My layout as of now, is a freelance shortline, small yard, with a few industrials set in circa 90s to now.
However, I have several fallen flag marked box cars which look really nice like “The Rock” in blue, and red “L&N”, “MKT” “NP”, “BN”, etc.
I could repaint and remark them as UP or BNSF, but would hate to to do it and loose those vintage graphics.
Trying to keep the layout as realistic as possible, does anyone know is there anyway to justify having those fallen flag cars moving around the layout, in a “real life” train senario? Anyone know
When I’m railfanning, I occasionally see cars wearing the colors and logos of fallen flags, albiet faded and weather-beaten. I’ve seen Southern, N&W, Chessie and even Seaboard System. I believe freight cars have to be retired after 50 years of service. So if you’re modeling the 1990s the fallen flags you mention could still be floating around.
There is still some fallen flag cars on the rails today such SP,BN,Southern, N&W,Soo Line, including B&M and C&NW.I recently seen one SSW(Cotton Belt) boxcar without UP markings.
In the 90s there was lots of fallen flag cars to be seen.
Freelance or no many of us try to model realistically as possible…I would not even think about using a AC&Y or Wabash boxcar on my modern Ohio Central.
As people have mentioned, if you’re modeling the early-mid 1990s, a lot of those liveries would still be in fair shape as the WP, MP, DRG&W, N&W et. al. had only become fallen flags within the previous decade - a little more rust and weathering, a bit more graffitti (I don’t recall graffitti at the time being as bad and overwhelming as it has become today, but that may just be confirmation bias on my part), but still more or less the same liveries you like.
Late 1990s, early 21st century, Patch Jobs, lots of weathering, more and “bolder” graffitti are the order of the day for those liveries (and more fallen flags - SF, SP, etc…but you do gain NYC and PRR again for awhile).
The photos I posted was taken between 2005-2013 and they are still flying their flags proudly…
NS has thousands of N&W(some covered hoppers with hamburger herald) and Southern cars still carrying their NW and Sou initials-a sight be be appreciated these days.
It really depends on what era the cars you have are from.
Most of the “Blue” Rock Island stuff is still around, most are simply just running the rails as patched out leasers or patched out short line cars.
as for the other ones, the NP is very iffy, most of the NP things will have been done in by the scrappers torch, and some MKT stuff will still be around, but mostly hoppers. L&N might still be around, but mostly that stuff will have been painted in CSX colors or scrapped. N&W also would still be around and to this fday I see almost as much NW things as I see NS.
Some RRs paint new equipment in a version of their fallen flag predecessor(s). UP has done this with Rio Grande and other schemes. This is generally because they want to preserve their rights to copyrights, etc by demonstrating they are still in use. It’s relatively few cars, and they’re modern not vintage, but keeps the lawyers fat and happy I suppose.
Another option is to choose your buildings, vehicles, etc carefully, or be able to change them out in some cases, and it’s usually easy to backdate a layout 20 to 40 years. Then you could run trains in both eras.
I’m a rubber-era kind of guy anyway. My layout is most modern in Durango, where the standard gauge and narrowgauge meet, then as you get more distant from Durango, things tend to get older in era. It’s not completely consistent and you need some space to pull it off, but that’s another option, in conjunction with varying the eras of my freight consists.
Don’t overlook the fact that the reporting marks of many of those “fallen flag” roads actually belong to their new owner and are often used as a method of eliminating the need to re-number large blocks of recently-acquired rolling stock.
Here are some seen on a railfan outing this week:
Santa Fe:
Missouri Pacific:
Another Mopac:
Norfolk & Western:
Rock Island:
…and one of those ex-B&O cars mentioned by NittanyLion:
There was good information offered in the previous thread, particularly regarding the 40-year limitation on interchange for most rolling stock of earlier eras. In the real world many cars would have been repainted into newer schemes before the 1990s (if the cars were still in service). http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/13/t/231037.aspx
By the 1990s, any remnant cars with these liveries in the real world would likely be very heavily weathered or covered with graffiti. Many others would be “patched out” with new reporting marks, at least. It’s unlikely they would still be pristine examples of paint schemes from the 1970s or earlier.
But as you were encouraged in the earlier thread (and this one), you should do what you like.
A common things to do when a car is sold from one RR to another RR or leasing company is a paint patch over the old reporting marks. This is an example of a Penn Central boxcar after the sale into Conrail. The PC road number was kept, but the PC reporting mark was painted over and replaced with CR.IN this case, the PC noodle logo was also painted over, but is not required.
Another example is one of the U25B locomotives that MEC purchased from Rock Island. IN these photos, loco 234 in the white & blue “THe Rock” colors was put in service after extensive repairs. All that was done was to paint out the RI info on the cab and replace it with the road number and Maine Central RR. That change meets identification requirements
There’s also ways you can creatively cheat. A steel mill near where I grew up (note I was born in 1982) had a jade green NYC coil car well past 2003 in captive service.
Or you could do something like the B&LE “Bluebirds” that were just patched Rock Island hoppers with plenty of that R showing through the paint.
There is still some NP and GN stuff rolling around. I noticed a few of their woodchip gondolas still in GN blue and NP brown in recent videos. Of course they are beat to high heavens and usually sporting new reporting marks, but they are still there.
