Hi all – I am putting together an Amtrak “rainbow era” passenger train and looking for power – and with our club’s grades, I’ll need lots. I found some Proto 2000 E8s in a hobby shop with this paint scheme:
Would this paint scheme have survived into the Amtrak era and appeared on Amtrak trains?
Thanks
Aaron
I don’t have the exact date in front of me but it was around 1963, B&O simplified the E unit paint to basic blue, then blue with yellow pilots, adding the “sunburst” to the nose on some units shortly after that. Finally a blue and gray scheme.
Scroll down at this site for some Amtrak Patched B&O E8 and E9s.
http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?120803-Early-Amtrak-Stuff
Over the years the port-hole windows slowly disappeared, too! Perhaps ACY Tom will reply with more specific details. He is very knowledgable on B&O history.
Have Fun,
Ed
Great shots – thank you, Ed! The same shop had some undecs. Learnign to paint is still on my to-do list, but Plan B was PC – those patch jobs might work for an all-black locomotive with Amtrak markings. Time to start searching the photo archives. Thank you!
Like Ed said, the Blue/Grey/Black/Gold did not even make it out of the 60’s let alone last until AMTRAK.
In 1965 the C&O took control of the B&O and all the paint schemes started moving toward two goals - simple and unified around the C&O Blue/Yellow or Blue/Yellow/Silver(grey) themes.
By the time AMTRAK came along, most B&O passenger cars and locos looked like C&O schemes with B&O heralds…
1964 - http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/bo/bo1444r.jpg
1969 - http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/bo/bo1446gea.jpg
1970 - http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/bo/bo1452ads.jpg
These two schemes co-existed until AMTRAK.
Sheldon
Thanks for the vote of confidence, Ed. When Amtrak was brand new, I remember seeing lots of different schemes. I lived in Chicago at the time, so I was able to see them going in and out of Union Station. Most E units were E8 or E9’s in the very early years, but there were a few GM&O E7’s working through between St. Louis and Milwaukee. There seemed to be a lot of UP and PC units running around on various trains in those years, largely because those roads had such large fleets to draw on.
The photos posted by Ed and Sheldon are pretty good representatives. I seriously doubt that there were any E units left in the classic B&O blue, black, and gray scheme with imitation gold lettering and striping in the early Amtrak days, although there could have been a very few freight F7’s running around in that scheme. If so, they would have been heavily weathered, with patch paint jobs. The last consistent B&O passenger scheme was the mid-1960’s C&O Enchantment Blue with the C&O inspired gray stripe on the lower carbody, yellow “B&O” on the sides, large Capitol Dome emblem on the nose, and a yellow pilot. It appears that some units never got the gray stripe. Around the late 1960’s, the scheme was further simplified: yellow pilots seemed to be repainted black or blue, and the gray stripes began to disappear, but I’m pretty sure some still had them at the beginning of Amtrak.
As always, dated photos are your friend.
Hope this helps.
Tom
Here’s one for you, Aaron
A former C&O E8, painted in B&O hauling a C&O train! Note the door headlight and scrunched B&O Capitol dome on the door!
http://www.railpictures.net/photo/63794/
I have heard B&O modelers mention that there were no two E8s or E9 painted the same. I have even seen a few B&O E6s painted in the “blue-dip” paint scheme.
There was all sorts of variety in the yellow striping, or the size of the nose herald, some were cast aluminum, older ones brass/bronze.
But, if you are looking for E8s to haul early Amtrak trains you probably have carte-blanche as far as paint scheme choices.
No reason to start with the B&Os. I like your idea of doing the painting yourself or getting a late '60s or early 1070s E unit and painting it for Amtrak yourself.
As Tom mentioned, in the early days you could see just about anything. It was called Amtrak’s Rainbow era. Sometimes cars and locomotives still retained their original paint even after Amtrak was five years old.
In the earlier link, you see the GG1 still in PRR buff stripes but numbered for Amtrak ownership.
I have a photo of an NYC E8 with the “lightning stripe” paint bleeding through and a painted out “Cigar Band” NYC herald on the nose door, painted out Penn-Central on the sides with an Amtrak vinyl sticker over that! So no matter what you choose, there’s probably an excuse to say it really existed.
Almost like this… only worse!
http://www.railpictures.net/photo/107495/
As Tom mentions, find a photo that ap
B&O simplified blue grey #204
http://www.railpictures.net/photo/565069/
http://www.locophotos.com/PhotoDetails.php?PhotoID=76476
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/Locopicture.aspx?id=27323
The last one #204 got repainted right after May to be seen in August.
More history can to done. If the diesel was leased to Amtrak then sold like the UP, IC and others.
If it helps at all, I’m pretty sure the Broadway Limited was the first Amtrak train to be converted to all-electric heating. That meant that its equipment was drawn from a very limited, select group of cars and locomotives that were specifically shopped and repainted for the purpose. I don’t remember the date when the upgraded Broadway went into service, but it was the beginning of the end of the Circus era. Maybe somebody else can provide that date. As I mentioned, E8’s and 9’s were the dominant power. A few E7’s were used in the Abraham Lincoln service, and I believe a few F’s were used on the Santa Fe for a while.
Tom
You guys are a wealth of information!! Thank you. At $50 a pop, it was kind of hard to pass on those Es, but if they aren’t right for the train, then they aren’t right for the train. I’m already pushing the envelope on a rainbow train a bit… it’s 15 cars (possibly 16) and very rainbow.
Autonerd, let me tell ‘ya somethin’, it’s YOUR layout. If you want to run those cool-lookin’ B&O diesels (and they ARE cool-lookin’, probably one of the best diesel schemes ever) on the head end of an Amtrak consist you go right ahead!
Call it a “B&O Museum / Amtrak Excursion.” Or something.
Hah!!! Actually, it’s the club layout (www.pmrrc.org), and one of the reasons I chose to model this train is because it will drive a couple of the rivet-counters bonkers. The other is because I wanted to see if I could build a plausible passenger train for less than $20/car. For my own sanity, I do want to keep the power somewhat close to realistic.
BUT – I love (and appreciate!) your attitude.
I laid out the cars and took a video, but I don’t have a YouTube channel, so I’ve no way to post it here. Right now, the train looks like this:
Autonerd, thanks for the vote of confidence. Hey, in the O gauge world we do pretty much whatever we please, you should slide over to the “Classic Toy Trains” site and Forum for a look. We never forget this is about fun and not an excuse to give ourselves more “agita” than life throws at us to begin with.
PS: Sometimes it’s fun to tweak the rivet counters just to hear them scream.
