Does anyone have photos to share or know where I can find some good close-up color photos showing the sides and ends of the SP caboose (both bay window and standard) to model? (1950-1970). I’m doing HO scale and I have the paint and decals necessary.
I would prefer not having to buy a $50 book with photos if I don’t have to.
Thanks.
JRP
You should buy the books and support the authors/researchers who make these things possible. Otherwise, search your library and the internet.
Mark
If you can find a copy, Southern Pacific Review 1981 by Joseph A. Strapac had a 40-page section titled “S.P. Steel Cabooses, 1937-1981”, with lots of photos of bay-window, cupola, and transfer cabooses. This was published by the Pacific Coast Chapter of the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society. The photos are all black-and-white, but they include good side and end/three-quarter views. My softcover copy had a cover price of $15.95.
– Steve
JRP, I have the same interest. I model in N and there is not much to choose from. I have found a link you may like. It is a bit invloved but you may find some of what you are looking for.
http://home.earthlink.net/~pmcclosky/spwebresources.html
Show us some results when possible.
Consult the prototype when in doubt, I recommend you purchase the necesary publications for your library. Overall, SP steel cabooses changed very little over the decades, bay window design supplement and eventually replaced older models, radio antennas were change and relocated, ditto for tool boxes, marker lights/light packages, windows blanked out. The paint department is where the real changes occured, SP decreed in January 1957 making Daylight Orange mandatory on caboose ends and optional on bay windows, this was done to exhaust existing paint stock that would then be discontinued it also served to improve rear visibilty. But wait, SP also applied white or aluminum paint to several earlier then 1957 in a quest to improve visibilty. Around 1955 the 15’ gothic lettering began to be appled along with radio equipped stencils.