The late 80's would include Conrail, CSX, or even NS as run-through power for coal or container trains. Although a rarity, possibly some BNSF run-through power with Powder River coal trains. I have a book with several photos from the late 70's and early 80's showing Conrail power on Guilford tracks in Massachusetts with coal destined for a power plant in New Hampshire. Truthfully, you were liable to see almost any power at least once in any year.
Thankyou Hank - that's good news, and as I'm new to all of this your help is very much appreciated. Regards, Mike
Here's a great website called 'NERAIL' that features RR pictures from New England. You can look by railroad and by year. It should give you all sorts of examples of what lines ran through and what types of locos they were: http://photos.nerail.org/byrailroad/
Bruce, the NERail photos for the B&M show a more eclectic mix than I even imagined...thanks! I never would have guessed seeing a SOO at East Deerfield.mg: :shade:
Mike did you say mid 80's or late 80's? Guilford bought up B&M 1983. I remember the GP38-2's and GP40-2's were still in the Allen Dustin dark blue and block lettering B&M scheme, they lasted that way, some into the 1990's. Some of the Maine Central locomotives were painted in the first phase of Guilford paint, overall Gray with a wide orange stripe, large white blocklettering on the hood and numbers on the cab. If you are modeling 1986 you can enjoy all sorts of paint schemes as Guilford was not so keen on paint. The SD26's from ex-Santa Fe heritage ran around for years in the yellow and blue paint until the Santa Fe actually complained to Guilford. Some ex-Conrail and NS units just had the predessesors name covered and a large white G applied with a new road number. For Bow powerplant runs, Conrail was the power I saw the most from B&M era to 1997. Although I swear when I was a kid I saw a string of Chessie engines sitting in Concord Yard. Mike, interesting choice why Guilford? We had a joke in NH, only people outside of New England would model Guilford. That doesn't hold true as much as it did, last Time I went to the Springfield RR show I saw a number of young people modeling Guilford. That was because none of them were old enough to remember Maine Central, B&M and D&H.
I would not be surprised if you did. There was all sorts of odd power on that line over the years. Here's a shot of an old N&W SD40 on that run in 1987: http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo=200101051859306127.jpg&byrail:2:Norfolk_and_Western_Railroad I used to live near the BOW route as it went through northern MA into NH, and I saw a lot of Conrail in the early to mid 1990's. These days it's NS.
Your welcome. If you want to look through some really nice B&M photos from the 1970's to 1980's, I suggest you go through the photos by David Hutchinson (under browse by contributor). It appears he used to work for B&M which got him some great access.
Bruce I too lived near that Bow power line. My memories of the late 1970's are fuzzy but I do remember the Geep 7's and 9's both in blue dip and later the rebuilt Geeps in block lettering switch around Concord. Must be why I like the Chessie colors so much as a kid I generally ran only what I saw on my HO layout.
Seen a Pan-Am box car here in E. central IL. on the CSX track outback. Got a couple photos of one this summer. Not very good ones though http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/data/519/thumbs/102_1049.JPG http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/data/519/thumbs/102_1049.JPG Have no idea how far W. they were headed. do kinda like the engine colors inch
Thanks Bruce for the excellent nerail site. I've found SOO, NS and CP amongst the Guilford pics. Gives me plenty of scope. BNSF7173 I'm very flexible about the era. Thankyou for the interesting info re painting of locos. Funny you should mention SD26 - I was going to weather mine but in light of what you said it might be better left freshly-painted. I had no idea they were so slow getting around to things like that. I chose Guilford because my layout is half English, and on the other half I wanted New England. And to me the Guilford scheme appealed most. And once I'd bought the SD26 I felt pretty much committed to Guilford lines, though I guess it could be used as a visitor to Vermont, [?] for example. I'm still open to suggestion about it. Thanks again for the replies. Mike P.S. Unable to find any Guilfords in Vermont, or vice versa. East Deerfield looks like a good place to try to model.
Mike at least one of those ex-Santa Fe loco's were painted by 1987. I have a picture of #630 in Guilford paint pulling two U33C's one ex Conrail and one Ex-D&H. East deerfield would be a good spot as there are tons of pictures of it. MA in general is a good location, try Palmer MA then you have interchange with Amtrak, New England Southern and NS, or in your case Vermont Railway and Conrail respectivly. Nashua NH had some Guilford traffic when I lived in NH, but not much. Vermont is pretty territory along the Conn River line. NH is devoid of many pictures, I'm modeling the B&M in 1977 and want to do NH, but of all the books I have, there is very little of NH because B&M had given up a lot of the lines in NH by the 1970's. Jim
Bruce, first off, welcome to Train Board. Do you have any pictures of other repainted loco's you could share? Although I model B&M in 1978, the new Pan Am scheme is interesting enough for me to paint a few up. Jim
I think there is still only one done up in the new Pan Am scheme: MEC #505: It's been a while since this one has been out now, and no others have shown up yet. I'm wondering if this is a one time scheme in order to satisfy some legal requirement that comes with the use of the Pan Am name.
That's the one that is shown in the Feb. 2007 issue of TRAINS. Decorum prevents me from commenting.......:thumbs_down:
http://railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=171373 This photographer says there are two Pan Am GP40-2Ws.
After looking at the pic again, my attention is drawn to the new "Downeaster" scheme on the "cabbage" unit. I've ridden the Downeaster between Portland & Boston, and it's a nice train- goes along the former B&M route, and ends at North Station under Bancnorth Center (where the Celtics & Bruins play).
