The Alco PA1 project

[randgust]

OK, so on the B units - Life-like dummy B's can be hard to find by themselves.  A's were easier, I ended up with two.   The stock dummy chassis is the plastic one with a fuel tank weight, which proved that it was just way too light to track properly even after gauging.



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PABX101.jpg

Stock B shell is quite nice.  The only inaccuracy on these I can find is the stack position that was modified on ATSF units.



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PABX102.jpg

On the powered B unit, I got a powered A and was surprised that this one was the 'second generation' split frame, ran well, but converting it a a B unit?



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PABX201.jpg

Rather than buy another LL B unit at an inflated price, I got a Kato B unit shell undecorated for this one.  It also has the right stack position and fits just fine on the LL drive.



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PABX202.jpg

The unit numbers on these are so tiny they can't really be seen, right above the stirrup on the red stripe.  Frankly, I didn't bother.



On the p

[nkalanaga]

For the dummy B, which is too light, could you add stick-on lead weights?  There should be plenty of room, but would the extra weight affect the rolling ability?

[randgust]

For the dummy B, which is too light, could you add stick-on lead weights?  There should be plenty of room, but would the extra weight affect the rolling ability?

If you look where the motor should be on that frame, I already added two block lead weights, had to do the same with the dummy A unit (#70) that has the exact same frame.  Stock was just the lead in the fuel tank area.  Both the dummy A and B tracked terribly as soon as a reasonably heavy 9-car passenger train was put behind them, lots of derailments.  But the powered A and B could pull way more than this.

They don't roll all that well, but they aren't awful either.  The big issue on all of these was wheel gauge on those long-wheelbase trucks.

[Cajonpassfan]

Twenty plus years ago, I turned a dummy LL B (with a Kato shell on it) into a Soundtraxx sound unit, spliced between two Kato A's. A little bit of weight and gauging the wheelsets solved initial tracking or pulling issues and (gasp!) the Katos didn't pull as well as the powered LL's. My experience has been that heavy cars (and dummy locos) need to have very free rolling trucks in order to minimize any negative effects on pulling performance.
Following this with interest!
Otto

[randgust]

The reason I didn't start this thread earlier was the recognition that I really wasn't sure if I had shelf queens here or a running concept.... as much as I liked PA's, I didn't want four powered units and considered this a low-budget low-pri, long term project.   Until I got the powered A, B, and two dummies to successfully pull full-length trains I wasn't convinced I wanted to take it through final work and weathering here.   The entire Fast Mail idea came about when I realized that I'd already collected enough cars between my standard steam passenger train and my Amtrak "Chief" and my rolling stock to pull it off pretty much with what I had.  So far I've only bought two more cars, the mail container flat and one express boxcar.

I can see how these dummies would be just ideal as sound units.  They have all the pickups, tons of room, etc.    I may do that to 70 down the road anyway, I went through the work of equipping the nose with LED's that could be used off a DCC board.

But yeah, in field trials, the ABBA found things to derail on that even my Hallmark 4-8-4 never imagined.

[peteski]

OK, so on the B units - Life-like dummy B's can be hard to find by themselves.  A's were easier, I ended up with two.   The stock dummy chassis is the plastic one with a fuel tank weight, which proved that it was just way too light to track properly even after gauging.
On the powered B unit, I got a powered A and was surprised that this one was the 'second generation' split frame, ran well, but converting it a a B unit?



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PABX201.jpg

Randy, I just noticed that the frame pickup strip on the right truck is not properly aligned.  You probably already fixed it, but just in case, I wanted to let you know.

[randgust]

Yeah, I noticed that in the photo as well and put it back in place.  But I never noticed it while running, what can you say, that mechanism is just a tank.

[randgust]

OK, bet you thought I gave up.  Distracted, maybe.

I tried the diaphragms, and while they look great, they caused all kinds of derailments on the dummy units.   Frustrating weeks of tweaking and testing, finally glued them solid to make sure they wouldn't snag.  Added a lot of weight, put a lot of miles and testing on them.

So after that, finally have gotten brave enough to weather.  Dummy 70 and the PB dummy are weathered, the 65 (with masked off windows) is for comparison, unweathered.  This is the kind of '67 appearance I'm after, lots of dark smoke weathering on the roof, horns, radio antenna, relatively clean sides, more dirt on the nose.  One of the things that I noticed on weathering is the shutters under the radiator fan, and the grille section INSIDE the warbonnet curve, accumulated more 'grime' than the rest of the grilles, but it was very consistent in period photos. And a decidely 'orange' cast late in life on the warbonnet red rather than the usual warbonnet red you see on models, which is why I wanted to do my own paint rather than start with a factory job.



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PAA7004.jpg



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PAA7006.jpg

Getting there, looks like I want even in photos.

I may have actually ridden behind them as a kid either on the Grand Canyon or the San Diegan operation, but what stick in me is the Green Frog video shots of them accelerating to about 90 and just belching clouds of black smoke late in life.   Remember, 244 not 251.   

[mmagliaro]

Randy,
Heck, I'm not even a diesel guy, but those look NICE.  They have just the right black sooty weathering, but not overdone, and a nice low stance on the rails.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Those are dirty girls.

I like em!

[randgust]

OK, I finished up the other A unit - 65 - through weathering....



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PAA6501.jpg



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/PAA6502.jpg

So, the last great thing I still want to do here on the thread is assemble the ABBA set with all the various cars I've accumulated for the end-of-life "Fast Mail" and do a short video.

Oh, and yeah - 65 has a Z scale coupler in the pilot as it's the powered lead unit with the Mars light package in it, 70 has a regular MT coupler although it's a silver one, it's the trailing unit.

Even dragging around two dummy units. two powered units have more than enough TE to handle a long, long train.   And they are extremely quiet and reliable now.

[randgust]

This was fun.   I keep thinking I maybe overdid it, then I find shots like this one - my era on the Fast Mail in '67, and OMG, the smoke!  And the contrast between the sides and roof is way more pronounced than even I dare.   The accumulation on the windshield, nose, and headlight area is even beyond what I've seen......

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/d1/12/8b/d1128b0e8741ecff7a3cf2e16aed2dd1.jpg

http://streamlinermemories.info/SF/AlcoPAGrandCanyonChilicothe64.jpg

[thomasjmdavis]

This was fun.   I keep thinking I maybe overdid it, then I find shots like this one - my era on the Fast Mail in '67, and OMG, the smoke!  And the contrast between the sides and roof is way more pronounced than even I dare.   The accumulation on the windshield, nose, and headlight area is even beyond what I've seen......

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/d1/12/8b/d1128b0e8741ecff7a3cf2e16aed2dd1.jpg

http://streamlinermemories.info/SF/AlcoPAGrandCanyonChilicothe64.jpg

Randgust- great job on this project. And thanks for the prototype photos.

If you hunt around, you can probably also find some photos taken about the same time of units just out of the car washer in Chicago or LA, a bit the worse for 20 years of wear and tear, but clean and shiny and a new coat of aluminum paint on the trucks. 

My first attempt at weathering a loco was a Con-cor dummy PA that I picked up at a hobby shop, 45 years ago, that had a bad lettering and striping job- someone had returned it and the owner sold it to me for a few bucks. I blasted it with my first (cheap) airbrush, trying to hide the errors.  I always thought i had over-done it, but in truth, it needs another couple passes to get as dirty as the units in your prototype photos.

[propmeup1]

Without reading this entire thread I thought I'd throw in my 2 cents.  I have an A-B-A set of Concor PAs. Custom did them in Brunswick Green and put the ant up top. I have an A-B-B-A set from BLI. How I wish the BLI would run as good as the Concor set. The Concor are unstoppable and pull like there's no tomorrow.   I'd let to put Soundtraxx in the Concor and rid of the BLI set. One is dead and two others have been returned in the past two years.    I have no idea how much I've spent in shipping back and forth many of my BLI locos and especially the diesels. 

[Jbub]

Without reading this entire thread I thought I'd throw in my 2 cents.  I have an A-B-A set of Concor PAs. Custom did them in Brunswick Green and put the ant up top. I have an A-B-B-A set from BLI. How I wish the BLI would run as good as the Concor set. The Concor are unstoppable and pull like there's no tomorrow.   I'd let to put Soundtraxx in the Concor and rid of the BLI set. One is dead and two others have been returned in the past two years.    I have no idea how much I've spent in shipping back and forth many of my BLI locos and especially the diesels.

You can make the BLI's run great as well, just ditch their crappy decoder and put in an ESU or Soundtraxx