Jump to content

Union Pacific fleet revisions


Cracked Ass

Recommended Posts

This is mostly for news and sightings of restamps, repaints, and refurbishing of UP's various fleets.

We all know the Solid Colds got chopped, channeled, and repainted into Chilled Express.

Right now the gold UPFEs are rapidly turning into white ARMNs with the UP shield on the upper right instead of Chilled Express. People should be getting flicks of anything noteworthy on gold UPFEs before they all vanish under the new paint.

Golden Wests are the latest issue. Due to deprescription (explained elsewhere), Golden Wests are losing their old shortline marks (GVSR, VCY) and getting restamped with other marks owned by UP (SSW, SP in particular). The first bunch of Golden West restamps I saw made me relax: it looked like they were just restamping the numbers and load limits and not buffing the cars.

But there's a new and ominous development: I just encountered a freshpaint red SSW flat, paint date 6/04, build date '73. I looked closely under the paint job and saw the old decals: it had been a GVSR 768xxx series car. So some Golden Wests are getting a total repaint and reporting mark change. I don't know how widespread this will be. But it's a threat to the Golden West fleet, and there will never be any new Golden Wests, since they were essentially a paper company front for the now defunct Southern Pacific. There is a lot of classic west coast and other shit on these cars, stuff with historical value. Again, I would encourage anyone who benches and takes flicks to consider concentrating on documenting all decent Golden West stuff before these cars start to get rare. It's early yet, there's still a million of them out there, but it's not too early to flick stuff that will soon be history.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This forum is supported by the 12ozProphet Shop, so go buy a shirt and help support!
This forum is brought to you by the 12ozProphet Shop.
This forum is brought to you by the 12oz Shop.

I've seen the stamps, but had no idea they were repainting them.

 

I make it a point to flick every GVSR/VCY/SSW I see, even if they have garbage on them, because where I'm at, they aren't common.

 

So these red freshpaints...are they coded VCY/GVSR or they're all SSW/SP?

 

Either way...this is why we bench. Documentation.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally posted by ghostvandal

do you think that the gvsr already restamped and owned by other companies like BN will get repainted too?

 

No. Different company = different schedule for repaints. Although I never heard of a Golden West of any type with BN marks. Remember, Golden West restamps SP and SSW have NOT changed hands - they were owned by UP, and are still owned by UP. They just changed the reporting marks because there is no longer a financial benefit for leasing the shortline marks GVSR and VCY. The only Golden West I ever saw that was bought by another RR and restamped was a ridged lumber box (the kind west coast heads are bored with: local, ridges, double door, no good panel) stamped TKEN, which is Tenneken Rail and not a UP company.

The overall Golden West fleet is enormous, and A) it would take forever to repaint them all and B) I don't think they're trying to do them all. So keep rocking these cars.

I know people with the mentality that when they hear a certain fleet or car type gets buffed or is being repainted, they avoid hitting them, not wanting to "waste their paint". I see it a different way: you get to hit and flick a paint scheme that is getting rarer, and you get the "last word" on that car before it becomes something else.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally posted by fr8otech

 

So these red freshpaints...are they coded VCY/GVSR or they're all SSW/SP?

 

Sorry, didn't see this the first time.

The red freshpaint I saw was an SSW 23xxx series. Which is extra weird because there already is such a series, the old SSW Hydracushion flats. Although a lot of the original Hydracushions are rusted to fuck and may have been scrapped, which opens up "dead" car numbers that can be reassigned to these freshpaints.

For the record, there will be no new cars or repaints coming out of the UP fleet with GVSR or VCY marks. GVSR is Galveston Railroad of Texas; VCY is Ventura County RR. These are shortline RRs that never ran the Golden West fleet, and never will. They just let Southern Pacific, the creator of Golden Wests, put their reporting mark on those cars for a small fee. Doing this saved SP some money over a couple years, but not nearly enough to avoid being taken over by Union Pacific.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

thats good info. especially for a nerd like me always looking to get fliks of shit that will someday be "rare".

 

what about the golden west non-boxcars (airslides, covered hoppers, open top hoppers etc.) since there are less of them do you think they will go first?

 

as for the golden oldies. i saw this coming but its still hard to believe.

only because there is so much vintage shit on them...its like they never buffed them shits.

 

but all that being said, for those into benching and collecting it would be a good idea to get your documentation on. there is still a lot of good graff on the golden oldies and the golden wests

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Don't panic guys...the up is in a finacial booboo, that is why they stopped re-vamping ALL the upfe's,plus they are two different cars used for 2 differnt things, yellow bok bok bok, white mooooooo

...golden west re-paints(stenciled) are specifiying who owns/leased them...so refer to the first sentence......BUT I have seen buffed gvsr's and did scratch my head as well.:eek:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally posted by ghostvandal

bok bok bok?

i ve seen chilled express with carrots, oranges, etc..what does the upfe carries? its supposed to be different?

 

me too. im not a refer head, but i ve seen all kinds of shit in them (well not really seen, but i know what they produce in the spots where i have seen them laid up). that famous crew from the bx used to paint at a spot where they make canned veggies from raw veggies.

i think the load depends only on the customers demand.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What about Golden West gondolas?

And on the subject of gondolas, aren't Gondola Connection gondolas owned by either GVSR or VCY or UP (thanks for shedding light to me about this topic of which company owns which cars...) or actually were owned by these companies? That is what I heard through the grapevine, although now I have seen Gondola Connections with NOKL and other rreporting marks....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

good lookin

 

i have noticed about 5 or so of the GVSR to SP restamps. there was no buff involved though. i have been flicking every boxcar, reefer i can for the past year now. this thread is really helpful.

 

suggestion: allow flicks to be posted in trainspotting section of the forum (little or no graff, just raw boxcar shots.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

good info. i wish i had the time to know this shit. i always liked golden west because they dont buff ( for the most part) even when dip shits go over the numbers thsy use some kind of solution to clean the spray paint off the numbers. well that sucks if they start to disapear they are rocked with good shit .......

 

upfes are for what ever is refridgerated and travel alot and fast and all over good trains to get.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest mikro137
Originally posted by ghostvandal

bok bok bok?

i ve seen chilled express with carrots, oranges, etc..what does the upfe carries? its supposed to be different?

 

usually refregirated cars such as these carry perishable items such as produce. where i live there is a major grocery distrobution terminal , and the cars are full of fruits and vegitables.

 

 

on a light note about the vcy/gvsr subject , i was reading a railroading magazine a few months ago , and there was a picture of a clean gvsr , and in the caption , it stated "...it is almost as amazing that this car is'nt covered in graffiti" which i found to be quite humorus.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

...i have seen a handful of GW's restamped as CSXT...this is probably only a very small part of the fleet, but they may actually retain the paint scheme for longer than the west coast cars...in the same way, i've seen a few solid colds that are CSXT now and they all have original paint as well...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was lucky enough to catch one of the new white ARMN extended height (UP logo cars, not chilled express) up close and I noticed an almost buffed tag on it. Not painted over but it looked as if some type of cleaner/paint remover was used on it. I've noticed other photos on here with buffed new ARMNs. Does anyone know how actively they are buffing these cars and for what reason (pride in the new fleet?)? Personally I think its a nice catch regardless of its fate, but it got my curiousity going...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I actually just got one of those off a little while ago, and aside from being spotless-ly clean, it had loosely the same thing your describing: Streaks that were semi-buffed off.

 

It got crushed then rolled out. I just hope someone catches a flick of it be fore it's run ends.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...