Peoria Rocket Attn SD45Elect2000-Randy

[Bobster]

Greetings,

The following will be N scale only for Peoria Rocket.  Ready to run with little modification.

Rather than hijack the thread about Bill's article I thought I'd start a new thread based on your Peoria Rocket comment.   Model Railroader (Author Mike Schafer) did the "Pike-size passenger trains: part 2" article years back which mentioned 2  Rockets and showed a couple passenger cars as well as showing a couple yellow and red E-8's leading the Peoria Rocket and the Quad City Rocket at Bureau, Illinois.    The article used engine re-painting and stand in cars.

Now a person wanting to model the Rock Island only has to do the cars.  Ebay frequently has E7A, E7B, and E8A's  in prototype paint.  Intermountain has FP7's in prototype paint.  I have even seem the E8's in yellow that the RI got from Union Pacific in later years.  I don't know if the yellow units made it to Peoria but I've seen pictures of them in Des Moines Iowa.

The passenger cars can be a real miix.  Some very old cars if you can live with them are some newer.   Micro scale decals will be needed but the following can be done:

RPO 720 is very close to the old 6 window RPO Con-Cor RPO. Switch the lightweight 4 wheel sets to 6 wheel heavyweight sets. I have a picture of it painted silver.

RPO 753 Sand the window frames off the old Con-Cor 10 window RPO.  paint it silver and add 6 wheel trucks.

RPO 510-516  If you can live with ancient the Arnold shortie RPO works with one extra window.

Baggage 854-858 Very close to a Kato de-skirted Budd baggage car. I have a blue print, but no pictures, showing skirts.   I have seen a picture of 854 in Peoria.

Coaches 312-315 Atlas-Rivarossi 52 seat coach.  Ancient molds yet Rock Island prototypes!  Waterloo, Golden Rod, Mistle Toe, and Hawthorne.  Originally 52 seat coaches rebuilt to 40 seats in 1956.   The usual companions in the Rivarossi set are baggage dorm 820 which I don't see as logical in a Peoria Rocket, and Observation Golden Vista/Golden Divan which probably never went to Peoria when in the round tail configuration .

Budd diners 420 Mount Evans and 421 Centennial (2nd) are prototypes   Kato Budd Diner.  422-424 very close Yucca, Sahuaro, Ocotilla.

There are also 40 foot express green box cars and silver box cars numbered in the 20000-20084 series.

TOFC  Atlas.  In my lifetime I have seen trailer on flatcars right behind the engine(s)

Now having said all that there are many more possibilities should one want to use additional car sides.  I think someone has done ex-troop sleepers that would be RI prototypical.  I'm a little tired so forgive me if I'm not remembering this straight.  I believe there are heavy weight baggage cars out there that are correct but I just can't remember who makes them.   Kato engines E8 and F7 will work but will need repainted  E8's are 643-661, E9's are 662-665, F7's are 675-677.  For Intermountain FP7 numbers were 402-411.

Again this was N scale RTR with minor changes for the Peoria Rocket only.

Happy modeling,
Bob L.

[sd45elect2000]

Thanks Bob,

I always liked the Rock trains and with the new cornfields available I thought that the Peoria Rocket would be a wonderful train in a typical setting. I almost have all of the cars so I guess I can get started !!

Randy Stahl

[jmlaboda]

There's a lot more that can be done if a person doesn't mind investing in the time and patience needed to accomplish more accurate cars.  Click the link below to visit the Rock Island page at the N-scale Varnish's User's Guide...

http://n-scalevarnish.info/index/varnish/UsersGuide/CRIP.htm

[skytop35]

Union Station Products has some sides for Rock Island, with a little work they make up into a nice car.

[Bobster]

Greetings Randy & all,

I agree with Bill and Jerry that's why my last paragraph starts "with the many more possibilities should one want to use additional car sides".    I was aiming at ready to run.  The ex Minneapolis & St. Louis Herrington, pictured above, is an outstanding of examplea coach from the last of the Rockets.  The E units would have been solid maroon, maroon with yellow "wings", or red and yellow.  Then there was E-8 652 in a bankruptcy blue and red scheme with a huge white star on the nose for the bicentennial in 1976.

Several other things that may be of note.  Much of the Peoria Rocket route was in the Illinois River Valley.  From LaSalle, Illinois Eastward for many miles the railway is paralleled by the Illinois and Michigan Canal and the old Chicago, Ottawa, and Peoria Traction roadbed.    The Rock Island's one railroad tunnel in Illinois is between Utica and LaSalle.   Split Rock Tunnel is a short tunnel through a sandstone outcropping.  The canal builders split the rock to put the canal through.  Hence the name.   The Rock Island originally went through the rock.  Then the soft sandstone was cut back for a track between the rock and the canal.  Finally the rock was cut back more and both mainline tracks were outside the tunnel.   There was a retaining wall put in on the north edge of the canal and the track through the tunnel was removed.  CSX has since made this a one track main again.  Yet the tunnel still remains today though unused.

In the Peoria area, just above the narrows, at the south end of upper Peoria Lake,  on Illinois 29 / Galena Road,  the tracks are  squeezed to the waters edge by the river bluff.   People have built houses as far south as possible which means the first step off their front porch is railroad track.
The first of the cornfields heading north would be just North of Peoria east of the tracks in the San Koty section of Peoria Heights near Gardner Lane.   Next about 15 mile north, just north of Chillicothe, north of where the Rock Island went under the Santa Fe.  I think there are baseball fields there now.  The next opportunity would be from North of Sparland to south of Bureau where the river bluff is farther west.  From Bureau to Ottawa you're back in the valley.  The valley gets shallower as you get closer to Chicago.  If my memory is correct the corn fields didn't really get close to the tracks again until just East of Joliet then there were I remember seeing many.

Now all the above is if you want to be prototypical.   Google earth can be your friend, although much has built up since then.   I guess this kind of tells you where I grew up.   My first train ride was the Peoria Rocket to Chicago in the mid 1960's.  My second trip on the Rocket was a day trip to watch the Cardinals beat the Cubs in May 69.   I also rode the Rocket to Bureau Junction as a teen in the1975/76 time frame with local bicycle club.  We pedaled back to Peoria.  It was supposed to be one of the last Peoria Rockets and there were lots of rail fans out with cameras.  Then the state of Illinois got involved and the Rockets continued on.   That ride was slow and really rocked and rolled.   I remember the engine was really filthy.   I wasn't into trains or photography then.

This may be way more than you wanted to know but thank you for letting me share it. 
Bob L.

[Nato]

                    Here are a couple of photos of a Rock Island Train on the Riverside end of my N Scale layout in Salt Lake. The cars are Rivarossi and Con Cor, the locomotive is Life Like. These photos taken about three years ago by Bob Gilmore (Robert 3985) show this part of the layout before more trees and the telegraph poles were in place. Nate Goodman (Nato).

Rock Island 001 small by ngoodmanlgcy, on Flickr

Rock Island 002 small by ngoodmanlgcy, on Flickr

[Bobster]

Nato,

Nice pictures of the Rocket.  Nice pictures in the link also.   

Bob L.