For all you members with your own railroads what scheme do you use to number your engines and rolling stock ?
I came up with a system years ago for numbering engines for my “St.Paul Route” that works OK…if I did it over again I might do it differently, but it works OK.
For steam engines, it’s loosely based on the Missabe Road. 400’s are passenger engines, 300’s are freight engines, 200’s are Mallets, 100’s are early (pre-1900) and miscellaneous engines, and two digit numbers go to switchers.
Diesels use numbers from 500s to 900s. The first digit indicates the builder…for example 900’s are EMD engines, 600’s are Baldwins etc.
In both steam and diesel, the last two digits indicate when (approximately) the railroad bought the engine, so a GP-7 might be no. 950 while an SD-40-2 might be no. 972. Some real railroads - in my area, the Minneapolis and St.Louis - actually did something similar.
There are a few exceptions. I decorated an A-B set of FT’s for EMD demonstrator FT 103, and another set of bodies for my railroad. Since I wanted to use the same powered chassis for both sets of bodies (I rotate eras, so FT 109 would be around only in 1940, my RR’s FT’s would be in subsequent periods) I made my FT set no. 103 also, and a later A-B set of FT’s became no. 102.
Plus if I get a deal on a pre-dec steam engine with the number on the tender and the RR name on the cab, I’m OK with just replacing the RR initials with “St.P.D.& C.Ry.” on the cab and using the tender no. as is, or if I can get a replacement tender shell using the no. on the cab and just replacing the tender with a shell lettered for the St.Paul Route.
My HO Winneshiek & Western RR is a “could-have-been” standard gauge short-line hauling timber and coal out of the mountains of SW Virginia to a connection with the newly completed Clinchfield in the WWI era. I had a mental picture of the railroad acquiring locomotives, and tried to put at least some of them into a chronological sequence.
Thus, #1 is a Class A Climax. When the line had success with that locomotive, they went back to Climax and so #2 and #3 are Class B Climax locomotives.
I have always liked the lines of the small steamers of the Maryland and Pennsylvania, so locomotives from that prototype have kept their “orginal” Ma & Pa numbers while the tenders are lettered for the Winneshiek & Western, using custom decals. This would apply to #s 4, 5, 6, 24, 27, 29.
The WWRR has been known to lease locomotives from other railroads for testing purposes, in which cases the original number of the engine is retained while the tender is re-lettered. The Little River Railroad 2-4-4-2 is being leased, and has retained #126.
Other locomotives, both geared and rod styles, are pieced into this framework. There is no #13, as many early railroads would not have such an “unlucky” locomotive. The three locomotives for the connecting Clinchfield are numbered the same a prototype locomotives of that wheel arrangement.
My passenger equipment is limited as this is a rather backwoods line. The Baggage/Mail car and the coach are built from Maryland & Pennsylvania prototypes, so the numbers 35 and 16 are used, with details appropriate to those specific Ma & Pa cars. My passenger train pulled by #6 thus looks very much like a Ma & Pa passenger train except for the lettering.
For freight equipment, I just selected round figures for the different types of freight cars. 100 s
I use the simple 2 or 3 digit numbering system…Since all of my freelance railroads been short lines I decided to use 3 digit numbers.
Examples:
C&HV(N Scale)
GP7 100-109.
GP9 200-209.
I choose these numbers because the GP7 was the first on the roster and then then GP9s.
C&HV(HO)
SW1000 100-102
SW1500 150-155.
GP38-2 380-389
GP40-2 400-405
GP50 500-501
In this case I use the model number as the first 2 digits.
In my HO-Scale days circa 1978-82 my era-of-interest centered on the “transition era”–the mid-50s–and my motive power fleet was very steam locomotive intensive. As I have said in other postings I had over the course of the previous ten years built up a fleet of die-cast steam locomotives–mainly Cary/Mantuas with a few non-PRR specific Bowsers; I had only a few diesels representing first-generation units mainly those offered by Hobbytown of Boston. I had a pretty good idea of how I wanted my motive power fleet to look and, figuring I would acquire new (model) units in the years ahead I set out to create a viable numbering system. To really be viable in this regard I had to go all the way back to the year 1907 when the Seaboard and Western Virginia Railroad had merged six other lines all of which had, of course, their own numbering systems. This had, of course, created a hodge-podge of locomotive types and, to sort things out, the new Seaboard and Western Virginia Railroad had sorted things out with the creation of a new numbering system.
I was, at the time, working as a computer operator working the graveyard shift while using my GI-Bill education benefits to attain a BA degree. Admittedly I should have been studying but instead I assuaged my boredom while working up a locomotive roster complete with classes, subclasses, and wheel arrangements. The railroad had gone through two renumbering systems most recently in 1947 which became the basis for numbering my existing steam locomotive roster. As an example–and that is all this is, an example–under the 1947 numbering Mikados carried numbers between 1300 and 1499. I don’t remember the intricacies of my system but I do remember that certain features distinguished class D6a Mikados from D6b Mikados and that allocated certain numbers to these classes and I, therefore, knew what numbers to decal onto the engine an
I’m still haven’t arrived at the final solution for the Picture Gorge & Western (standard gauge, 1900) and the Port Orford & Elk River (narrow gauge, 1900) in coastal Oregon. But my ideas are similar to Bill’s. My current plan:
First sort and group of buckets is by year of prototype manufacture (or purchase for used locomotives). 1870s will have 1-5, 1880s 6-10, 1890-1895 11-15, and 1895-1900 16-20. This keeps my numbering chronologically coherent and provides numbering space when at a later date I replace or add a locomotive whose prototype was built at an earlier date than the largest existing locomotive number. For example, my General model will wear #1, and be a passenger loco. The freight 2-8-0 (Baldwin late 1880s) will have #6 or even #7 or #8. Then when I add the BTS 4-4-0 model down the road it can become #1 thorugh #5, depending on whether or not I keep the General model. The geared lokies will be in the #11-#20 range, along with any other more modern locomotives.
For narrow gauge, the buckets will likely be smaller - perhaps 3 numbers per decade.
Fred W
Easy. Any way I want.
I just extended the numbering scheme my prototype railroad (The CMStP&O, also known as CMO or the Omaha Road) used for diesel switchers.
When the CMO was merged into the C&NW in 1957, they had a mix of diesel switchers numbered in 50-series of road numbers. #55 was an EMD SW-1, #56-57 were Alco S1s, #58, 59 and 60 were Baldwin VO-660s.
I wanted to run a pair of of GE switchers (a 44-tonner and a 70-tonner), even though the Omaha Road didn’t have those engines, so I just picked two available numbers in the same series and numbered them #51 and #53.
I also a have an Alco S1 I want to paint and letter for the Minneapolis and Saint Louis (MST&L). They at one time had a numbering scheme where engines got numbers according to the order they were purchased in. They didn’t have any S1s, but they had an S2 numbered No 741 - the 7th engine purchased in 1941.
So I just postulated that they also bought an S1 in 1942, and numbered it 142 (first engine bought in 1942).
The rest of the engines I own (one each from CNW, GN, NP, MILW) are of engine types those companies ran, so I just picked historical road numbers appropriate for the company and type of engine, courtesy of http://www.thedieselshop.us and http://utahrails.net/cnw/cnw-index.php
But there are many ways of doing this - I like the orginality of Wolfgang Dudler’s scheme, where all numbers are powers of 2, and the engines are named for famous physicists.
Most common for a bigger railroad is probably some kind of class series of road numbers, though - each engine gets a three or four digit road number, where each type of engine gets a number in a series of maybe 100 numbers (e.g 500-series from 500-599, 600-series from 600-699,and so on and so forth).
Wow, such a simple question with very hard answers.
After serveral years our club finally came up with a scheme where we took all the number sets from 100-9900. We guessed how many of each class of loco we would possibly have and then assigned blocks of numbers to classes of locomotives. The assigned blocks were as small as 10. I believe we ended up with about 40 classifications. We allowed some locomotives to be grandfathered as they were already painted and we pretended they had not yet been subject to the 1952 “renumbering plan”.
Ones numbering scheme is going to very greatly depending on what type of a railroad they are modling. A lumber company, industrial, or small short line could very easily get by with sequential numbers. First locomotive purchased is #1 etc. The Virgina & Truckee is a good example of this. It is only when one is trying to simulate the feeling of fleets for large class 1 railroads where it gets tricky. One of our club “jokes” was that we assigned 16xx to the Alco RS3 class because this was the horse power rating and we could call them the “sweet 16s” They all carry female names. The first three easily come to mind as they are Billy Jo #1601, Betty Jo #1602, and Bobby Jo #1603.
One of the discussions we had while coming up with the rolling stock number assignments was the “size” of our railroad. One faction thought we were modling a small struggling class 1 so box cars should only have 5 digits, the other faction thought we were modeling a large transcon class 1 in competiton with the UP & AT&SF so the box cars had to have 6 digit numbers. We ended up with “fancy” paint schemes of 5 digits and plain paint
My engines have a scheme of their own:
WT 2 named for Otto Stern
WT 4 named for Joseph Henry
WT 8 Albert Abraham Michelson
WT 16 Alexander Graham Bell
WT 32 James Van Allen
WT 64 Willis Eugene Lamb
WT 128 Thomas Alva Edison
WT 256 Benjamin Franklin
WT 512 Robert Andrews Millikan
WT 1024 Arthur Holly Compton
WT 2048 Henry Augustus Rowland
But the next engine WT 4709 will get the name Alina.
Our grand daughter Alina, born on April 7. [:)]
Wolfgang
Easy lowest numbers for the oldest engines highest for the newest. Seperation is determined by the “fleet quantities” of each engine type. For example if your road has “purchased” an order of 20 GP9 they would be numbered sequentially, If you only model 2 of them choose 2 numbers widely seperated in the range but not neccesarily the end numbers. Also if your road has “history” predating the modeled period allow for the “fact” there would have been engines purchased that are no longer around. How many digits to use? depends on the “Size” of your road and "fleet. Remember it’s YOUR railroad, you have the final say. Enjoy it.
Brian
the first engine you should always number your lucky # after that # your trains by 100s-frieght, 200s-passenger, 300s-others
I model the PRR as close to prototype as I am capable including engine numbers but I also model the fictitious Allegheny RailRoad so I can model non-PRR engines. In the case of the ARR I use the diesel model #r for the first two digits and then assign two more digits to differentitiate. Example1:
GP35 All engines numbered 35XX between 3500 and 3599. I chose 3512 and 3516 to indicate the railroad had several.
Example 2:
U25B and U25C. All engine start with 25 but here I need two classes so the U25B engines are from 2500 to 2550 and the U25C enginess are 2551 to 2500.
Steam engines I assign a prototypical number. the GS04 just happens to be 4449
Actually after my prior long post, I should add that I can have fun being as whimsical as the next person. On my freelance short-line industrial railroad, The Pikes Peak, Fossil Creek & Tesla, all of the locomotive numbers are prime.
Although I don’t think I’d want to do five-digit numbers, I’ve always kinda liked the way the British do it where the first two numbers are the “class” or type of engine, then the last three are the specific engine’s number. So if adapting that to USA usage, an SD-60 in British style numbering might be no. 60123 or 60032. Nice for ‘trainspotting’ since the first two numbers tell you what the engine is.
We use a variant of that system over here in Norway too.
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4 digit numbers (first digit is type code) on diesel locomotives.
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5 digit numbers (first two are class code, third is type car) on electric or diesel motor unit train sets,
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6-digit numbers (first two are class code) for electric locomotives
For the motor units, the 69 and 70-73 series are EMUs, the 90-91 series are DMUs
So:
- 72-003, 72-803, 72-703 and 72-103 is a 4 car electric motor unit train set (train set no 3 of that class)
- 92-01, 92-51 is a two car diesel motor unit train set (train set no 1 of that class)
- 4.651 is a class Di 4 diesel locomotive (but the class does not have anywhere near 651 engines …)
- 17.2221 is a class El 17 engine locomotive (and this class doesn’t have 2221 engines either)
I won’t get into the numbering of freight and passenger cars - there are a few quirks there too 
Grin,
Stein
Stix - you don’t like five digits? How about seven? (as in D511063, DD13702?) Of course, the alpha characters and the first two numerals are the class, but there really were JNR classes with over 1000 locos in them. All but a few went over 100.
Single-alpha indicates a steam loco - B, C, D, E indicating 2, 3, 4, or 5 driving axles. Prefix D for diesel, E for electric. I won’t go into the significance of the class numerics - which aren’
I will just number my engines 1 to X and same with road freight cars. Non road freight cars will be run as numbered.
I have numbered all of my locomotives using the date they were first operated on my layout.
The earliest is numbered 947. It was put into service in September, 1947. It is an HO Varney F-3. It still runs well, with a little help from a Bowser update around 1965.
It will still pull the walpaper off of the wall. It is made from cast zimack and weighs a ton!
The detail is not bad considering when it was made.