Model Railroading > SP SD9e perspectives

Scanning slides tonight so I thought I'd share a few here for the modelers. Part of doing any model is getting photos of what you want to model for detail parts needed and what the locomotive looked like in different time periods.
 
Photo one is 4319 soon after the GRIP rebuild in the early 70's in Oakland. Originally 5372 built Jan 55, then numbered 3850 in 1965 finally getting 4319 as her last number. Scarlet and grey never looked so good.
Photo two is 4429 at Mojave 6-22-85 wearing fresh paint. Upgraded 9-8-77, wondering how it ended up getting repainted. Accident? Kodachrome repaint after failed merger?
Photo three is snow service 4348 with a nice patina on her in Sparks Nevada October 84. This is the weathering I personally like on any SP model. 

Hard to believe a few of these are still working 65 years later. SD9s forever!

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The SP SD9's were regulars where I spent my elementary thru college years in the Davis/Sacramento area in the 1971-1984 period.  Always been favorites and I couldn't resist getting one of the Walthers SD9E's.

Cheers, Jim 

One of my favorite memories is leaving East Bay Model Engineer's Society's layout in Emeryville one Friday night, and heading over to the West Oakland Diesel Shop to see if the commute fleet had come in to do their "weeked warrior" duties. A Westbound train had pulled into the yard for a crew change to head Eastbound to Roseville up the Cal-P. Lead unit was an SD45T-2 - I want to say 9157 but I honestly don't remember - followed by 9 Cadillacs, all working!

Those SD9s completely drowned out the sound of the T-2s turbo. The sound was glorious. You had to be there! It's not something I'll ever forget.

One of the few regrets I have in selecting 1953 as the year I model is that I can't model any SD or GP9s. I do get to model the SD7 in the original tiger stripe wth silver ends paint scheme, which is a nice consolation.

Thanks for sharing these photos. 

Arved Grass
Fleming Island, FL



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/06/20 06:06 by Arved.

Put a DeLorean on your layout, so you can freely model those 9's .  Looking at my fleet, said DeLorean is the only explanation, other than the influence of Dr. Who.

Fresh gray and scarlett sure looks good.  

Some roof details you might like.
Back-in-the-day the SP would sometimes tie down work trains and flangers in Colfax and leave them, um, unattended....
SR



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/06/20 19:58 by BoilingMan.

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Fantastic shots. The roof pictures are always welcome to us modelers SR. Do you happen to know the locomotive number?  Sporting a Nathan M3 horn too with horn heating element. Thanks for posting these.
I just posted some more SD9e pics on the nostalgia board. In your back yard, Truckee 
Thanks again 

SP SD9’s are an all- time fave of mine. I have a pair of P2K’s, a brass flanger, a sack of detail parts, and plenty of photos taken over the years- My goal is a snow scene diorama.
SR

I’ll go through the pics today and get the numbers of the roof detail units- I’ll post them here.

Looks like I climbed up on two pairs on two different days:   The 4305 & 4319 coupled to a caboose on a dry day, and the 4438 & 4384 coupled to a gon full of scrap on a wet day.
I probably shot these in 1985, give or take a year.
As near as I can tell:
4305 Photos 7-8-9
4319 Photos 1-2-3-4
4438 Photo 10
4384 Photos 5-6-11-12
Points of interest:  The 4319 doesn't have the blister over the electrical cabinet.  The 4384 has the FARR air filter.
 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/07/20 10:05 by BoilingMan.

Why SR, it's amazing how you got different perspectives of each unit from what I sure is the overpass, because surely you didn't climb up top ;-)  I've climbed up a GP9, didn't find it an inviting place to be.  Great photos.  You can clearly see the wire mesh applied to the grills on some of the fans. My guess it was to help prevent crew members feet from accidentially getting caught in the grill and causing a trip.  I think it was orginally applied to the rear fan, but they got switched around a lot.  I made an attempt at representing that on my models a few years ago:

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?3,4467463,4467463#msg-4467463

Dave, if you're scanning more of Thom's slides, don't hoarde, we'd all love to see them ;-)  Good motivation to get to the SD9s I have remaining in my "to do" pile.

Elizabeth

Yup,
With the Walthers units out, trying to feed the SD9e frenzy and keep interest up on these fine EMD products. I'll post more. Some are needing more photoshop work. Thom took GREAT notes.
I posted some of Mark McLeod's snow service power of the 70's here: https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,4953652 yesterday.
I have four P2K re motored with Kato motors from the old run I want to do. I did breakers for McLeod's 4317 as a warm up. (photo attached)
SR's photos definitely rock. Top shots are always welcome

Dave

Betsy Wrote:
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> Dave, if you're scanning more of Thom's slides,
> don't hoarde, we'd all love to see them ;-)  Good
> motivation to get to the SD9s I have remaining in
> my "to do" pile.
>
> Elizabeth

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Terrific images, all!  These are very helpful. Thanks for sharing.

Cheers.
Harry

Warming to the subject-  a few more detail shots:
SR

Photo 1.  4305
Photo 2.  4319
Photo 3.  4319?

 

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1.  4305
2.  4319
3.  4305

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4305-4319
 

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SR

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Outstanding images. 4319 has a better patina in your photos than the first photo in this thread. Funny thing is I did 4438 over 20 years ago and traded it off. Time to do a better version for myself. These photos are a modelers gold mine for SD9 modeling. Thanks for taking the time to post them SR

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You're welcome and, nice models! 
I really like the blistered paint around 4305's D/B-  if I can figure out how to model this, then I think 4305 would get the nod as my trailing unit.  Someone must know the technique involved?

I never tired of shooting SD9's, my fave SP diesel in the 80's.  The day the SP retired the last one was surely,  "The day the music died"
SR