Weathering and Vanderbilts

 

WEATHERING LOCOMOTIVES

Look at this beauty!   

In 1952 the war-baby Berks are the pride of a well-maintained steam fleet,

but still get good 'n dirty between shoppings, from a lot of hard work.  

If you've ever operated on the SNR, you know there's a satin sheen that envelopes the motive power here, making the entire fleet look like it just got delivered.  And you probably also know that it's because when it comes to weathering locomotives, I am complete chicken-$#!+.  Diesels have been in SNR paint for 10+ years, and steam for twice that, yet the only engines I've ever weathered are the scrappers.  (Well OK, plus the Barrett County's Heisler.)  So how did this workaday look suddenly come about?

In December I was having a conversation with my friend John Pyles, who mostly goes by "Maynard" (long story), and the subject of weathering engines came up.  Several key facts emerged from the ensuing discussion around my self-acknowledged chicken-$#!++iness , most notably that Maynard:

a). does not despise airbrushing, unlike the other party to the discussion, 

b). loves to weather engines, 
c). has done so professionally, 
d). is currently retired, and, 
e). is currently out of engines to weather.   

Like a razor-thin shaft of sunlight illuminating a Druid vault on the Solstice, my world suddenly lit up.

                       👉"Need a retirement job?" 😍

I was actually kidding, but Maynard was insistent that he'd love to take on the SNR's roster.  And that he was affordable.  

I was feeling guilty about the idea, but 20 or so years ago I overcame similar guilt and let my friend Bob Kress (Kentucky Central) weather the first 250 or so freight cars for me.  OK, "let" is probably a bit too Tom Sawyer, but Bob did also enjoy weathering, and was happy to get the freight fleet going for me, as his retirement job.  So why not get over the same hump with locomotives?  

Even though S-4 #175 is only 3 years old, being a sooty Alco product, 

she's already acquired a light coating of grime.  Most importantly, the satin sheen is gone!

So yes, that project is underway.  The work is beautiful, everything still runs (always my greatest fear), and most importantly, I don't have to do it.  

Presented above are the first two subjects.  There's a transit box with 5 more recent graduates in it waiting to come home, and an equal number of candidates ready to be delivered to Maynard.  At this rate, he'll be available again within a few months (😉), if you're in a similar boat.  

I'll show you the progress -- watch this space.

VANDERBILT TENDERS

Speaking of hardworking steam locomotives, it is widely acknowledged, by people who are me -- and possibly by others -- that the three coolest and most aesthetically pleasing design phenomena in the entire history of our constructed environment are:

1. Tailfinned automobiles;         2. Art Deco anything; and                 3. Vanderbilt tenders. 

I mean really -- who wants to drag a shoebox behind their engine when they could have such a beautiful, geometrically-compound expression of form following function?  It has been a tenet since the beginning of the SNR that one of its signature "looks" would be a corporate preference for Vanderbilt tenders across most of the fleet, kinda like the B&O.  But all of the steam suitable for the SNR came with bricks.  So they'd have to be converted.

I started off with the Heritage Berkshires, as seen above.  Yes they're Kanawhas, in deference to the C&O, but many years ago my friend Darren Williamson (IHB) swapped out their giant VanSweringen cisterns for these really attractive long-distance Vandies made by Spectrum.  (And now they're weathered!)

Problem was, there just aren't many other examples out there that were offered as tenders only.  MDC made a well-proportioned one years ago, but they're really short.  Those will go well on the Consolidations, for local work -- but what about Mikes and other mid-range engines?  Spectrum also had an offering in the medium-distance size, but they have one problem:  they're fugly.  

Check it out -- everything's looking pretty good, except... whoa, the coal box is taller than the cab!  Huh?  It sticks up above the tank like Dr. Who's phone booth.  And on this first one we tried, with a BLI Mike, it keyed up with the cab overhang on a curve, and derailed the tender!

Crunch!  And that's with a lengthened drawbar, too.  

No engine small enough to run this tender could possibly be tall enough for its gooney coal bunker!

And I could hardly find any prototype shots of tenders that looked anything like this, either.  The vast majority have the coal box rising just slightly above the tank, like you'd expect.  Maybe with some extended sideboards here and there, but nothing like this.  I can't imagine what led Spectrum to create a universal model in the form of the ugliest and least-seen adaptation...?  Oddly enough, in the oil version, the oil bunker fits perfectly with the tank.  Only the coal version looks like a Sasquatch on a horse.

Anyway, I stewed for quite some time over what to do.  I had bought several NIB models, and really wanted to use them, but I just couldn't stomach the dorkiness -- it destroyed the aesthetic I was after in the first place.  And the thought of sectioning those coal bunkers and getting them glued back together smoothly just filled me with agita.  

Ultimately it occurred to me that since both oil and coal versions were offered, the bunker had to be removable -- and a few weeks ago I finally dragged one out and sat down to find a way.  Sure enough, with enough disassembly, I could get the bunker separated from the tank, and could then slice off 5/32" from all the bottom edges.  Thankfully there were no rivet lines on the bunker sides.  Then with a bit of extra trimming and fussing, I was able get it all back together squarely and screwed down tight, and without compromising the speaker.  

Like James Dean's '49 Merc, the chopped-and-channeled version 

just looks undeniably cooler than the dowdy, old man's conveyance it started from.   

Whew!  So I'm working through converting the rest of the inventory while I can still remember how I did it.  The first one took two years, and the second one took an hour.  (Two, if you count reworking the ccrappy coupler box.)  We'll be swapping them in for the USRA coffins on the Mikes, 2-10-2s, and Pacifics over time.  Then we'll take a look at fitting decoders and sound into those MDCs...

Thanks as always for reading, and let me know what you think!