hey all, have a look at this thread over at trains.com its about weird names created after switching hood panel doors in the shop, some examples include CSXX and BMF and B_S_ i was wondering if anyone has modeled this on a loco or has attempted it? i thought i might give it a go, any one have thoughts on this? i think it would be quite an interesting touch to the Mrr
http://www.trains.com/community/forum/topic.asp?page=2&TOPIC_ID=50738
regards OZJIM
That would make a good conversational piece. It could also be used as a fixer up for a model project gone bad. Say you have painted that masterpeice model and mess up one of the decals. Just leave part of it off!
Proof that even real railroads mess up their prized locomotives every now and then.
There is a photo in the book Penn Central Power (I think) with the caption, “On the Penn Central, we soon found out that, If something can go wrong, it will.” The locomotive was coming out of the paint shop.
In 1968 I photographed NH Alco 0956 with “NEV HAAVEN” on the hood.
Also saw PC coaches lettered “NEW PENN CENTRAL ENTRAL”, another classic was “EW PENN HAVE.”
The Rock Island was famous for that sort of thing. You can tell a railroad will be going under when they can’t settle on ONE paint scheme and stick with it, and the Rock seemed to have a new scheme for every diesel order. I’ve seen photos of U25B’s with one base scheme, and doors from engines of three other schemes! And of course, either no spelling at all, or ROCKROCK spelled out on the engine sides.
I do this all the time with scratch-built G-scale rolling stock and locomotives by putting different road names and numbers on each side. As a train goes around the layout, one side may be something like Sorry Gulch and Cripple Creek number 9, and going the other direction might read Sandy Creek number 5. This way, I get double value out of the items.
Many of us in Milwaukee remember a photographer, model railroader and prototype railroad employee named Rod Robinson, who died a few years ago in a motorcycle accident. He was a fixture at train shows selling slide sets, and had a huge Lionel collection.
Rod was employed by the Milwaukee Road, then the Soo Line and finally the CP. He had a great photo of himself standing on a Milwaukee Road engine where the hood doors had been replaced so the engine side said “Milwaukee Rod.”
While I’m telling stories – Rod had a slide set for sale of the C&NW Estabrook Park spur which was next to a bike path. One of his shots showed a CNW geep stopped while a gorgeous woman in very short shorts was nearby on her bicycle. I made some “frank comments” about the woman on the bike, and Rod looked at me saying “That’s my wife by the way.” I was so ashamed I ended up buying the slide set …
Dave Nelson