Santa Fe Passenger Train Tail Lights

[DrW]

Finally, I have the equipment together to model the Santa Fe Clovis-Carlsbad consist (at some point it was officially called the "Cavern"), a motor car (M-160, or my favorite, the M-190) and an observation car.  One of the observation cars used was ATSF 3197.  "The Coach Yard" produced ATSF 3197 in brass, and it is a lovely model.  Most of TCY's products do not have working lights, but the ATSF 3197 has working tail lights, a white light on the roof and a red light below the tail window.  Both lights are wired to be permanently lighted.  Is this prototypical?  If not, when was each one used? 

Thank you very much for your help

Joachim

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Southwest Chief]

I kind of remember seeing a photo of the light setup like your model.  The red light you're describing replaced the drumhead.

So I'm guessing that the red light would be on if the car was the last on the train...which it almost always was on the Carlsbad turn.

I think the white light was for very long backup moves.  It would have been used almost like a headlight. 

So, again I'm making an educated guess here, but I think your most typical setup would be red light on white light off.

To be sure, I'll check my Santa Fe books to see if I can find that photo.

[gmpullman]

I agree with Matt that the roof light would be a back up light, and not much of one at that. I have a NYC wiring diagram from June 23, 1948 for several classes of NYC round end observation cars and the white backup lamp was a plain 25 Watt 60 Volt type A lamp. 

I have seen a few rare shots of NYC observation cars with the white lamp lit (along with the markers) but I would guess that this was an oversight on the part of the crew that backed the train into the station. In GCT the train was towed backwards so they would probably only have used it in Chicago or St. Louis.

Now your 3197 has marker lamps along with the red lamp in place of the drumhead. Many of the western roads only used the red oscillating light when and if the train went into emergency (the white light on the locomotive would switch to red by an automatic pressure switch as well.) This may be the case for you so when running you'd only see the two side marker lamps.

You would have to check Santa fe operating rules to see if the oscillating light was used only in an emergency application.

I'm getting ready to install a red Gyralight on the rear of my Nickel Plate passenger train and that one was on as long as the train was in motion. It hung on the back gate of the last car and plugged into the 64V. trainline connector. Some of the Nickel Plate cabooses had red Gyralights, too.

Hope this helps you out, Ed

[DrW]

Thanks Matt and Ed for your responses.  That was about what I thought.  I guess for the time being I will disconnect the white light (as I don't think I will do a lot of backing up) and leave the red tail light.  At some point I might put in a decoder so that I can control both lights manually.

Thanks again

Joachim

[Southwest Chief]

Found the photo I remembered seeing.  Only the red light appears to be on.  It also looks like the original marker lights (those protrusions near the roof line on either side of the car) have been plated over:

This photo can be found on page 91 in the book Santa Fe all the way Volume 1 1940s - 1966

[ndbprr]

While the back up headlight may not have been of much use it was probably law to have a headlight in the direction of travel.

[DrW]

That pic is very helpful.  Thank you very much.

Joachim