Nostalgia & History > Super Chief in Los Angeles

Photo taken at Union Station in May of 1971.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/26/20 11:57 by edsaalig.

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edsaalig Wrote:

> Photo taken at Union Station in May of 1971.

Could it be late April instead?  F45 5920 was the trailing unit on the last westbound San Francisco Chief that arrived at Richmond, CA on May 2,1971, so it can't have been on the last or even second-to-last Super Chief/El Capitan.  I haven't heard of Santa Fe leasing their 6-axle cowls to Amtrak before 1973, by which time 5946 was in freight paint.

       The crews showed their sorry attitudes by overspraying the silver touch up work on many of these units.

dcfbalcoS1 Wrote:
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>        The crews showed their sorry attitudes
> by overspraying the silver touch up work on many
> of these units.

The crews had nothing to do with it. The carmen were the ones with the bad aim with the spray gun.

The silver overspray was almost ubiqitous with anything painted red and silver, but this particular unit got more than its share.
I could never understand how a class act like the ATSF -- with the most recognizable paint scheme in all of railroading -- allowed their carmen to constantly muck things up like this.  Or how a carman could be so careless.

IIRC the silver spray job was one of the last things that happened before the engines were brought over from the engine facility.
It happened after all of the hoses and connections had been made. Which means they were under pressure to get it done fast!
Still doesn't explain why management didn't seem to do anything about it though.

You just know there was one guy assigned to the day shift "silver spray paint touch-up duty" with his paint cart at the 8th St. Coach Yard during this time period, who maybe wasn't good at much else, and wasn't good at this either.  It seemed to be common during the last year or so of operation prior to Amtrak, and at that time the ship was sinking pretty fast - even on the Santa Fe - and management likely looked the other way.  At least one could say that at least the Santa Fe was still going to the trouble to actually touch up the silver spray paint at this late date. 

Of course, maybe all the big overspray screw-ups happened when the regular man was on vacation, and a low-seniority guy had to fill in for just a day or two.  A likely scenario.