Needles Division Santa Fe RR N Scale: 1981 Westbound Manifest Freight led by SD45 5512

SD45 5512, straight from the paint shop in San Bernardino.

U30CG was a General Electric custom project for the Santa Fe. I have a thorough description of the modifications done to a similar Trix unit in my July 21, 2012 blog, the most important being the use of a Kato chassis. Although these units were retired in September of 1980, I couldn't resist having one these on my roster in June of 1981.

General Electric U36C, created from a U30C Kato frame and a N Scale of Nevada (now OOB) U36C conversion kit. You can occasionally find these kits on Ebay. Custom painted with the normal roof additions.

Santa Fe SD39 4015. Please refer to my April 15, 2013 blog for a thorough review of the SD39's on my roster (three). This particular unit represents a freshly repainted unit.

The Milwaukee Road covered hopper started out as a MT silver car. Heavily weathered with rust tones adds a realistic touch.

In 1981, many ATSF freight cars from the fifties still roamed the rails in their original paint schemes. This box car still caries the yellow "Damage Free" and "Route of the Texas Chief " logos. The Texas Chief lasted right up until the end, as it was rolled up into Amtrak in 1971.

Two 50' cars, a MR reefer and a UP Hi Cube box car. the refrigerated unit is from Micro Trains. The Hi Cube car featured an extended roof top used mainly for appliance loading. The reefer had it's roof walk removed. Both cars are heavily weathered.

MT Cotton Belt 50' plug and sliding door box car. The gondola is a BN model loaded with crushed scrap metal.

This 61' 4" insulated plug door box is one of 35 in the Bx-171 class. One of it's prime uses is to carry beer for the Coors Brewery in Golden Colorado. The car is heavily weathered. I have several "beer cars" on my layout.

Western Pacific's version of the beer car. Yellow lettering on brown paint, with a aluminum roof top. These fine models come from Red Caboose.

I have had these cars in my collection for so long that I can't remember who produced them. All four cars are lightly weathered and feature Gold Medal Models photo etch upgrades.

These cars were used for shipments of fluids within and for the Santa Fe Railroad.

This 50" MT car received modifications from it's original release. I modified the Circle Cross logo with updated white Santa Fe lettering, changed the number to 12943 from 10001, and added a placard to the door and decaled "with". Finally changed the black smoother roll to smother ride, thus making it a member of the 100 cars in the Bx-76 class.

Relatively stock MT car, with roof walk removed, lightly weathered.

Earlier version of a Western pacific beer car.

Custom painted 50' insulated box car. The aluminum door retains it's natural color. The decals on the right were custom made. Atlas later came out with this very car. *(see below)

Custom painted plug and sliding door 50' MT car.

Two very different hoppers on the Santa Fe. Both models upgraded with Gold Medal Models photo etching.

Custom painted double plug door 50' MT car.

Another Santa Fe beer car

And another as well as a Rio Grande beer car.

BN beer car and custom painted refrigerator car. This car has the billboard Santa Fe lettering, as opposed to the "Ship and Travel..." logo on the stock MT car.