Model Railroading > Livin' Large, with F units

Here are some F units on Live Steam tracks in Texas.

The B&O F has recently been sold to a guy in Houston, but it operated by its previous owner here in East Texas.

These WP F's were owned by the guy shown from Houston, but he recently sold them to a bloke in Salt Lake City.
The man from Houston still has a triplet of Santa Fe geeps - GP7-GP7B-GP7,

These Santa Fe F's A-B-B-A are battery powered.  They were from an estate from OK City, the owner who passed
built them about 25 years ago.  They are nicely detailed, as well as its obvious warbonnet eye candy dress.

The 2nd and 3rd photo are at a track near Comanche, Tex.

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These SP Black Widow F units are gas powered shown here, but are currently being converted to battery power.
The owner of these is the son of the owner of the warbonnet F's in the page above.  The Black Widow Cotton Belt
RS3 was mine, but I sold it two years ago to a buddy of trainorders.com member SantaFeDan.

Second photo are KCS painted (but private road lettered) FA's but I guess are still considered F units?  These at a track near Fort Worth.

Third photo is a UP F7 owned by a guy from the Dallas area.  It has a really cool gyra-lite and is battery powered.
 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/13/18 17:41 by WrongWayMurphy.

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Cool stuff Shane.Would love those WP ones,but the SF units are magnificent.
Regards,dK

This FTA and FTB are brand spanking new, gas hydraulic powered, scratchbuilt by a genius in Weatherford, TX.
This was its maiden voyage, Train Mountain ORE back in June of this year.  Details like front pilot, horn, etc have
not been installed yet.  Owner shown operating them here, is ex- BNSF from Fort Worth and is conductor for the
narrow gauge in summer at Cumbres and Toltec.

THe newest entry into Texas F's is this A-B-A set of Texas & Pacific F7's.  These were complete basket cases last year,
and the owner, seen operating them here, worked magic and converted them to battery power with all new electronics,
patched the bdies, and applied the paint.  Not very good photos on these (I took all the above but not the last two).
They will be properly photographed during our spring meet season.

That is the majority of the F units here.  We have some PA's and at least one E but those will have to be shown another time.

 



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/13/18 18:00 by WrongWayMurphy.

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Excuse my ignorance but on the multiple unit sets, namely the WP and SFe sets, are all units powered and controlled from a single controller? 

Railbaron Wrote:
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> Excuse my ignorance but on the multiple unit sets,
> namely the WP and SFe sets, are all units powered
> and controlled from a single controller? 

Not sure about the WP units, but am very familar with the ATSF units.

The warbonnets have batteries and motors in the B units, and the A-s have all motor controls, sound system,
air compressor (for brakes),lighting controls, wireless controls in them.  Thus it takes at least one A and one B
to run a train.  Last fall one of the motor controls failed in one A unit and they ran A-B-B.  With the wireless
he can run any combination, and one can consist the units just like we do with HO DCC locomotives.  We use
wireless controllers made by CVP Products marketed under the AirWire name (made for use for G scale trains)
and modified for these outdoor trains.
 

Any of those beautiful Fs have working Mars lights?  One from a fire engine could work, they are
12VDC and would be nearly the correct size.

SR2 Wrote:
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> Any of those beautiful Fs have working Mars
> lights?  One from a fire engine could work, they
> are
> 12VDC and would be nearly the correct size

I dont know the diff between Mars and Gyra-Lite, but the WP, ATSF and UP units have one or the other.
The FT's will have one when completed, and I would venture that the T&P units will eventually get them too.
The ATSF A's use small motors with cams on the output shaft that rotate arms connected to a flashlight in a figure 8 pattern.

Beautiful!!

Bill Deaver
Tehachapi, CA

Wow, those F units look great!

Ryan Wilkerson
Fair Oaks, CA

Amazing work from talented people. Thank you for sharing. 

Mike ONeill
Parker, CO

I belong to LALS, and man, those are some nice units. A friend on mine has a complete SF A-B-B-A set, with ars in 1 inch scale.

BTW, they build those engineers BIG in Texas!

Does Santa have room in his sleigh for the Santa Fe ABBA set to my house?

Awesome!

Is there livin large with E units? Have they ever been produced in this scale? 

BuddPullman Wrote:
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> Awesome!
>
> Is there livin large with E units? Have they ever
> been produced in this scale? 

This E8 was at Train Mountain in June and is very well detailed, battery powered, sound, wireless control.
I didn't think to take a close photo of it, unfortunately.  The builder is in Wisconsin, is a all around good dude.
This one sells for about $25k.

He can build you your own high quality custom painted E for a similar price.

 

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Nice shots wish that I was not tied up again during the meet next time isnt going to happen. Am going to put my walking shoes on and enjoy being a spectator and bum rides. Boyd in Chiloquin ps thanks for the pix.

I hope this makes it on the list:

Interesting pictures of the SP A & B unit.

Those were mine from the late 80s thru 2000. They were electric. I purchased them from Walter Bebe in Portland, Or. and he is the one that built the engines. When I purchased the engines they were painted "Daylight" colors. I had them painted in Grants Pass into the "Black Widow" paint scheme.  One of the first things that jumped right out was the lettering. The lead unit is correct aside the nose lettering.  but the "B" unit is not. The "B" units only had numbers on their side, not Southern Pacific. When I told Jerry in Grants Pass how I wanted it, I failed to catch the numbering of the "B". My fault.

The other items: There was a "Mars Light". I re-wired the head light controls and put it in.  There was a red position that would overide the white Mars. I also installed an air compressor and a better vacuum valve & controls.  Also, at the end of the "B" unit I installed a Red-White marker. I built this like the old "B" units had for lite engine movements. There are a lot of places I could ID the engine.. 

I kept the "Remote"  uncoupling device Walter put in on the front coupler.  He loved it. The list goes on.

I made a deal with Breen to sell the units to him in exchange of other 1.5 items and cash. That could have been in the late 90s but that is when I left Train Mountain. Never saw cash or anything else.

Its too bad. Now Bob's 1.5 switcher is missing from TM. He loved building the engine (to his use). He and his freind Barney Barham from Idaho worked many hours on the brake valves. 

Well, at least my 2-6-0 is safe in the Sacramento Museum in Sacramento. They have it on display on the second floor in a glass box.

Its sad when items go missing then pop up many years later under a different storry.

Almost forgot. Earnie with his Jublie from Canada lost his trailer on I-5 in the Valley below Red Bluff.  He was on the way home from a Sacramento meet, Its been years ago.  Well, the cops were there and they had to clean up the freeway, not to much damage. Funny thing was his caboose broke free of the trailer and was sitting there during all this.  When he went to leave his caboose was missing. Someone must have stopped next to it and loaded it up. No easy feat. He of course has passed on, but nobody ever saw the caboose again. 


Nudge



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/16/18 11:49 by spnudge.

R,

That A & B were removed from TM without permission. I know, they belonged to me. There is a switcher that was stolen too. Look under more "Model" or  F units.  Its sad.


Nudge