Can someone give me a history on Fruit Growers Express Solid Gold cars? Their is one down in a yard in Athens, GA that I believe is used as a tool car. I then saw another one the same CSX line when a MW train came through. It looked almost identical to the model below only with CSXT and a lot more rust. It was CSXT 910973. That’s about all that I could see as it went by, and I can’t really see to get any other details of the one in the yard…And I doubt that it is coming out anytime soon…
The car shown is an insulated box car used for temperature sensitive but not temp critical products. They put dry ice in with the product or load a product that must not freeze in a warm environment (such as Florida or a heated warehouse) for forwarding through a freezing area. AAR class R. with LPD’s, it would be an RL.
If it has an engine compartment at one end, it is a mechanical refrigerator car (RM) and if it has bars or door or air bags inside, then it is an LPD car (lading protction devices) and classed by the AAR as RML
The “GOLD” business was a marketing device. FGE was owned by several Eastern lines of which Chessie now owns most.
Interesting. I see a lot of former Chessie’s in MW service so that makes sense. I was wondering if it was a reefer or not, since I didn’t see the mechanics for one. Kind of nice to see them around. Any ideas on the years of manufacture?
Eric’s designations aren’t quite right: the mechanical reefers were RPL, and the non-mechanical ones were RBL.
Yes, FGE was owned by most of the eastern railroads. They also built refrigerator cars and cabooses at their shops (Chessie had some FGE-built cabooses).
“Solid Gold” was the trademark for reconditioned RBLs, built between the early 1960s and the late 1970s (not sure on the closing date). Mechanical reefers were painted in slightly different colors, and labeled “Solid Cold”. Most of these FGE mechanical reefers have wound up in UP’s “Chilled Express” paint scheme (or probably eventually will).
The CSXT car you saw, numbered in the 900000s, was definitely in non-revenue service. Revenue CSXT reefers (there are still some FGE-built cars there) are painted blue (like everything else) and numbered in the upper 190000s.
Someone with a better knowledge of history than I will have to explain the relationship between Fruit Growers Express and Western Fruit Express (no “Growers” in that name). There degfinitely was a relationship at one time. WFE was affiliated with the Great Northern originally; at the time of the BN merger Burlington Refrigerator Express was absorbed by WFE. It, too, was somehow connected with FGE.
Pacific Fruit Express had no connection whatsoever with FGE.
