I have found in this hobby, one thing seems to lead to another! Over the Christmas holiday I came across a set of Athern Chessie hoppers in my LHS that I “just had to have” Sticking to one roadname is not working so far…though I’ve stuck with the eastcoast/appalachia coal hauling theme…PRR (Sorry purists) , B&O, now a bit of B&O Chessie. My dad was at a train show recently and picked up a handful of B&O/Chessie cabooses that needed a little TLC. One of them is a bay window B&O CS. The others are your run of the mill ATSF style units…geez, the manufacturers pick a design and stick with it huh? I have no idea who manufactured the bay window, but I am sure it is one of the late 70’s numbers from eastern europe. I changed out the trucks/couplers with some micro-trains (it came with body mounted couplers, so I had to switch out some parts to make them work), put some glazing on the windows and detailed the ladders a bit to take away that chunky plastic look. Finally it received a light weathering just to make it look used. Though it sure won’t win any awards for accuracy, I’ve got myself a decent looking unit now. I was looking on line at the chessie caboose roster pics and didn’t find a paint scheme, or window layout that matched the one I have. Mine is Chessie yellow with a silver roof. It also has the walkways. There is no vermillion stripe, etc… I’ve noticed a few models on E-Bay that are just yellow and silver. I am guessing that this is a cheap alternative to get the “look” of the Chessie caboose. Any ideas? I’m not looking to super detail this thing, but it is good to know as I am learning that caboose modeling is an art in itself. Thanks ----Rob
I believe you may have a CON-COR bay window caboose (or possibly ROCO). It closely resembles the B&O Class I-18. Correct numbering would be C-3000 to C-3045, or 903000-903045. In the beginning days of the Chessie System, there were a few “non-standard versions” of the Chessie colors, especially if painted by a shop not normally painting cabooses.
Source: CABOOSES of the BALTIMORE & OHIO RAILROAD by Robert Hubler.
Rob,Here the best source for Chesie pictures…
http://www.trainweb.org/chessiephotos/
A word or 3 about modeling Chessie…First NONE of the Chessie roads was merged and it was common for it railroad to use its on locomotives until the 1980 formation of CSX.So,one must choose which Chessie road to model and that road should be the dominate locomotive road name choic-C&O,B&O or WM…NOT all locomotives was repainted into Chessie.Watch your numbers.
All 3 Chessie roads freight cars was use freely…
There’s more to learn as well.
Sorry, I couldn’t resist…lol
