New Boxcar Added to Fleet

My Gorre & Daphetid boxcar at Peters. The decals had dimensional lettering for a 36-foot car which is perfect for a Model Die Casting kit and fits right in with my era. 

Every model railroader has a beginning. Mine started in the fifth grade when I discovered that the local library had Model Railroader in its collection. From then until the end of college, my activity in the hobby was limited to reading the magazines. In those days, one of the real treats was admiring the photos of the Gorre & Daphetid Railroad as modeled by John Allen. As most of you probably know, his railroad was then, and still today, a scenic delight. 

      In 1970, I had the opportunity to attend a mini-meet of the Pacific Coast Region of the NMRA in Santa Barbara. Upon my arrival on Friday night, I ran into John in the hotel lobby. We spoke for a while and then, he invited me to join him on the layout tours. I spent the next few hours looking at the area's railroads. Later, he invited me to come up to his hotel room for a discussion of model railroad topics with Cliff Grandt and Charlie Trombley. I mainly listened.

John Allen as I knew him. 

     John was a very nice person and answered my questions and listened to my opinions as though I had years of experience in the hobby. I saw John once again a few months later at another model railroad event. He invited me to come to Monterey to see his railroad. I put off the trip and then, in 1973, John passed away and the railroad was destroyed shortly thereafter.

     Recently, I saw an offering for G&D decals on ebay. On impulse, I purchased a set and applied them to an old Model Die Casting kit. It's not prototypical but model railroading is supposed to be fun and I have a few unprototypical cars on the railroad which remind me of people or moments in my journey in this hobby.

     Every model railroader has a beginning. Fortunately, mine started out with some enthusiasm generated by one of the best modelers in the hobby. 

Central Pacific 564 - A Review

The finished Central Pacific boxcar with Bitter Creek Allen trucks. 

When the Central Pacific was in its infancy, it purchased 25-foot boxcars with a capacity of 15 tons. The traffic on the railroad quickly telegraphed its need for higher capacity cars and, in the 1870s, 28-foot cars became the standard with 34-footers later on in the century. The little 25-footers lasted for quite a while (a few hundred were on the 1895 roster) with some lasting into the 20th century.
     My model was built from a Bitter Creek Models (www.bittercreekmodels.com) kit. Laser-cut underframe, ends, side and roof comprise the kit with plastic injection-molded parts for brakes, bolt castings, etc. A basswood frame and ends form the basis of the car with basswood strips comprising the roof sub-frame. Thinner, laser-cut sides, end pieces and roof are glued onto the frame pieces. Enough pieces are supplied so that either cars from the 1870s and the later 1880s rebuilt cars can be built. The roof comes in a style representing the original metal-clad roofs and also the later wood roofs. Supports for the running board slide into slots in the roof which simplifies this tedious task.
     The instructions are very clear with several illustrations so that is little doubt as to what needs to be done at each step. Lettering diagrams are provided so that the kit's decals can be applied accurately. There is enough decal material so that a car from the 1870, 1880 rebuild or the 1891 renumbering can be built.
     

I built my car to reflect one which had lasted from 1870 and had not been rebuilt but had been relettered during the 1880s. An interesting note is that these cars were lettered with even numbers only. Flat cars were odd numbers only. The reason for this escapes me but it was common at the time. Perhaps it was for a quick identification of a car type when referring only to paperwork.
     Trucks and couplers are not included in the kits. Bitter Creek makes some very nice Allen/California swing motion trucks (P/N T-29) which are suitable for this car. Also available are CP/V&T Kimball trucks (T-30) and Light Thielson 15-ton trucks (T-32), any of which would be suitable. Bitter Creek also has several other nineteenth century trucks, many of which have been remastered and look very nice. Kadee 711 couplers were used.
      The boxcar kit is Bitter Creek's P/N K-20 and retails at $25.00. I recommend it highly as a well-researched, well-designed kit suitable for any nineteenth century railroads.

New Car Arrives on the S&C

C&A 13103 rests on a siding in Oakdale before going into regular service.

During my first operating session at the NMRA convention, I had to the opportunity to host Howard Garner as one of the operators. Many on the Early Rail list know him and his Cascade Western Railroad (and Cascade Western Laser). Howard is an excellent modeler and a very fine gentleman. A totally unexpected but very delightful part of his visit was the gift of a car he had scratchbuilt, the Chicago and Alton No. 13103. It was a car he used to get an Achievement Award toward his Master Model Railroader. The car is very fine with a complete underbody detail. Thank  you so very much, Howard. It is already in service on the railroad.

California Fast Freight Line

Two of the CFFL cars sit in Oakdale awaiting a shipment of grain. I chose to weather the cars a little heavier than normal since they would be fairly old and due for rebuilding.

As I had mentioned in my last blog post (Bridges and Boxcars), I have been working on ten resin boxcar kits. This morning, I put the finishing weathering on them. With the exception of one car, they are all lettered for the Southern Pacific and the California Fast Freight Line. The CFFL was one of many fast freight lines formed in the days following the Civil War. In those early days of railroading, shipping numerous items by rail became problematic due to transshipments due to gauge differences and other factors. The fast freight line was set up to allow shippers to group their items in cars which received expedited services. Of course, an additional fee was charged for this service.
   Merchants' Despatch was one of the first of the lines followed by the Union Line, Empire Line, Red Line, Blue Line, White Line and other colors of the spectrum. In all of these, several railroads furnished cars to the line and received income based on their participation. The CFFL included the Central and Southern Pacific, the Union Pacific, Rock Island, Milwaukee Road and the Chicago & Northwestern.
   By the late 1880s, improvements in rail service led to the disbanding of most of these lines including the CFFL. By 1891, the SP had started to rebuild their cars to include air brakes and more modern (for the time) safety appliances. This included repainting the CFFL lettering to the large circular SP herald. Of course, all of this took time and, in 1895, there were still numerous CFFL cars on the SP roster.These show up in many photos of the era, enough so that I wanted a representative number of cars on the S&C.
 

Decals for the cars were a combination of Art Griffin's CFFL set and ones using my own artwork. Griffin also has sets for the CFFL cars of the UP, C&NW and CM&StP and they are definitely worth the price. 

The cars were built from Silver Crash Car Works SP boxcars which are well-made and go together easily. Unfortunately, they are no longer available from SCCW but may be on the used market. The trucks were the swing-motion Allen trucks used by the CP and SP and still available through Shapeways. I used Reboxx wheelsets for the trucks which worked fine. The trucks are fairly fragile and do not endure much flexing to insert the wheels. They do, however, glue back together easily with CA adhesive. Couplers are Kadee 711s.
   For anyone interested in more information on the fast freight lines, see Railroad History No. 141. RRH is a publication of the Railway Locomotive & Historical Society (www.rlhs.org) and is a great railroad history magazine. That issue has an article entitled "Origin & Growth of Fast Freight Lines" by William W. Chandler. The article was initially published in 1889. John H. White's book The American Railroad Freight Car also has some good information.

Bridges and Boxcars

One of the finished trusses temporarily mounted on the piers. The finished bridge will be assembled on the layout.

The last few weeks have again been hectic with traveling to various events. The annual Virginia & Truckee RR Historical Society was held in Carson City Nevada at the first of October and was great as usual. It's the only place that I know where several early railroaders, both modelers and historians, gather. If you aren't a member, take a look at their website (www.vtrrhs.org). The society has a great quarterly magazine and publishes at least one book on the V&T each year.
 

Built in 1885, the wood structure lasted until the late 1890s. This view looks
 south into Oakdale

When I finally ended up at home, I decided to start construction on the Stanislaus River Bridge. This bridge was built in 1871 and allowed the S&C to enter Oakdale. It had two 140-foot wood Howe Truss bridges and several hundred feet of approach trestle. In amongst all the other things, I started on the two Howe trusses and managed to get them finished. It was not difficult work, just tedious. I started by making a jig so that the four sides needed would match and started cutting and gluing stripwood together. Making the metal tension rods took a little bit longer.
 

Each bay of the bridge had five tension rods at the joint. Mine were made from .015 inch music wire. Grandt Line NBW
castings cored .020 inches were used for the nuts at either end of the tension rod.

When the truss bridges were done, I started on the wood piers but then ran out of wood. I ordered a huge supply and, while waiting for it, started work on some Silver Crash Car Works boxcars. These are 28-foot cars and follow a Southern Pacific prototype, just perfect for the S&C. I purchased 20 of these a few years back and am just now getting to them. These managed to get finished except for paint. I'm waiting for the trucks to come in so I can paint everything together. This was not a great setback since the wood arrived in the interim. This allowed me to finish the two piers (the third pier is trestlework).

Ten boxcars await paint. The prototype of these cars was built to handle trade for the California Fast Freight Line, a traffic
expediter arrangement between the Central Pacific, SP, Union Pacific, C&NW and Rock Island.

   The jig for the trestles has been made so I will probably start putting the bents together next. More later after the paint arrives and/or the bents get built.