http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=I am a huge SP fan and I have a 20’ by 8’ layout (HO Scale), and am modeling donner pass in the 80s-late 90s. In my fictional world, SP owns D&RGW and the are merged with (not bought out by) UP. I am interested in operations and try to implement them wherever I can. I am interested in having a snow fighting job in my op sessions. Does anyone make/sell icebreakers to mount on top of the engines? They will probably be Genesis GP-38s. I also need Jordan Spreaders and modern rotaries. Thanks!
The icicle breakers I see at Walthers (not in stock naturally) are made for E and F units or certain cars.
These shouldn’t be too difficult to fab from some brass stock, if you can’t come up with ready-made.
How close is close enough for you in regards to SP rotories? With the exception of scratchbuilding, significient comprimises to any existing model will be required as when converted from steam to electric new carbodies were fabricated that featured a taller/angular unique to SP profile that has never been produced to my knowledge.
You have some choices when it comes to spreaders:
As SP specific spreaders have been produced in brass over the years with E Bay being your’e best venue, be prepared for sticker shock and a bidding war! Or many years ago Roundhouse offered 3 in 1 kits, among them a generic spreader, in reality, with the exception of the center still, aquiring the required materials to complete the kit was strictly up to the builder! But they did included complete illustrations of the finished product which proved suffcient to build several from scratch.
SP had a love/hate affair with ice breakers, upon the advent of open auto carriers, many a winter season passed with them remaining in the retracted position as they had the tendency to knock ice onto the cargo or onto the engine, posing a risk to crews and equiptment, instead SP preferred to send crews out in advance of the spreaders and rotaries with chainsaws, dynamite, Detcord and .22 caliber rifles to deal with offending shed/tunnel ice build up!
Best of luck
Dave
This is the Roundhouse 3-1 rotary snow blower I built a few weeks ago. I got the kit on Ebay as it is out of production. There is a lot of scratch building on this kit, which isn’t well publicized in their literature, but a very enjoyable project.
-Bob
Modern rotaries are custom conversions of older steam equipment done by the railroads, so there aren’t really any RTR models of them. At the Western Prototype Modelers meet this weekend I did see some models of SP’s Donner Pass rotaries that are stored up in Roseville. The base models were shortened versions of the Athearn rotary plow.
http://www.pbase.com/dh30973/image/149692366
http://www.pbase.com/dh30973/image/149692365
As far as the icicle breakers, all of the versions I’ve seen have been scratchbuilt from brass or styrene stock.
Thanks Everyone!