hi group. any Soo fans know about when the Soo started painting thier ex-Miw. MP15’s Candy Apple Red? thanks, michael r.
Mike,
Only 2 MP15AC locomotive got repainted in the ‘Candy Apple Red’ paint scheme - 1532 & 1534. I think they were repainted around 1991. Athearn has released these two numbers a while back.
The MILW was merged into the SOO back in 1986. Repainting was not a high priority, and the then current paint scheme was the standard SOO Red/White paint scheme. I have seen photos of the 1515 and 1518 in the Red/White paint scheme as early as 1987. However, most of the engines were patch painted in the ‘Bandit’ scheme and renumbered. Of the 64 units, 32 were sold off to UP when the lease expired.
The ‘Candy Apple Red’ scheme started in 1989, and was used up until the actual CP ‘Dual Flag’ paint scheme. Here is a link that lists all of the ‘Candy Apple Red’ engines:
http://www.trainweb.org/galt-stn/cproster/soo-red.htm
Jim
Looking at rrpicturearchives, SOO 1532 was first photographed on 7/1/1991. By that time it was in the candy apple red paint scheme. SOO 1534 was first photographed in 1985, and it was also in the candy apple red paint scheme at that time.
Edit: The 1985 date is incorrect, please see posts below.
Kyle,
That 1985 date is bogus - The ‘Candy Apple Red’ painting did not even start until 1989, and the ‘merger’ did not take place until 1-1-1986. I suspect a ‘typo’…
Jim
I apologize for any confusion that may have resulted from my post regarding the wrong date. I have noticed before that some people who post photos on rrpicturearchives sometimes get the date wrong, I assume because of how long ago the photos were taken, though I am happy that they post the photos. I don’t know that much about the SOO line, but figured I could help the OP by using a source I know (rrpicturearchives). Thank you for correcting the mistake, and teaching me a bit more about the SOO line.
Kyle - NP, I saw that same picture on RR Picture Archive and it set red flags off, as I knew that the SOO did not formally merge the MILW into their system until 1986, and they were still re-painting Red/White engines at the time.
Jim
The Soo Line bought the Milwaukee Road in Feb. 1985, but it wasn’t merged into the Soo until Jan. 1986. I believe somewhere I still have some company newsletters from 1985 (one of the guys that worked at the old Hub Hobby Shop was a Soo engineer and brought extras in) that in the heading say “The Soo / Milwaukee System” or something like that, with both RR’s heralds.