http://www.athearn.com/Newsletter/011508/Gen_MT4_011508.jpg
News to me, everyone/anyone know about this?
I posted about it a couple of weeks ago - it’s DCC & sound ready!! (Not sound installed)
Don–
Yes, the Southern Pacific MT-4 is scheduled to be released as a companion locomotive to the Genesis 1937 SP “Coast Daylight” passenger cars. Though the MT-4’s were only generally used as helper locos on the Coast Daylight between San Luis Obispo and Santa Margarita on the 2.2% Cuesta Grade, they were used as mainline power on the San Joaquin Daylight over the Tehachapi Grade when the original 1937 Daylight cars were assigned to that train after WWII. Mainline power on the Coast Daylight was originally the SP GS-2 Lima-built 4-8-4’s (later the more famous GS-4’s).
The majority of SP’s MT series 4-8-2’s were home-built at the Sacramento shops, and were very versatile dual-service Mountains. The only ‘off road’ MT’s were the MT-2’s, which were built for the El Paso and Southwestern and originally ran from Tucson to Tucumcari on SP’s “Golden State” line. They were the only MT’s to use the ‘bundle’ Elesco FWH system instead of the side-mounted Worthington FWH systems. The MT’s were used pretty much system wide as both freight and passenger locos on the SP system and were highly thought of by the railroad. Unfortunately, none were preserved.
The pre-production phots I’ve seen of the MT-4 looks very good. It’ll be interesting to see how the production model turns out. The Genesis model shows it without the ‘Skyline’ casing that covered the stack and the domes applied during WWII and after, and gave it more of a GS appearance. I have several brass MT’s, a 3, 4, and 5. Both the 4 and the 5 have skyline casings, the 3 is as it was produced without the casing. Either way, the MT is a very handsome locomotive. I sincerely hope that the Genesis runs and pulls as well as it looks–those locos were both fast and powerful.
Right now, my only carp–and it’s a
[i]Right now, my only carp–and it’s a minor one–is that the tender looks wrong, the MT-4’s I remember–and the brass model I have-- had an SP-1 SEMI-vanderbuilt tender, similar to the ones that trailed the AC 4,5, and 6 Cab-Forward 4-8-8-2’s, and not the full one that is shown trailing the loco. However, SP was famous for switching tenders at whim, and it’s entirely possible that the original MT’s had the 6-wheel Vandy that’s shown in the photo. So it could be prototypically correct for the loco as shown. It’s very possible that the MT-4 came out of the shops with the tender shown in the photo.
Tom [/i]
Tom, the SP Mt’s used a number of different tenders throughout their lives including 12,000 gallon tenders of class 120C-3, 120C-4, 120C-5 and 120C-8. The tender on the Athearn website looks like a 120C-3 to me.
Oh, yeah. The Mt-4’s (at least the first ones) did come out of the Sacramento shops with 120C-3 tenders.
Andre