Santa Fe's 2900-Class 4-8-4s in Victorville & Adding Staging Tracks in the F Yard

This time we'll cover some of Santa Fe's finest steam locos, their 2900-class 4-8-4s.  Then we'll look at some layout progress in adding staging tracks to the F Yard.

During 1943-44 the Santa Fe acquired 30 more 4-8-4 steam locos and numbered them 2900-2929.  They were very similar to the previous 3776-class locos, but they were heavier due to the use of wartime steel (so they were the heaviest 4-8-4s ever built).

In the postwar years they normally pulled the extra sections of the secondary passenger trains.  The final appearance of one of them on Cajon Pass was on Aug. 1, 1953. 

Chard Walker photographed #2928 leading an eastbound diesel-powered passenger train in Victorville in the postwar years:

Here we see #2915 with the westbound Grand Canyon on the Frost Flyover after leaving Victorville in the early 1950s, thanks to Robert Hale:

Jack Whitmeyer photographed #2929 with an eastbound passenger train at San Bernardino in the postwar years:

Here we see #2903 with the 3rd section of the westbound Grand Canyon climbing through Hesperia in Dec. 1952, thanks to James Ady:

Chard Walker shot #2929 (his favorite loco) with an eastbound passenger train at Summit in the postwar years:
 

Here we see #2929 and #2928 leaving Summit with a westbound passenger train, thanks again to Chard Walker:

Here is #2924 with a westbound passenger train climbing from Lugo to Summit in 1950, as shot by James Ady:

Here we see #2929 about to help an eastbound passenger train out of San Bernardino, thanks to Chard Walker:

Chard Walker also shot #2911 with an eastbound passenger train climbing toward Sullivan's Curve:

James Ady photographed #2907 and #2906 with a westbound Shriner Special descending at Cajon in June, 1950:

Finally, here's a great shot by Chard Walker showing #2921 and #2928 with an eastbound passenger train climbing around Sullivan's Curve in the postwar years:

The only HO models of these locos that I know of are both brass, although we keep hoping for a styrene model (the Bachmann model is a 3776, similar to a 2900).

First there was the Westside "Fleetwood" boxed set of "Santa Fe's Big Three," which included a brass model of a 2900 (it's the bottom loco in this photo):

I have this set, which is currently away getting painted.  Here's an example of a painted Westside 2900:

Later there was a Hallmark Super Crown model of a 2900, which I don't have:

Now it's time for another layout progress report.

Two weeks ago I drilled holes for feeder wires along the new Track E4 (which leads to the cassette loading area) and prepared and inserted the feeders, and when Bill Messecar returned on that Tuesday morning, he soldered all the wires to the rails along Track E4, as seen here:

Meanwhile, I was adding rail joiners to the nearby F Yard turnouts and starting to cut and fit short sections of track to connect them, as seen here:

Later in the week I completed connecting the three turnouts in the F Yard ladder together, as seen here:

Meanwhile, the package of Touch Toggles and related electrical hardware for the C Tower panel arrived from Kevin Hunter at Berrett Hill Shop, and I spread them out on part of the layout to inventory them:

 

Kevin wrote to say that he added a new feature to the yellow on-off cab selector buttons, so that we no longer need a separate button to turn a block off, and we can have just three buttons in a row on the panel instead of four, to select among three cabs.  

 

Don Borden then proceeded to redraw the C Tower panel with rows of just three buttons, which make the panel less crowded, as seen here:

On Saturday a week ago I attended a half-day operating session and lunch at Bill Messecar's Santa Fe layout.  My friend Don Hubbard was there and posed with his completed model of the Texaco service station that was in the Lower Narrows:

 

Here's another photo of Don during the op session, with me and Colin Kikawa in the background:

While I was there, Bill Messecar passed along to me his completed model of the first of the two tall, black steel water tanks that stood in Victorville by the section houses, so I later placed the tank in its location on the diorama map, and I placed the Texaco model from Don Hubbard beside it for a photo:

Meanwhile, I traded more emails with Don Borden as I tried to figure out which printer settings here would make his panel drawings come out to exactly the right size and spacing for the Touch Toggles.  

I think we've got it figured out, but I still need to mark up the latest panel drawings with the final changes to some tracks and labels (Don has been waiting patiently for me to do that).

I asked Don Borden to send along a photo of himself, and this is what he sent me, posing beside a small section of his large HO Cajon Pass layout:

 

Last Monday I used caulk to glue down the ladder tracks that lead into one end of the F Yard.  When Bill Messecar arrived here on Tuesday morning, we got to work laying down seven flextracks to form the first parts of Tracks F1, F2, and F3, up to where they curve around at the end of the room.  

 

Bill did the soldering of the rail joiners between the tracks, before we glued them down and anchored them with pushpins and water bottles.  Here's my photo of Bill after the three new tracks were weighted down:

And here's his photo of me, looking in the opposite direction:

After the weights were removed the next day, I found that we didn't have smooth lines coming out of the turnouts into Tracks F2 and F3, so I loosened parts of those tracks and re-glued them.  Here's the final result for the F Yard so far:

My friend Craig Wisch in Victorville is still working on how to model the poles that stick out near the tops of the walls of the control house at the switching station.  Here's his close up of what the actual poles look like (about 3' long and 1' in diameter):

 

Later in the week I got word from a fellow Cajon Pass modeler, Otto Kroutil from So. Cal., that he was visiting a relative in the area and would be able to visit me for the first time on Sunday afternoon.  So that was a good excuse to clean up some of the layout room and the tracks, so I could run a train partway around for him.

I had a great time talking with Otto today for over two and half hours about my layout and his layout and what we've been working on.  Here's a photo of us together beside my layout:

 

 

Tonight Otto sent me a photo he had shot today, with me posing by my layout and my bookcases of railroad books:

That's all for this time.  Let me know if you can help, either in person or remotely.