The late George Hockaday once told me that they actually swapped scrap rail for the Sharks. No matter what the deal was, I'm glad they were saved, and hopefully they will be made more visible to the public in the future.

As to the throttles, the last 10 AS-16 Road Switchers had GE electrical gear including throttles. Reading Company bought four of them and they were orphans among orphans. PRSL bought the other six in 1956 but not until Baldwin changed the GE throttles to the WABCO air throttles so they could MU with PRSL's other Road Switchers (all Baldwins).

The air throttles were WABCO, not Westinghouse Electric.

The RF-16 Shark units all had WABCO air throttles.

Phil Mulligan

The freight car-for-Shark swap reference in my previous post was from a story in the Winter 2012 issue of Classic Trains. It directly quoted Sterzing on this matter.

Regarding throttles, the Erie had a modest fleet of Baldwin road switchers that were M.U. compatible with their EMD and Alco counterparts.

JR

That's the story I always heard. Scrap freight cars equal to the weight of the Sharks.