend approached me with a model he had recently purchased, a Pacific Fruit Express Class R-40-2 car sold by Fox Valley Models (reportedly the former MTH model product). He had not realized it was a 1920s paint scheme (he models the 1950s) and did recognize that the yellow paint scheme would have been long gone by the time he models.

Here is a photo of the model. It is in some ways nicely done, with wire grab irons, and nice crisp sill steps. It even even has separately applied UP and SP emblems, evidently to represent the porcelain enamel medallions that PFE applied for a few years after 1928 (and then removed to avoid the hazard of them falling off the cars). The outside-metal roof surface being black and wood roof parts boxcar red is correct, as is all the lettering, for a car built in 1928.

Below is a photo of the prototype car class (Steve Peery collection). This photo, and considerable information about the prototype cars, can be found in Chapter 6 of Pacific Fruit Express (2nd edition), Thompson, Church and Jones, Signature Press, 2000.

But in early 1929, PFE changed its car color from yellow (an Armour Yellow, not the lemon yellow on this model) to a light orange. [Eight years later, SP would adopt this color for its new Daylight trains, and it became known as Daylight Orange, though originated in use by PFE.] The entire PFE fleet was entirely orange by the early 1930s, certainly before 1934. So the color of the model would be incorrect for any layout set later than 1934.

I won’t go further into PFE painting history, but an excellent source is available. Extensive information on PFE painting and lettering over time can be found in Southern Pacific Freight Car Painting and Lettering Guide, Dick Harley and Anthony Thompson, SPH&TS, 2016.

The Class R-40-2 design happens to have been characterized by grab iron rows at the right end of each car side, the last PFE class so equipped. From that time forward, new PFE cars would receive ladders in that location. When the cars of Class R-40-2 were refurbished in the late 1930s, they would have lost the grab iron rows along with the yellow color. 

Class R-40-2 was also the last PFE class to have a wood-framed superstructure. Class R-40-4 and all later wood-sheathed cars received steel superstructure framing. In the late 1930s, such framing was even extended to rebuilt cars. By 1950, nearly all the older cars which still had wood superstructure framing had been rebuilt or scrapped — including every single car of Class R-40-2.

Accordingly, I had to tell my friend that this model, to be used in a 1950s layout, would have to receive ladders in place of its grab irons, and be repainted orange, and would have to be renumbered as a rebuilt class or as Class R-40-4. The best choice would probably be one of the post-1948 paint schemes in which all side hardware was orange instead of black, to avoid having to repaint all those details black by hand in the repainting process.

My friend was not very interested in doing a total repaint, and I didn’t volunteer to take on the task. At that point, I suggested the model would look nice in his display case, he nodded sadly, and departed. But if anyone reading this account wants this model, let me know. I may be able to arrange getting it to you.

Tony Thompson

The peculiar Walthers steel reefer, Part 2

Previously I wrote about the numerous oddities in lettering on the new Walthers “mainline” refrigerator car model, particularly on the version pretending to be a PFE Class R-30-13 car. Since it is a steel car body, this is obviously beyond help, disappointing because the lettering is actually quite accurately rendered — for a wood car. That earlier post is here: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/10/the-peculiar-new-walthers-steel-reefer.html . 

To make the lettering accurate, the car needs almost everything re-lettered. But let’s see what can be simply done to make the biggest improvements. To me, the easiest fix on the model is to replace the wrong UP medallion on the side (left side) with the SP emblem toward the B end, with a black and white one. For this you want Microscale set 87-501, but be sure it’s from within a few years of purchase. Microscale continues to apply original numbers to revised and improved sets, of which this is one.

Here’s what it should look like (PFE photo), a repeat from the previous post for clarity.

The repack stencil, the distinctive PFE design with pointed rectangles, just visible at the bottom of the photo above, needs to be added too, and this is in the same Microscale set. Finally, a reweigh date appropriate to your modeling era should replace the “NEW” date on the model. After January 1, 1949, the required reweigh interval was 48 months, so I have to use 1950 or later reweigh dates on my 1953 layout. Here is the re-done left side.

This simple approach can’t be repeated on the other side, the right side, however, because the SP emblem is now away from the B end. For that arrangement, typical of 1946–1948, the UP emblem would be the one without the word “railroad” in the blue field, and like the black-white emblems, these are readily available in the Microscale decal sets. For this, the desired set number is 87-414. It also contains the repack rectangles. Here is the re-done right side.

One easy detail to fix on the “R-40-10” model is the corner sill steps, which on the prototype were orange in the 1948 paint scheme; this is an easy correction. And many Class R-40-10 cars, starting in October 1950, were refurbished and upgraded, visibly receiving steel-grid running boards (like this model) and car fans. One could also apply Preco fan boxes to this model, taken from Details West set RD-215, but given all the other compromises, it doesn’t seem needed.

This leads me to comment that some might contemplate correcting the rest of the model, replacing the incorrect roof, carving off the molded-on ladders and grab irons, and replacing them with free-standing details, and so on. To me, this would be a waste of time. InterMountain makes an excellent R-40-10 model, without any of these issues, while it would be a lot of work on the Walthers body to come close. 

So “saving” this model, to me, means making it acceptable as a “main line” model, all right in a passing train but perhaps not in switching, where it could be scrutinized. I completed the work I want to do by I painting the corner sill steps orange, and the very shiny wheel faces dark gray, then giving the whole model a coat of flat finish, preparatory to weathering.  I followed my typical method, washes using acrylic tube paints, as has been described and explained in my “Reference pages” (see link at top right of this post).

In this photo, you can see that I’ve also added a few chalk marks, and a route card applied where the route card board should be, at the bolster, though Walthers has not molded that detail on this model.

That completes the paint scheme revisions I wanted to do, to at least make the paint scheme(s) of this car credible, suitable for use as a “mainline” car. The shortcomings of the car body will be ignored. I’ve gone as far as I want to with this one.

Tony Thompson

The peculiar new Walthers steel reefer

I have seen promotional material for the new Walthers “mainline” refrigerator car in HO scale, and wondered what it might be a model of. Since their ads have shown a Fruit Growers steel car, perhaps that was their goal. But they are also marketing two Pacific Fruit Express paint schemes on this car body, so I wanted to evaluate those models.

I have no idea where they got the ideas for their two paint schemes. Neither one makes any historical sense. But before I get to that, let’s look at the car body itself. The photo below shows that the model has molded-on ladders and grab irons. The rendition of the rivet lines of the steel body are not bad, nor is the door appearance. Ice hatches do resemble the Holland hatch covers used by PFE for a time. The running board represents a steel grid, and it is a see-through grid. 

That’s the good news. But the roof is a late-1920s style flat panel roof, not the prototype’s raised panel roof. And the underframe has no relation to any PFE underframe I know of. Aside from the roof and the relatively invisible underframe, the body is not a bad version of PFE’s first steel reefers, Class R-40-10.

Now to the PFE paint schemes they have chosen. The one shown above is a mish-mash of components from different eras, and one wonders what they thought they were doing on this steel body scheme.  I will come back to it, in favor of beginning with the single-emblem scheme, cars that are lettered as Class R-30-13. It’s shown below in a Walthers photo.

This scheme had a UP “Overland Route” slogan emblem on one side, which you see above, and an SP emblem on the other side. The paint scheme as shown above was in use prior to 1936. That’s because it’s the pre-1936 UP emblem with the word “System” in the blue field. That would be all right for the time the R-30-13 cars were built, as would all of the rest of the lettering. But as mentioned, all this decoration is on a steel body, while the lettering is for a wood-sheathed car.

These single-emblem cars have car numbers beginning with “40,” consistent with Class R-40-10, but they are lettered as Class R-30-13, a car with wood-sheathed sides and ends and an outside-metal roof, wood running board, and K brakes: none of those features are on the model. 

In a way, it’s a shame they went to all the trouble to accurately letter the car this way. If it were just a wood car body, the lettering would be quite nice. For comparison, below is a prototype photo (Pullman for PFE). Incidentally, the deep underframe (whitewashed for the photo) is yet another feature missing from the Walthers representation of Class R-30-13.

Now let me return to the steel car. This second paint scheme has car numbers beginning with “41,” again consistent with Class R-40-10, and for that class the car body makes far better sense, even the lack of placard boards on car sides (but unaccountably, they do have placard boards on the ends). Unfortunately, all the dimensional and capacity lettering and data is copied exactly from the R-30-13 model, entirely wrong in almost every detail for a steel-body Class R-40-10.

But the emblems are a problem, too. The chosen “two-emblem” paint scheme, with both railroad emblems on both sides, essentially a 1946–1950 scheme, is fine, but they have chose to letter a red-white-blue UP emblem with the word “railroad” in the blue field, something never done with that emblem. In fact, the first UP emblem to contain the word “railroad” was the black-white one introduced in 1950.

The PFE photo below shows the black-white UP emblem. Clearly Walthers got the white border and the word “railroad” in the upper field, but chose to stay with red-white-blue, an imaginary scheme (it’s shown in the upper photo in this post). 

Moreover, as is obvious in the model photos above, Walthers painted all side hardware orange (ladders, grab irons, and door hardware), consistent with PFE practice beginning in 1948. From that time until 1950, the all-orange sides co-existed with the color two-herald scheme, as mentioned.

Where can you find all these lettering details as to arrangement and dates of use? An excellent book from the Southern Pacific Historical & Technical Society, entitled Southern Pacific Freight Car Painting and Lettering Guide (SPH&S, 2016) contains a thorough and clearly presented description of all the PFE lettering schemes down through the years, organized and written by Dick Harley.

Quite aside from curiosity about how and why Walthers made its peculiar lettering decisions, as a modeler the far more interesting question is, what can be done with this model if you’d like it to be more prototypical? I will turn to that topic in a following post.

Tony Thompson

Express reefers from REA

The Railway Express Agency, or REA, was an outgrowth of a number of prior express companies, dating back to the 19th century’s days of stagecoaches and intercity steamers on the east coast, with express companies undertaking to deliver packages and parcels (for a fee) to certain destinations. These gradually grew into a number of much larger companies, among them Wells Fargo and American Express, surviving today in related business areas. 

An adequate history of REA is provided by Vic Roseman’s book, Railway Express (Rocky Mountain Publishing, Denver, 1992). Considerably more coverage of rolling stock, though not of corporate history, is available in Pat Wider’s excellent contribution to Railway Prototype Cyclopedia (Volume 7, 2002), which is entitled “BR and BS Express Refrigerator Cars.” I will summarize the background, as I have done previously (see, for example, my post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/01/express-refrigerator-cars.html ).

During World War I, when the U.S. government took over railroad operation under the U.S. Railroad Administration or USRA, a simplification was accomplished by compelling the merger of railroad-owed express companies and the four major private companies at the time, Adams Express, Wells Fargo, American Express, and Southern Express, into a single company, American Railway Express (ARE). After the end of the USRA, it was expected that the ARE would be disbanded and the business returned to the prior companies; but this proved impractical, and the ICC approved continued operation of ARE.

But both the ICC and Congress wanted this business to be operated by the railroads, not a private company, and accordingly in 1929 a new corporation was formed, owned by 86 of the largest railroads, and named Railway Express Agency. Offices, employees and rolling stock of ARE were all merged into REA. The right to operate all express services and related services was held by REA, and all revenues were distributed to the owning railroads.

In addition to ARE-owned rolling stock, REA also obtained the use of 665 express reefers that had been owned and operated by General American Transportation Company as a lease fleet. These were wood-sheathed cars originally built by GATC. An example is below, REX 1227, photographed at Oakland, California on February 16, 1952 by Wilber C. Whittaker. 

After World War II, REA realized it owned a great many cars of wood construction that were over 25 years old. In 1947–48, they went to American Car & Foundry for 500 new, all-steel cars, nicknamed the “100-mph cars.” Their original rather flashy aluminum, green and red-banded sides soon proved too prone to dirt accumulation, and were repainted dark green, like the car in this view (New Haven, Connecticut, February 1954, Bob’s Photo collection). The rippling of the welded sides is evident.

With regard to express refrigerator cars, nearly all railroads with significant ownership of such cars voluntarily provided them to an REA pool. Distribution and movement of the cars was under REA direction. That meant that if you were a shipper and wanted an express reefer, you called REA, not your local railroad; but nearly all railroad station agents were also REA agents, so in reality you called the person you always called for an empty car, and he or she put on a different hat to take your order.

When REA cars were loaded, the local agent acted as the car clerk to apply any placards that were needed. I will show two examples, loaned to me by Michael Litant from his collection. Both are 5.5 x 8.5 inches in size. The first, below, was applied to REX 7465 in Santa Maria, California (very near the location I model on my layout) on June 17, 1967. The stamp at lower left is for salt additions, and is marked as 1 percent salt for this cargo, routed on the Santa Maria Valley to the SP at Guadalupe, and then by “best route” to Boston. Unfortunately the cargo is not shown on this placard design.

Here is a second example, virtually identical in format, this one applied at Yakima, Washington to REX 7499, on June 17, 1966, and is shown as departing Yakima on Northern Pacific eastward train no. 2, The Mainstreeter, which often carried substantial head-end traffic.

Both these placards were placed on cars in the 1957-built car group REX 7400–7899, 54-foot riveted cars with 6-foot sliding doors and BX trucks. Below is a photo taken at Dallas, Texas by Dick Kuelbs in August 1961, showing REX 7833.

To return to the topic of the pool, shown below is a listing of the REA express reefer pool roster in 1953. It is Table 5-4 from the PFE book. Note that of the 2500 cars in the pool, over 1600 of them had REX reporting marks. This is well over half of the pool. Express cars of other ownership sometimes came into REA use also.

It is known that the pool arrangements were that REA would only be responsible for minor repairs. Anything consequential was the responsibility of the car owner. Thus although the REA pool operated nationwide, and indeed an express reefer of any ownership might travel anywhere, the majority of each owner’s cars were kept in more or less the owner’s geographical area to facilitate maintenance.

The modeling consequence of this is that whatever area you model, local railroad express cars would predominate, along with REX cars, which could go anywhere (and the table above shows how they numerically dominated the pool). On my layout, express cars are operated in just this way. I will return to the modeling and operating uses of these cars in a future post.

Tony Thompson

The steel express cars of PFE

A previous post on this blog showed both prototype photos, and model examples, of the wood-sheathed 50-foot express refrigerator cars in the Pacific Fruit Express fleet. Those cars, originally 300 in number and built in 1923, were supplemented in 1953 with 40-foot steel refrigerator cars, which are the subject of the present post. You can view the previous post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/01/pfe-express-refrigerators.html .

Those 40-foot cars came about when PFE, responding in the summer of 1952 to a shortage of express cars on the part of the Railway Express Agency (operator of pooled express reefers from a number of owners, including PFE), drew 50 cars from the 4700-car class of steel cars, R-40-10, and equipped them for express passenger service. 

The cars chosen were among the R-40-10s that had already been upgraded with Preco electric fans and steel-grid running boards. The additional modifications included marker light brackets, upgraded brakes, steam and signal lines, and most visibly, high-speed trucks. They retained their Type E freight couplers rather than receiving tight-lock couplers.

There is more about these cars in Chapter 8 of the PFE book (Thompson, Church and Jones, Pacific Fruit Express, 2nd edition, Signature Press, 2000), for which I wrote all the parts about PFE cars. I also posted  previously, going into the history is some detail (that post is accessible at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2016/02/pfes-40-foot-express-reefers.html ).

The new batch of express reefers was numbered PFE 901–950. Below is a photo of the first car, PFE 901, at Los Angeles Shop, freshly painted but not yet weighed (PFE photo, CSRM).

Since the car bodies overall were unchanged, it is tempting merely to paint a Class R-40-10 model in Dark Olive Green paint on sides and ends (black roof), letter it in Dulux Gold, and have yourself a PFE steel express reefer. And that is basically what InterMountain Models did a few years ago. (And you could also add a fan control box and a steel-grid running board.) But the issue of trucks, at least, calls for more effort. I have briefly addressed that before; see my post at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2016/02/pfes-40-foot-express-reefers.html .

The prototype 50 cars, in process of being prepared for express service, received two sets of trucks that Union Pacific (co-owner of PFE) had been experimenting with, 25 sets of each type. These had been tested in UP’s high-speed stock trains from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles, but were superseded by roller-bearing trucks.

The first 25 cars, PFE 901–925, received a Chrysler FR-5 truck with hydraulic snubbers. The second 25, PFE 926–950, used the Symington-Gould Type XL trucks. Each is shown below, in photos taken from the PFE book. The Chrysler truck, with its prominent angled snubber outside, is at left; the Symington-Gould truck is at right.

As it happens, the appearance of the Symington-Gould truck is much like, though not identical to, the Cape Line T-13 truck, and I have used them to model a car from PFE 926–950. Shown below is the model of PFE 928, with the Cape Line trucks, being spotted for icing on my layout.

For the Chrysler truck, there is no commercial equivalent, but I’ve shown how I modeled this truck (see it at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2016/02/pfe-40-foot-express-cars-part-2-trucks.html ). The core idea was to add a resin casting for the snubber parts.

My set of these parts came from Ross Dando’s Twin Star Cars (you can visit them at: https://twinstarcars.com/WP/product-category/twin-star-cars-products//  ), though these parts are not currently on the website. If you wished to do the same truck modification, you would need to contact Twin Star directly to see if they can be ordered. Here is the truck with the Ross Dando casting attached.

The result was that I could model one of the first 25 cars in this PFE group. Here’s my model, starting with an InterMountain kit, correcting the trucks to resemble the Chrysler FR-5 and adding the etched metal running board (the fan control box is on the other side: there was only one per car).

I enjoy being able to operate these 40-foot steel express cars together with the conventional 50-foot wood-sheathed PFE express cars, reflecting the prototype fleet, whenever my seasonal produce shipping from layout packing houses calls for the use of express reefers.

Tony Thompson

PFE express refrigerators

I recently received an interesting comment from a long-time reader of this blog. The comment was, that I had mentioned PFE express refrigerator cars many times, but rarely had provided anything comprehensive about them. This is probably true about the blog, because of the PFE book (Thompson, Church and Jones, Pacific Fruit Express, 2nd edition, Signature Press, 2000), for which I wrote all the parts about PFE cars. Let me see what I can add; also compare Chapter 5 in the PFE book. 

The first point to recognize about PFE express reefers is that PFE owned a fleet of 300 very conventional wood-sheathed 50-foot cars, built by AC&F and General American during 1923–24, which were very similar to many other owners’ express cars in that period. One benefit for modelers in that fact is that a manufacturer can offer the “standard” General American express car in a variety of lettering schemes, and in fact Athearn (in the blue-box days) and Walthers have done just that.

As built, these cars had round roofs and flush ice hatches, that is, no hatch platforms, and side and end grab irons were arranged according to passenger-car practice. They were numbered 501–800. Below is a copy of a builder photo of these cars (AC&F photo, courtesy Gordon Mills). 

Note that the car is lettered for American Railway Express, the predecessor of the Railway Express Agency (REA), to whom the cars were leased for operation. Upon replacement of ARE with REA, the leases were terminated and cars returned to PFE. Subsequently, PFE, like most major owners of express reefers, voluntarily made them available for an REA pool.

As built, these cars were typified by a wide fascia board the full length of the car. Earl Hopkins, retired PFE General Mechanical and Engineering Officer, told me in an interview that these boards were 50-foot lengths of 10-inch wide clear redwood, as specified by PFE to the builder. 

Beginning in 1930, PFE partially rebuilt these cars, adding ice hatch platforms, ladders on car sides and ends in place of grab-iron rows, and generally rearranging safety appliances in accord with freight car practice. (Both the old Athearn and the Walthers models are a mixture of these features, having flush ice hatches, but side and end ladders.)

Below is an in-service photo of one of the cars, showing that wide fascia board, taken at Roseville, California  on May 7, 1956 (Chet McCoid photo, Bob’s Photo collection). Note that the car has a conventional power hand brake. These were installed when many of the express cars were overhauled during 1942–46, replacing Miner lever hand brakes. Note also that reporting mark and car number are to the right of the car door.

By 1953, the year I model, many cars were in poor condition, and PFE undertook to rebuild again 83 of the 155 cars then in service, about half of the fleet. Inside, the old wood superstructures were replaced with steel frames. The rebuilds are easy to recognize because the original wide fascia boards were replaced with a much narrower fir fascia board. Lettering was also revised, as seen in this photo at the Harborside Terminal, Jersey City, NJ, in 1958 (Jeff Winslow photo). Finally, fans were added (note fan symbol above nearer truck.)

Thus there are four different appearances shown by these express refrigerators, according to era. First, the as-built appearance, without ice hatch platforms or ladders. Second, the post-early thirties look with ice hatch platforms and ladders added. Third, the post-World War II look, with power hand brakes instead of lever hand brakes. Fourth, the final rebuilt look (only part of the fleet), with narrow fascia boards, from 1954 onwards.

For my own modeling, the post-World War II look, appearance 3, is appropriate for most if not all of my PFE express reefers. Probably the best commercial model of the post-WW II cars was the brass version by WP Car Company. I have a couple of these. Here is what they look like (weathered and in service on my layout):

Here is another model I have, weathered by Al Massi and traded to me by Otis McGee for a Richard Hendrickson PRR express reefer. I don’t specifically know the origin of the model, but it might be a Challenger brass import. In the early 1950s, the prototype cars had become rather dingy, and this model reflects that. 

In the 1950s, there were also some quite interesting PFE express cars in the form of 40-foot steel reefers. I will summarize their history and modeling in a future post.

Tony Thompson

Reconditioned PFE car, Part 2: model

From 1935 to 1941 or so, Pacific Fruit Express “reconditioned” (that is, minimally upgraded and repaired) more than 7600 older cars with 30-ton underframes (and a few 40-tonners). They were classed R-30-9 (or R-40-9) when completed. I gave some background on these cars in the preceding post (you can consult it at: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2023/12/the-pfe-reconditioned-wood-cars.html ).

I am building a Red Caboose kit for one of these cars, as I mentioned toward the end of that previous post. Most of my kit assembly is according to the kit directions, so I won’t go into it here, and nearly all of the kit details are fine. An important and quite visible exception is the ice hatch arrangement, which is what I showed in that previous post, with wood hatch covers and  replacement hatch cover hinge supports and striker bars.

To continue: one thing I do with models of most house cars: insert weights inside. I usually use 5/8-11 steel nuts. Together, these weigh about two and a half ounces. I attach them with canopy glue, which has proven itself over the years to provide a secure and dependable attachment of these heavy objects inside models. In this photo, you can see that I’ve added the side and end details.

I would just note that these nuts cost 69 cents each at my local hardware store, $1.38 together. Comparable stick-on commercial weights, for the same amount of weight, cost about $5.00, and I have had the stick-on adhesive fail in some cases. Canopy glue has never failed in my models.

Once that is done,  I proceeded with the underframe. The kit supplies a K brake system, which in fact most of the Class R-30-9 cars, when reconditioned, did retain from their original construction. Many of these cars were rebuilt again in 1949–1950, and at that time some cars were upgraded to AB brakes. But since so many photos from the early 1950s do show K brakes, I decided to apply that system to this car.

Second choice to be made is couplers. As is my practice, I substituted Kadee whisker couplers in the kit coupler box, but I drilled out and tapped the box 2-56. The view below shows the completed underframe and floor, attached to the car body, and with the Kadee couplers installed (the brass screw heads will of course be painted). Sill steps remain to be installed. Usually I do not add the drain chutes, which are all but invisible.

The third point to consider is trucks. The kit supplies T-section trucks, a type very commonly retained on reconditioned Class R-30-9 cars; but the Red Caboose version of these trucks is simply sub-standard. I replaced them with a pair of Kadee “HGC” T-section trucks, Kadee part 1572. Again, I tapped the truck screw hole 2-56.

Withe the underframe complete and attached to the car body, I needed to choose a car number. I felt it should be well under PFE 95736, after which all reconditioned cars were given steel hatches, and not too close to the original car, PFE 91022, as the earliest cars kept ice hatch platforms. I chose PFE 93461. Here is the re-lettered model, ready for weathering.

Since the paint scheme of the model is one that was in use from 1946–48, by my modeling year of 1953, it might be fairly dirty — keeping in mind that PFE did wash its cars frequently in this period. I also wanted to include the appearance of a workman having wiped the dirt from the car number for better visibility. Weathering was done with my usual acrylic wash technique (see link to “Reference pages” at upper right corner of this post).

Note above that I have also added chalk marks and route cards to the car.

This concludes work on this model, another addition to my considerable fleet of PFE cars. And with six shippers on my layout who use reefers, they are all useful in layout operating sessions!

Tony Thompson