Today I saw a first. It was a 100 ton Pacific Car and Foundry (PCF) Mechanical Reefer with load restraints or dividers (RPL). I have never seen nor heard of such a thing, until today. It is ARMN 757493, class R-100-2 and looked like a class R-70-20. Does anyone know anything about it? Was it a 70 ton RPL rebuilt with 100 ton capacity or did it start out as a 100 ton RPL?
The load restraints are there to keep the prisoners inside from escaping!
The only two I have been able to find anything on so far are the ARMN 757402 and ARMN 757493. Maybe they are uprgrading some 70 ton RPLs to 100 ton RPLs.
Given UP’s practice for renumbering those cars, they’re formerly UPFE 457000-series cars with the same last three digits. Upgrading them to 100-ton capacity is merely a matter of changing the trucks, and possibly someother components.
That means that they are ex-SPFE cars, according to Pacific Fruit Express, 2nd Edition. Thinks for all your help with my questions about reefers.
I have a pic of ARMN 766147. Is it also one of the upgraded cars?
Eric, I may have steered you wrong about those 100-ton cars. I don’t think any SPFE cars were relettered UPFE and not renumbered.
The cars I looked at yesterday in the 760000 series were all 70-ton cars; I’m now wondering whether your 750000s are sequentially renumbered from the 460000s-- i.e. ARMN 757402 might be ex-UPFE 467402. I will try and dig the prior identities out, though it may take a while.
Meantime, I found two things a little troublesome about the R-100-2 stenciling on the car: Looking at ARMN 757402, I find that the load limit and light weight still add up to 220000 pounds–that’s the gross rail load of a 70-ton car. Also, class R-100-2 is already assigned to some FGE-built “Chilled Express” reefers in the ARMN 931000, 932000, and 933000 series. I wonder if that classification was stencilled in error.
That is a 70 ton reefer. It is a rebuilt R-70-16. It has had some work done on it (I do not know the extent). Some some of the ARMN 766000 series cars are incorrectly stenciled R-70-20 though.
Just got the word back this morning–ARMN 757402 and 757493 are in fact formerly SPFE 457402 and 457493, respectively.
I have not seen either one of these since 02/17/05. Has anyone seen these or other ARMN 750000 series cars?