I bought a BLI NH I-5 because it’s a beautiful engine but haven’t had anything to put behind it. Now Rapido has announced their New Haven cars in several variations and I’m not sure which one would be correct for the short life span of the I-5. I would appreciate help on this. In addition, how many cars would there be in a typical consist? Thanks, Werner
Ah, one of my favorite subjects…
The Rapido coaches are the Osgood-Bradley “long distance” 10-window lightweight coaches (aka “American Flyers”) that are actually older than the I-5’s. These were flush riveted, and weighed only 60 tons (vs. 85 tons for a heavyweight coach). Designed in conjunction with the New Haven RR, the cars were slightly tubular in cross section, and were delivered with full skirting. This skirting was first removed over the trucks on one coach when the NH experimented with 41-BNO outside swing hanger trucks. After the truck experiment, they found that they liked the open access to the trucks, and they started making the skirt cut-outs a standard item (probably during WWII). After the scrapping of the I-5’s in the early 1950’s, the coaches had their entire skirt removed.
It was pretty rare to see mixed cars in photos, as in you wouldn’t find cars with full skirts with cars that have truck cut-outs too often. And of course you’d never see full skirts with no-skirts.
So of the Rapido cars, the Hunter full skirt, Hunter partial skirt, and Pullman partial skirt would all be appropriate for being hauled behind an I-5. The last two would not (especially McGinnis).
Osgood-Bradleys have also been made by E&B Valley and now Eastern Car Works as flat kits. NJ/Custom Brass offered these as brass models in the 1970’s, both as the 10-window and as the Grill cars (of which the NH had 5 of them, designed for light snacking…the AmCafe of it’s day).
For other car types, the NH’s stainless steel fleet did get hauled by the I-5’s between 1948 and 1950-ish. These stainless steel cars were painted with the green window band and roof with black trucks. The diners were not ready at first, so a heavyweight diner would be used instead (and painted to match, BTW). The cars have been produced in br
Hi Werner,
The Rapido Bradley coaches would be a good choice for a basic 1930-40’s Shoreline train. Either HUNTER green variation (Skirts/Partial Skirts) would be basically correct. The paint scheme of your I-5 would come into consideration here along with your era of choice - the earlier the I-5 and closer to 1937 the more coaches would have a full skirt. Basically though, Hunter Green is the color you want - full skirts were on from delivery for a few years depending on the service the car recieved…later in the 1940’s they started leaving the portion over the trucks off for ease of maintenance.
For a number…that depends on the train but for these a HW baggage car and 6 to 10 coaches would make a decent train.
Thanks much, Paul and David. I took a look at my engine again and it is #1402. The box says it is the small script, Shoreline version. What drew me to this particular one was the lettering on the cylinders. Going back to the BLI website it would appear that this scheme followed the as delivered paint job, so woiuld I be right in thinking that it would be early 40’s? I seem to remember that when Rapido first announced the Osgood Bradley cars they said that they would be the first of several car types and I hope that they will eventually come out with the grill cars. I’ll definitely look into the Athearn baggage. I don’t mind taking an Xacto knife to a car I can get used for 3 bucks but I don’t think that I’d ever have the guts to do it to something costing $75. Thanks again for the course in NH passenger equipment. Werner
The other express runs would have been trains like the “42nd Street Express”, the “Gilt Edge”, and the “Senator” (using PRR equipment…so there’s another option). I don’t have a NH timetable in front of me, but there were many other trains that they ran that might have got I-5 service.
For example in the 1942 NH consist book, train No.13 —42nd St. Express showed 16 cars:
1 baggage
2 parlor
1 diner
2 coaches
1 smoker
9 coaches
1 parlor
Many trains had 2 baggage and an rpo as well.
The coaches would have been all Osgood-Bradley/ The parlors and diner all HW.
I believe the NHRHTA still has kits for the bagagge and rpo cars available.