I'll thrown in my 2 cents here, too. Years ago, I had RailGraphics make me up some SP&S passenger decals in yellow and also Dulux, which I pretty much used up doing some old Con-Cor heavyweights and other stuff. As I've collected Lowell's releases, though, I've sold most of my older passenger rolling stock on eBay, keeping only the stuff I really liked. Here are some pictures of my SP&S passenger equipment (I really just want to show off!) I guess it's going to be tough to see, but these cars are all Kato s I painted and decalled, using the excellent book by Todd Schwenk as a guide. On a different note, Mr. John Moore, I, too did as SP&S work train almost 30 years ago, using the old Dimi-Trains kits. I think I have a picture of the crane and tender yup, there they are. The RS3, by the way, is a first generation Atlas I did at the same time: my wife and I call that time "BC" for "Before Children," two of whom just graduated from college.
Nice cars and it puts a picture to my earlier comments on the equipment SP&S owned that ran in both trains. Anumber of years ago I got carried away with the M of W feet modeling and dang near have one of everything they rostered except for the Jordan Spreaders. I got especially enamored of this little jewel that was part of the bridge and tunnel gang I found in one of my reference books. Unfortunately Lowell's stuff comes too late in the game for me because I have close to every crane they rostered at one time or another along with support cars.
the only MoW I have thus far would be: 6 SP&S Atlas Hart Ballast hoppers the MTL BN/SP&S heritage car A bachmann 250T crane with flat(are on their way), up next will be a tichy wreck train kit the work/tool cars will need to be de ribbed and modified per car. I'll get some reefers to paint for SP&S MoW(ex NP wood ones, used in MoW for Ice) the list is gonna be a long one.
VERY nice car, John! I've always admired your stuff. SP&S 750, you're off to a great start, although (correct me if I'm wrong, Mr. Moore) I believe the heritage car Micro-Trains did was used in revenue service on the BN and was just done as a tribute to the predecessor lines?
Hey, guys, Bob again, I just remembered I had a couple more pictures of SP&S stuff I did some years back: I know the Kato cars are not really prototypical, but I'm not much of a rivet counter and the only one I have to please is me, so...anyway, I'd really like to get started on a layout large enough to run my SP&S train. I have a pair of old (1st gen) Kato F7s I painted, again many years ago, that run well but really loudly, especially compared to today's releases but also sprung for Lowell's E-7, which runs like the proverbial Swiss watch.
Nice stuff everyone. I'm tired of using loco decals for my passenger stuff, so I'm looking forward to the Microscale set. I'm not a rivet counter either (it's hard to be with either SP&S OR Milwaukee Road.....2 of my 3 favorites). Here's part of my wreck train, and my diner.
I really can't comment on that car since I paid little attention at the time it came out. I know that they did a fallen flags series that featured cars that ran on the Hill lines which consisted of one each of the roads in the original merger. Right toward the end of the SP&S they did receive a batch of modern steel cars that were in BN green with SP&S lettering and reporting marks and a few repaints were also done in that scheme. MT did a small batch of boxcars in SP&S along with the wood cupola style cabooses. MT's single door wood boxes with metal ribbed ends. are close stand ins for a bunch of the earlier stuff and the freight car decal set has at least one decal to do one or more of those cars that did not carry the football but arched road name lettering on the side instead. Any of those cars that is accurate for GN in the early 1910s 20s would also be accurate for SP&S older boxes. For folks trying to build a freight fleet it is probably best to remember that the parent lines were very stingy on what they allowed SP&S to buy and sometimes some new equipment was part of a in house build by the parents or a small order tacked on the one of theirs when going outside. So any mainline freight would have not more than 10% to 20% of the consist lettered for SP&S. The rest were made up of GN, NP, CB&Q, and a smattering of foreign roads. SP&S owned few tank cars, they being used mainly in company service. Almost no hoppers except a few in ballast service and they were always short of gons. Wood chip cars were another matter and they had a decent roster of them and during the early years after WW2 they converted the lions share of their roster to chip service. Then they acquired a bunch of different batches from both parents several times and bought a number of old gons from other roads. That resulted in chip trains of a variety of styles of 40 foot converted gons. So you can take just about any style of old wood composite drop bottoms, add wood extensions, and be close to accurate. They even got a small batch of Caswell gons from ATSF. So about 30 % or more of my SP&S fleet are chip gons. The rest is made up of double door boxes for lumber, some wood single door, and a few more modern all steel cars. Throw in a few more standard gons, a few single dome tanks for company service , a couple of flats, a very few hoppers and you about have your freight roster. Later on they did acquire some of the modern wood chip cars. Even though stock shipments, primarily sheep, were a big seasonal thing they had very few cars, most having come from the acquisition of the Oregon Electric. Most of the stockcars came from the parents when needed along with other car types. They did own a few reefers. but they were assigned to company service and were of the old style wood side type. So it would not be untypical to run a solid block of reefers carrying apples with only the power and caboose carrying SP&S lettering or a grain consist heading west without a single SP&S car in the consist except for the caboose. The modeler has to keep in mind that the SP&S existed as the prime forwarderof both GN and NP trains through to Portland. West bound consists coming off the Oregon Trunk usually had a mix of GN and SP&S power and later some WP thrown in. GN steam was prominent on the Trunk, usually with a SP&S crew, and often was a big R class steamer, with a SP&S Mike cut in about ten cars back as a helper because of bridge loadings.
John, That's been the basis of building my fleet. For the most part the SP&S cars are outnumbered by a ratio of atleast 1:5 in my fleet(it's small and growing). My woodchip car fleet though is the only part(other than Passenger and Caboose) where the SP&S dominates other road names with NP in a close second. yep the BN car was a revenue car, but I'm using Rule #1 with it and the 5 seattle North Coast cars in my fleet.
Not to be critical, just helpful: MicroScale now makes GN Big Blue decals with the prototypical style font and size if you'd want to replace the letting on your "Pass" series car. In case you're so inclined. It includes the Pullman and SP&S Co lettering too.
Thanks, Backshop, I'll look into those should I do another car like this. I had to do that one one letter at a time - talk about tedious!
