Does anyone know whether the SP ever had any heavyweight coaches in the Daylight livery - like the Spectrum heavyweights?
I have got a few, and although inferior to Blueprint or Walthers heavyweights, they are the only quality heavyweights offered in the Daylight livery - is this because of the fact that the SP never had any Heavyweights in Daylight livery and Spectrum are using some ‘modellers licence’, or did the SP run these style coaches in this livery?
Like many other people on this forum, if the SP never had heavyweights in daylight livery - I’m still gonna keep them, seeing as they look pretty good behind a light mountain!
Will have to do some looking about heavyweight coaches in DAYLIGHT colors but do know they operated several heavyweight head end cars dining and lounge cars all repainted for service in Daylight trains. If I get a chance today will look at my SP coach books and see about the heavyweight coaches painted Daylight colors.
In the Pentrex DVD “Southern Pacific Classic Collectors’ Series” there is footage of SP Daylight painted heavyweights running with a unskirted black GS-5. I guess they exist.
There were some, but for the most part, the heavyweights were painted in the SP two-tone gray, and used in Sacramento/Oakland service on the “Senator” trains. The San Joaquin Daylight had heavyweight head-end cars painted in Daylight colors, and they showed up occasionally on the Morning and Noon Daylights in later years. I remember some Daylight colored Heavyweight Harriman coaches that were used on the Sacramento section of the San Joaquin, but I don’t know if they transferred through, or the passengers changed coaches at Lathrop Junction, south of Stockton, where the two trains met. I remember coming home from Basic Training in Texas in the early 'sixties, and taking the San Joaquin from LA to Lathrop, but our coaches were cut off for Sacramento without disembarking. In the steam era, the Sacramento section was pulled by specially painted Atlantic 4-4-2’s to match the Daylight scheme of the coaches.
Tom
The Sact Daylight had a Harriman combine (like the Roundhouse car) that ran Sacto to Lathrop and return but the main part of the train was through cars that cut off of #51 and in the PM were added to #52. The San Joaquin Daylight typicaly ran w/ hvywt bagg and bagg/RPO(w/30’ RPO sect)until post WWII when the Harriman 70" bagg/RPO was traded for a 80’ clerestory roofed RPO in Daylight. The AHM/Rivarrosi PRR RPO is an almost dead-on model if you swap out the low arched roof for a clerestory. The San Joaquin Daylight also had a regularly assigned “Hamburger Grill” car that was clerestoried roof car in Daylight paint. The Noon Daylight had a regularly assigned 60’ baggage car in Daylight paint (again roundhouse Harriman bag is a good, but not perfect match). I don’t know if the car stayed when that equipment was moved to the Starlight. About the time the San Joaquin Daylight got the full 80’RPO the Harriman bagg was traded for a 80’ clerestory 3 door baggage car that sometimes appeared in 2 tone grey. By that time the GS-4 or 5 was black & de-skirted.
One other thing. The Cotton Belt (SP subsidiary) had some Osgood=Bradley “American Flyer” coaches painted in Dalight that wound up on parent SP, but, A, they were a very distinctive car and nothing like the Spectrum and B, I believe that by the time they went to SP they were painted silver w/ the red letterboard.
SP also had several heavyweight coaches painted in the daylight scheme as crew cars to acompony the daylight-painted wreaking crane that was based out of Roseville. These cars were actively used untill the 9/11/96 takeover by UP.