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RE: painting of Budd RDC1 demo unit: In response to your post, I am looking at several ads touting various aspects of the RDC, published in Railway Age in 1950, just after the RDC1 demonstrator made its "national tour" in 1949 (there's a map published on one of the ads). These appear to be unretouched photos that show the demonstrator from various angles. The demonstrator has the Budd corporate logo, in two colors on the letterboard centered under the roof blister assembly and extending 1 window on either side of the engine exhaust gap, with the line extending approx. 1-1/4 windows on either side of the gap (Logo--letters dark blue with a bright red horizontal line running through them. To see this in color, check out just about any National Geographic from the same period as Budd advertised its psgr eqpt in almost every issue, in color ) . The car is numbered "1950" white on dark in the upper side lighted number boards (one at each end) and "1950" is also shown painted on the center number plate (centered under the window gap) in what appears to be standard Roman dark color-probably matched the logo. Everything else is plain stainless--no embellishments. Incidentally, FYI here are some of the claims they made: RDC1 demo that made the tour configured to seat 90. On 1st suburban demo trip on CNW arrived in CHI with 170 pax (what a sardine can). At full load 83 mph max level; 62 mph max 1%; 42 mph max 2%, 28 mph max 3%. Acceleration 0-44 mph in 60 sec, 0-57 mph in 1 mile. Stop from 70 mph in 1254 ft. Claimed "lowest cost/pax operation of any form of mass transportation in this country"--wouldn't you love to see how they cooked that number--ain't hyperbole great? Price FOB Philly $128,750 for the RDC1. RDC2: 17'-1" bag compartment, seats 71 pax, price FOB Philly $127,800 (950 bucks less, plus the car has a trunk--such a deal for you!). 1st 2 buyers advertised to be WP (1 RDC2 ultimately named "Zephyrette") and CNW (2 RDC1 & 1 RDC2). Oh by the way, since you truly expect someone to say it, why don't you buy a reprint of the Budd brochure (that's tacky, I know, but why disappoint someone with so sincere a wish.....). Seriously, I hope this info helps. Maybe someone has an old color slide they might want to post. If I had one, I'd be glad to, but I don't. Hey ndbprr, if you can't sell the brochure due to lack of interest, sounds like you have an audience here. Why don't you consider scanning and posting parts of it here (I, for one, in the true spirit of engineering geekdom, would enjoy seeing the curves) because these other guys sound like they could sure use the modeling related info. To start the ball rolling, if someone will let me know how to paste a jpg on this thing, I'll be happy to post the map and a fairly good B&W photo of the demo from a wheel bearing ad in 1950.[?] Best Regards.
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