Article on PA diesels in latest Classic Trains thumbs Up

[passengerfan]

I received my copy of Classic Trains yesterday and right away the cover caught my eye. As far as this railfan is concerned the Santa Fe PAs were the best loooking of the lot. To me the PA was the best looking of all passenger diesels. It really did not matter to me which railroads I watched but the Santa Fe PAs always stood out. The SP Daylight scheme looked excellent as well but then SP went to the Bloody Nose scheme and it was never the same.

The two finest looking passenger trains with matching consist were the Santa Fe Chief with A-B-A set of PAs and the SP Shasta Daylight with A-B-A set of matching PAs. This article alone was worth a years subscription to me.

Al - in - Stockton  

[artpeterson]

Hi Al - certainly agree, that cover shot is a "screamer!"  I was glad to see that the article didn't sugar-coat the performance and maintenance issues.   Some interesting data collected and presented!  Art

[Texas Chief]

While working for "Intermountain" some years back, I had a chance to talk to the publisher of one of the major model railroad magazines and I complimented him on the great cover shot of an F unit in Santa Fe "War Bonnet" paint scheme. He told me that every time he produces a mag. with that type of cover picture, he sells almost twice as many copies that month. Being a Santa Fe fanatic, I can really believe it. In a word, "Beautiful".

Dick

Texas Chief

[SSW9389]

I went out Friday and bought a copy of Classic Trains so I could read this article.

Was the cover photo enhanced. I don't know or care, but it is sure colorful.

A few gremlins have found their way into author Peter Hansen's article.  

On page 22 the statement about EMD's E unit production being suspended during World War 2 is not completely true. E6 units were built up to September 1942 and then production was suspended for a time and then production restarted with the E7s in February 1945. 

Page 31 has several errors. Instead of 61 Alco RSDs purchased 1951-1953 there were 63. Santa Fe RSD-4s #2100-2109 and RSD-5s #2110-2162. The author states that Santa Fe never bought another Alco for passenger service after the PAs. After the PAs Santa Fe bought 2 RS-1s, an RS-2, 5 RSD-5s and 2 RSD-7s with steam generators, passenger service may not have been the primary duty of these units, but they were certainly capable of it. And finally there were 11 E1s not 12. The Santa Fe's E8ms were rebuilt from the 2 EMC box cabs, 8 E1As and 3 E1Bs. 

Ed 

 

[Kootenay Central]

.

[Mario_v]

As far as I know, there are 5 survivors ;

- 2 PAs, DH16 and DH19, I think, in Mexico's Puebla museum, in operational condition. 17 can be seen here, in a Pentrex trailer, operating a train : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcKM3KCWUZU and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5anim1E2Rg It loos like a PA3.

- 2 in the US, one of them being Mr's McCormick Nickel Plate unit, and its sister that came from Mexico and will one day became a display unit on the Smithsonian institute, wearing its best Warbonnet garb.

- 1, and the rarest of all, a former Companhia Paulista broad gauge unit (only 3 were built, I believe), in a museum in Jundaí, 37 miles North of São Paulo. It's basically a hulk in primer, but it still has the original trucks. It has a detail that makes it a litle ugly, a flat pilot.

[espeefoamer]

For many years the Rio Grande had a steam generator unit that was rebuilt from a PB.It still looked basicly like a PA and had the original ALCo trucks until rebuilt in the early 80s.

[Philcal]

Great article on the Alco PA's. I recall seeing Santa Fe PA's at LAUPT as a child. Took them for granted. The article brought back many great memories.

[egmurphy]

Mario_v

- 2 PAs, DH16 and DH19, I think, in Mexico's Puebla museum, in operational condition.

Close, it's actually 17 and 19.  I haven't seen them run, but I have been there when they start up the diesel engines, which they do every couple of weeks.  By the way, both are painted in schemes that they never actually wore while in service down here.

Here's DH17, wearing an imitation SP Daylight scheme.  She was repainted in this scheme by the paint crew in one of the shops that was originally part of the Southern Pacific de Mexico (later FCP, and finally, after merger into the FNM, "Region Pacifico").  Note that the logo she has on the nose is based an old SP sunset logo, marked FNM and "Region Pacifico".

 

And here's DH19, wearing the traditional NdeM scheme.

And one from the front.  Didn't have the "pole filter" on the camera that day.

 

Regards

Ed