Great Northern Railway Red River Streamliner

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

The Great Northern Red River was inaugurated in 1950 and operated from St. Paul, Minnesota to Grand Forks, North Dakota. Its schedule had the train leave St. Paul Union Depot at 5:30 p.m. arriving in Grand Forks at 11:59 p.m. The train returned the next day to St. Paul leaving Grand Forks at 7:30 a.m. with arrival in St. Paul at 2:30 p.m.. Upon arriving at SPUD, the train was serviced and readied for its 5:30 departure.

The Red River was a single set of five car train pulled by a single E7A number 512. The cars were built by ACF, consisted of a RPO/Baggage, three(3) 60-seat coaches and a Dinette/Coffee Shop/Parlor observation. In the 1960's the Dinette/Coffee Shop/Parlor observation car was removed and the Cafe/Coach from sister five car streamliner, the International(Seattle to Vancouver, B.C.), was substituted.

The interesting thing about GN E7A #512 is it wore the standard E7A paint scheme, F-unit style scheme and simplified.

This is sister E7A #511 in the original scheme worn by the E7's. The date of the photo is mid-1960 as the train negotiates Northern Pacific's Northtown yard. The train in the photo is the Red River. The RPO/Baggage has been replaced by a straight baggage. The long bridge in the background is St. Anthony Parkway.




The 512 in the F-unit style of paint. The photo is near Westminster Tower in St. Paul.



The 501 in the last scheme worn by many of the GN's E7's the unpopular "simplified" scheme.



The model is an Oriental Limited import, built by Samhongsa. Its from the late 1980's just before Oriental shut down and their projects were taken over by Challenger Imports. Its a good model with a can motor, dual flywheels and sprung trucks. I had started to paint the train a number of years ago and was never really happy with the base coat. Looks strange in just orange paint.


























The tail car after taking a bath in "super stripper" to remove the second try with the Scalecoat paint.









As you can see the car is tarnished and rather ugly. Now its time to sand or media blast it.

My media blaster





The tail car after blasting. Much cleaner and better looking without that tarnish.








You MUST NOT TOUCH THE BLASTED BRASS WITH BARE HANDS. This will leave oils from your skin on the unprotected brass. The brass will tarnish immediately leaving perfect impressions of your fingerprints on the model. You don't want this as it can and will affect your finish. I use medical gloves to handle the brass after blasting.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

The baggage/RPO in paint. Still needs window glazing(clear 0.05" is on the way), interior, lighting and decoder.

[thebessemerkid]

Good looking train.

Are you bead blasting or using some other media?

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Feb 14, 2015 10:13:51 GMT -8 thebessemerkid said:

Good looking train.

Are you bead blasting or using some other media?

A fine grit aluminum oxide is what I've got in the blast cabinet.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Started working on the interior for the coaches. I'm using the excellent Red Cap Lines Heywood Wakefield coach seat kits. Each kit does a 48 seat coach. But the Red River coaches are 60 seats. So it takes four kits.

The prototype had two different colors of fabric colors used on the seats. The middle rows of seats were blue and the outer rows of seats were a maroon color. Two rows of seats on one end faced each other according to a builders photo in the Randall book on GN's ACF and Budd built cars.

I loosely arranged the seats to see what it roughly will look like in the car. The tan colored seats will need to be painted. I'll also be painting the blue seats a closer blue to the in the prototype. I will not be trying to paint on the wheat shaft the prototype seats had embroidered in the top portion of the seat back.




I put the cart before the horse and put the sides of the seat on one set. The sides need to be painted and the armrest on the prototype is upholstered in the same fabric as the seat. You can see the detail of the Red Cap seat.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Tried some fancy photography of the completed RPO Baggage. It's a failure.

Anyway, the glazing is in, the walls of the interior painted a pale green if a full interior is ever desired and it's wired for a decoder and lighting. The diaphragm is the last piece to this cars puzzle.

 

[brokenrail]

Beautiful project and thanks for sharing it with us. Expect a large box in the mail with all my unpainted GN brass.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

I got the other four cars in full paint. Now its on to stripes and lettering.

[onequiknova]

Remind me to only model stainless passenger cars. Man, that's a lot of striping.

[riogrande]

Sweet. The GN is a handsome passenger train!

[alcoc430]

Wow great work on the paint. Thanks for sharing

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Red River coach 1137. 1137 is a 60 seat coach with a conductors compartment.




Women's rest room and the conductor's desk window. The venetian blinds are Plano etchings which are fabulous.




I make the blinds different lengths to make the car look like it is in service.




The window on the end is a hallway window. I added the safety bar and made the shade out of sheet styrene. The windows in the hallways had shades and not blinds.






Men's restroom. The dressing room for the men was smaller than the ladies and thus the window is smaller.

[mrsocal]

Very cool!! The blinds look spectacular.

[wjstix]

Technically the E7s were delivered with "Great Northern" written in script on the nose, along with 'goat' heralds. That only lasted a year or two before the more common "E unit" scheme was applied.

FWIW, compared to other simplified paint schemes, I always thought GN's was one of the more attractive ones. Not as good as "Big Sky Blue" of course....

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Finished up the coach 1138 the second coach in the train.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

The little streamliner is coming together.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

The Oriental Limited E7A for the Red River represents a unit in the mid to late 1960's. Specifically, the rotary beacon which was a device that became standard equipment in the 1960's. Since, the modeling of the train is the late 1950's to early 1960's, the beacon needed to be removed.

This is the "beacon" that Samhongsa had soldered to the roof. It is a solid casting. I saw one of these models custom painted and the painter did the only thing one could with this beacon and that was to paint the lens yellow. Hardly very convincing.




Here is the E7A with the giant hole that Samhongsa put on these units for the beacon patched. I soldered a piece of brass on the bottom and due to the curvature of the E7A roof I used solder to fill. I then filed and sanded the solder smooth to match the roofs contour.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Finishing up the fifth and last car to the little streamliner. The "Red" of the name Red River are individual letters I pieced together as are the numbers. Wait till you see the Tomar Red River tail sign in place and illuminated.

[riogrande]

Looking awesome!

[TBird1958]

Great work, the striping job is excellent! I've always struggled to get them straight - yours are are spot on!

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Jun 24, 2015 9:45:56 GMT -8 wjstix said:

Technically the E7s were delivered with "Great Northern" written in script on the nose, along with 'goat' heralds. That only lasted a year or two before the more common "E unit" scheme was applied.

FWIW, compared to other simplified paint schemes, I always thought GN's was one of the more attractive ones. Not as good as "Big Sky Blue" of course....

Great Northern E7A's 510, 511 and 512 were delivered in the standard E7 butter knife scheme from EMD in August 1947. E7A's 500-509, built as 500A-504B in June 1945 had the scripted "Great Northern" scheme which was short lived.

Photo of 512 with the Red River on its inaugural tour.

 www.flickr.com/photos/hunter1828/15468176659/


A nice breakdown of the various schemes and numbers of the E7A

www.greatnorthernempire.net/index2.htm?GNEGNPrototypeDrawingsDiesel.htm

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Some poor photos of the opposite side of obs.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Did some of the detail painting on the obs car like the marker lights.

[slowfreight]

Making much faster progress now. Keep us posted.

[tankcarsrule]

Man, that's a lot of great modeling!

Regards, Bobby

[scl1234]

Outstanding work Jim!

One question... Who sells the "mail duffel pick-up appliance*" shown just outside the door of that baggage/RPO?


*My apologies...since I can't remember the name.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Jul 16, 2015 9:51:40 GMT -8 scl1234 said:

Outstanding work Jim!

One question... Who sells the "mail duffel pick-up appliance*" shown just outside the door of that baggage/RPO?


*My apologies...since I can't remember the name.

This car is a brass Samhongsa model imported by Palace Car Company and the mail catch came with the car.


Cal-Scale makes a pouch catch.

www.ebay.com/itm/HO-SCALE-CAL-SCALE-345-MAIL-POUCH-CATCHER-/191501392583?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2c965f5ac7

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

Coach #1139 the final coach in the train.




Ladies lounge and restroom.












Aisle








Men's lounge and restroom. The men's lounge was smaller than the ladies.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

The Observation-20-seat Parlor-Lunch Counter Diner is finished except for the tail sign which goes in with the full interior.

















The small frosted window to the left of the galley door is a wardrobe room. The very small frosted window to the right of the door is the kitchen.





The lounge section was located at the front of the car and was exactly like the GN Empire Builder Ranch car, except the Red River car didn't have the western decor.




The parlor section was at the tail end of the car.




The frosted window is a ladies restroom consisting of nothing more than a hopper and sink. I guess the gentlemen had to hot foot it to the coach ahead if they needed to heed the call of nature.




The windows with bars and shades are an aisle way next to the lunch counter seating.




The Mars light is a Highliners headlight casting I whittled down to fit. It will get a red tinted light when the interior goes in the car. The lens on the Mars is a Highliners headlight lens I whittled down.






The curved windows in the curved section of the car was interesting to build. The Railway Classics tinted glass material is thick and straight as a board. I cut the size window I needed with a little extra. I then heated the window just enough so it was flexible. Then while still warm and pliable I pressed it inside the car. The window cooled and retained the curvature of the car.

[Great-Northern-Willmar Div]

More progress on the interiors of the Red River.

The coach seats are painted and assembled. The seats are from Red Cap Lines. They are models of Heywood Wakefield Sleepy Hollow reclining coach seats. The floor is Red Caps linoleum printed material. VERY detailed passenger car parts.

The Red River's three 60 seat coaches had a blue cloth on the middle seven rows of seats and a maroon cloth on the book ends of the blue seats. I painted the tidies(head rest covers) on the back of the seats.






How the seats look through the tinted windows of coach number 1137






Now onto the Railway Post Office/Baggage car's interior. The original plan was to cut up the interior from a Walthers Great Northern Empire Builder RPO. Both the Red River's RPO and the EB's RPO were built nearly at the same time by ACF. The EB's 60 seat coach is nearly the same interior as the Red River's 60 seat coaches. Both 1950 and 51 products of ACF. The major difference was the Red River had reclining leg rest seats, while the EB's 60 coach did not. The RPO on the Empire Builder was a full 85 foot car. The Red River had a 30' RPO section. The construction though being both 1950 and 51 graduates of ACF was similar.

Upon further review, I decided there was enough difference between the Empire Builder RPO and the Red River, that the plan of cutting up the EB RPO interior was going to be a mess. So I am now scratch building the interior of the Red River RPO/Baggage using the plans in W. David Randall's book on Western Railroad Budd and ACF built cars.

My efforts so far.

The table will support the pigeon hole mail cases, just like the prototype. The "boxes" underneath the table represent cabinets found under the table on the prototype. The bins on each side of the table are supposed to be mail sacks for sorting the mail. I copied Walthers interior as scratch building little sacks, seemed a LOT OVER THE TOP, even for me....Mr. Detail.