Hello There, could someone please tell me is Santa Fe ran passanger cars like this Bachmann model, if so could you please give me some idea of what years they were in use. Thank You Dave Downunder.
Yes they did. They ran on the San Francisco Chief. Prior to the high levels there was (I think) one on the ElCap as well and possibly on some of the shorter runs.
Wig-wag is correct. They even kept one for the business car fleet. BNSF still has it and uses it quite often when the big wigs wanna take a ride! Sammy Carlile
Here is a quickly assembled bibliography on the Santa Fe full-dome cars. #506-513 1954 Budd lightweight fulldome bar lounge pix 507 Santa Fe Diesels & Cars p.48 scale drawings & pix, Railroad Model Craftsman Apr74 p.45 general article on ATSF dome cars Santa Fe Modeler, JanFeb82 p.20 pix 507 Zephyr to Amtrak p.13 floor plans,Car Names, Numbers & Consists p.195 pix, floor plans, A Quarter Century of Santa Fe Consists,p.109 pix,plan in directors train, Passenger Train Cars, vol.2,Business Cars p.89-90 pix 507 Santa Fe Streamliners: The Chiefs & their Tribesmen p.72 pix #508, ATSF Color Guide to Frt & Pass Eqpt p.18 #550-555 1954 Budd lightweight full-dome bar lounge-dormitory general article on ATSF dome cars Santa Fe Modeler, JanFeb82 p.20 pix 550, ATSF Color Guide to Frt & Pass Eqpt p.18 pix 554, A Quarter Century of Santa Fe Consists, p.81 pix 553, Santa Fe Paint & Lettering Guide p.20 interior, color artist's rendering Santa Fe Trackside w/ Bill Gibson, p.59
In addition to the San Francisco Chief these cars were also used on the Chief and Texas Chief. They lasted a short time on the El Capitan as they went to the high level cars soon after the full domes came showed up. The Bachmann car is very well done, with the correct trucks and all. The only problem is the huge letter board that was installed after the Santa Fe sold many of these cars for service on the Auto Train. While in ATSF service they had much smaller letter boards above the windows.
I was flipping through the channels tonight and PBS was running a documentary about dome cars. I did not catch the name of the series, but it was the most boring dialogue over interesting pictures. you might be able to find oiut what it is by going to PBS.organd searching for dome cars.
