Some Diesel Demonstrators in Victorville & Minimal Layout Progress

We've run out of postwar Victorville locos to cover, but this time we'll start to look at some diesel demonstrators that either did or could have crossed Cajon Pass.  Layout progress has been minimal over the holidays, but Craig Wisch's model of the Lime Rock Plant is coming along beautifully, as we shall see.

I have a special interest in collecting all the HO diesel demonstrators from my time period that I can find, because they have a variety of colorful paint schemes (other than Santa Fe and Union Pacific), and they can be an excuse to run exotic diesel models that neither Santa Fe nor UP used.  We have proof that some of them did cross Cajon Pass, and we have to use our imaginations for the others, which may or may not have come west.

We'll focus this time on the diesel demonstrators that we know visited the Victorville and Cajon Pass areas.  Here's a first look at Alco FPA-2 demonstrator ABBA set #1602 on the SP in Soledad Canyon in c.1950:

Here we see the same 4-unit FPA-2 set leaving LAUPT with a UP passenger train bound for Cajon Pass, thanks to Robert Hale (an FPA was an FA equipped for passenger service):

Robert Hale also got a shot of Chard Walker hooping up orders to these same FPA-2 demonstrators at Summit in c.1950:

As for HO models, Proto 2000 made FA and FB units, so I have an ABBA set.  It's hard to find photos of these online, but here is one A unit:

Our next diesel demonstrators will the the H24-66 Train Masters.  Units TM-1 and TM-2 demonstrated in the East in 1953, while units TM-3 and TM-4 demonstrated in the West.  Here's a nice shot of the two units in the East:

Here's another colorful shot of these units in the East:

I've seen photos of the Western units, TM-3 and TM-4, together at Summit on Cajon Pass, but I don't know where to locate those photos now.

Atlas Master made beautiful models of these Train Master units in HO, and I have the TM-3 and TM-4 pair.  Here's a photo of their model of TM-1:

Another diesel model that demonstrated on Cajon Pass was the GP7 in 1949.  Here we see GP7 unit X100 helping some Santa Fe F7s with a freight on Cajon Pass:

Atlas Classic made HO models of three units, #100, #200, and #300, and I have the first two of those.  Here's a photo of the third unit, #300:

Another demonstrator diesel model that crossed Cajon Pass was the Baldwin DR-4-4-1500 sharknose, units #6001A, A1, B, B1, in 1950.  They had an eye-catching red and white paint scheme, as seen here in New York in 1949:

Here's another view of these early sharknose units in 1949:

Chard Walker reported that he saw these units come through Summit, but he didn't get a photo, as far as I know.  It could have been at night.

I have an ABBA set of these demo sharks, made in HO by Bachmann:

Let's look at one more demo-like diesel that stopped in San Bernardino for a few days of display and shop work, and this was the 1947-49 American Freedom Train Alco PA-1 diesel #1776 (and its display train).

Here's a classic shot of this diesel and two of its heavyweight display cars, full of historic documents:

Here's another view of the Alco PA-1 diesel #1776 and its train of precious documents:

There is at least one photo of this train parked at the San Bernardino Depot on Feb. 29, 1948, but I can't locate it at the moment.  

Although it spent the first week of March, 1948, in San Bernardino, it came in on the SP from Arizona and later left on the SP line to Tehachapi, bypassing Cajon Pass (but it came close enough for my purposes).

Rapido made an HO model of this loco, as seen below, but I somehow missed it, so I'll have to wait for one to come back onto the market:

Of course, then I'd need to paint and decal an entire heavyweight train for it to pull.  I do have all the decals.

Next time I plan to cover some diesel demonstrator models I own but that probably did not cross Cajon Pass, as far as I know.

Now let's catch up on some layout progress, or lack of progress.

Three weeks ago I was busy with Christmas preparations and gatherings, and taking some time off from the layout.

Then on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, Dec. 26-27-28, I worked with the Boeing Employees Model Railroad Club at the annual Tacoma Model Train Festival, where the club sets up its portable modules and runs trains for the public in one of the rooms there.

Here's a shot of me on Tuesday, working with Jay Biederman (left background) and Sandy Webster (right background), when Ray Rydberg arrived to relieve us and shoot our photo:

The nice thing about our room there is that it has large windows that look down on the BNSF tracks, so we get to watch all the freight trains roll by.  We were excited on Tuesday to see a military train of about 100 cars roll by, all loaded with military vehicles of all types, some in Army olive drab and some in United Nations white.  The sunlight was not from a good direction, but I did get this one shot while the train was stopped for a while:

There is now a freeway in the foreground, where the Tacoma Union Station tracks used to be.

I was inspired to go visit the N-scale layout one floor down that always has some modules showing an Army base and various Army scenes.  Here's a module depicting a scene circa 1970:

And a view of one of the circa 1944 modules:

 And another one of the circa 1944 modules:

On Thursday I worked with Jay Biederman again and with Tim Repp.  When we were relieved by club president Byron Osborn, I shot a photo of Tim (on the left) and Byron (on the right):

For the last two weeks my time was spent relaxing, watching football (bad news there), and buying a condo unit for our son to move into.  He's been staying with us since the end of August, when he lost his long-time apartment.  

He works from home four days a week, and he's been spending all his free time at his computer workstation too, which has been located right next to my layout, as seen here:

 

But on Friday and Saturday of this past week, we helped him move out to his condo (just eight minutes away), so now I'm free again to work downstairs on the layout, while I play my fifties rock & roll music.

Over my holiday break I've been thinking that I really should focus strongly on getting my 2 staging mainlines wired up to two power packs, so I can finally run two trains in large circles to my heart's content.

And that leads me to think that I should get my E and F yards completed and wired up too, so that I can park a few trains in the F Yard and a few different locos in the E Yard.  Then I could run a small variety of trains out of the F Yard and around the staging mainlines.

And that leads me to think that I should focus on the Reversing Tower Panel design, along with the F Yard and E Yard panels, to control these tracks and turnouts.  I had picked the C Tower to do first, but there are no C Yard tracks on the layout yet.  Maybe I should set aside the C Tower and yards and focus first on the Reversing Tower and yards.

But before I leave the C Yard panels, here's a look at a revised version of the Left C Yard Panel, thanks to Don Borden's drawings:

I remeasured these track lengths, and I decided to ask Don for a few more changes, to fit in a few more diesel sets into the parking spaces:

C4 is 130" long and can be divided into 4 sections of 32" each, instead of 3 sections, so let's add a 4th parking section to C4.

C5 is 84" long and can be divided into 3 sections of 28" each, instead of 2 sections, so let's add a 3rd parking section to C5.  (28" is long enough for 4 F-units or 3 PAs.)

Just for the record, here are the lengths I measured for all of the C Yard tracks:

C1 = 80" - no parking here, it's only for through loco movements.

C2 = 68" - good for two parking spots of 34" each.

C3 = 66" - good for two parking spots of 33" each.

C4 = 130" - good for four parking spots of 32" each.

C5 = 84" - good for three parking spots of 28" each.

C6 = 56" - good for two parking spots of 28" each.

C7 = 56" - good for two parking spots of 28" each.

C8 = 36" - good for one parking spot of 36".

C9 = 28" - good for one parking spot of 28".

I've also been measuring the lengths of various diesels and steam locos, but I won't get into that.

Back in the real Victorville, Craig Wisch has made more progress on his big cardstock Lime Rock Plant model, including modeling the two storage tanks that stood along the east wall of the main building, and adding many of the roof details and piping.

Here's a current view of the street side of the building, complete with the sign board near the top:

 

Here's a good view of the track side of the plant:

Finally, here's another view of the street side of the plant, from a different angle: 

We're still negotiating the dimensions and appearance of the curved-roof shipping office that stood in front of the Quonset hut building.  Also, he doesn't like to work with styrene, so he will return to me the Walthers kit I had sent him for the conveyor tower that fed the lime rock powder down into the two tanks, and I will build that later.  We are in the final stages of this enormous project!

Craig is also eyeing a much bigger project he wants to do for a Victorville museum, which is to build HO models of all the stores and hotels that ran along D Street in the glory years, across the street from the depot area.  Wow!

Meanwhile, Bill Messecar has been working on a diorama for all of his section houses, pump houses, and water tanks, and he plans to bring it along on Jan. 24.

I have revised my previous blog entry slightly, to include a Bachmann Spectrum model of an Army GE 44-tonner to use as a stand-in for the Army 45-tonner seen in the photo at the Victorville depot.

That's all the news I have this time.  I hope to get back to working on the layout this coming week.