Model Railroading > Thanks, Ken and Tony for the SPMW Inspiration

In 2022 The Southern Pacific History and Technical Society published Southern Pacific Maintenance of Way Equipment by Kenneth W Harrison.  In 2006 they also published Southern Pacific Freight Cars Vol. 4 Box Cars by Anthony W Thompson.
I like to run "track slider" cars to keep my layout rails clean (or at least less dirty) but I don't like seeing those stock Walthers cars so I install A-Line sliders on more intersting 40 foot cars.
Here are two that I just finished, as inspired by the two above books.
The SPMW 2474 is a bit of a Foobie, I did not find an exact match for the reporting marks, but it is definately a USRA 50-ton 40-foot double sheathed car per their spec 1003 B, classsifed by the SP as B50-12.  The number fits within the series range of 50 ton SPMW boxes.
The SPMW 6270 is as close as I could come to the car shown on Page 291 of Ken's book.  It was originally built for the Pacific Electric but ended up in SPMW service.  It is SP class B50-13, complete with T-Section trucks.
The fine print on the sides of both cars is the two warning signs (English and Spanish) that SP placed on MW cars advising all persons not to sleep under them as they may be moved at any time.  As a teenage railfan I tried to follow them to understand what I could of Spanish, which never went well as I had to go to summer school to try and change the "D" I got in 9th grade.
Not shown here are two others to run when I have the layout set up for BN operations, 40 ft steel cars as BN and NP.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/25 21:25 by railstiesballast.

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Very tastefully done, kudos!

Those cars do look great. I haven't tried the A-Line sliders yet. I went with a different approach using the Walthers cars. The Walthers cars have a woefully inadequate shell, as I'm sure you noticed, but the frame on down is really solid and tracks great in either direction. I considered installing a better car body but honestly like the look of them painted flat black. Not that they really represent anything very prototypical, but their my MOW stock and super easy to find on the layout and I grew to like that. Add to that I don't have to worry about handling them. A couple of drops of mineral spirits cleans the pads effortlessly, and keeps me happy enough with my approach to stay lazy with them.

I would like to try the A-Line set up on a more modern fifty foot car though.

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The Walthers track cleaning cars do a pretty good job. I use old Athearn livestock car bodies to improve their appearance, ignoring their modern trucks for the sake of better running trains. I also have one Harriman baggage car equipped with the same slider cleaner for my 5 car mail train.