Reading & Northern Acquires Eleven Iowa Pacific Cars

Alexander D. Mitchell IV · **Posted:** Wed Jul 21, 2021 4:55 pm

https://www.facebook.com/RBMNPassenger/ ... 2638322313

Quote:

The Reading and Northern has purchased eleven passenger coaches of various types of seating. A passenger coach auction occurred over the first half of 2021 in Colorado. Many of the coaches have an amazing history, previously running on famous trains including the “City of New Orleans”, the “Crescent”, and the “Twentieth Century Limited”. There are several types of seating: coach, dome, parlor, open air, and lounge.
The Reading and Northern has renumbered the majority of the equipment to better fit into the current numbering system of the Passenger Department. Some of these coaches are unlike any the Reading and Northern has ever owned over 36 years in the passenger business.
More information about the equipment moves from Colorado to Pennsylvania will be given on our Facebook pages. Many of these cars will be accessible to the general public for years to come. Passenger ridership records continue to be broken through spring and early summer of 2021. All eleven cars will make a great addition to our expanding operations for years to come.
Over the next few weeks we will be posting more information and pictures of each of our new coaches so stay tuned for those!

Alexander D. Mitchell IV · **Posted:** Wed Jul 21, 2021 5:02 pm

Tentative ID list so far, pulled from various sources:

59: full dome built by Pullman-Standard, Lot 6908, Plan 7635 built in 1952 as Milwaukee Road 59, ex-Amtrak 9383. Iowa Pacific picked up full dome 59 in 2012 from Washington Central/Columbia Basin - Spirit of Washington 108 carried named City of Renton. Car was used on Iowa Pacific's Santa Cruz & Monterey Bay operation in California.

448: ex-NYC stainless lightweight diner, recently briefly leased by BNSF.
2904: Ex-IC heavyweight coach
3305 is the ex-IC Mardi Gras round-end observation from the Roanoke Chapter NRHS, and famous from NS steam excursions.
3378 "Calumet Club" is ex-WICT, exx-IC, rebuilt to parlor/obs/lounge in 1952 from a heavyweight coach.
1056 is heavyweight open-window rebuild Lookout Mountain and famous from Southern steam excursions thru early NS years.
1062: Heavyweight coach
1066-1068 are all former Southern modernized heavyweight coaches, used in the Southern excursions as well.
1125: Ex-VIA/CN lightweight P-S duplex sleeper "Ellerslie"

EJ Berry · **Posted:** Wed Jul 21, 2021 9:40 pm

NYC 448 - RBMN 1166 is a 1947 Budd stainless steel 44-seat diner.

Phil Mulligan

traingeek8223 · **Posted:** Thu Jul 22, 2021 10:27 am

1062 is formerly SL&RG 5067 and before that Adirondack Scenic Railroad 5067 and Canadian National 5067.

mcgrath618 · **Joined:** Mon Feb 15, 2021 6:54 pm **Posts:** 231

Surprised they didn’t go after the Crusader observation car. Anyone know the status of it? If a railroad like the RBMN wouldn’t touch it, I worry that it is in a bad way at the moment.

diningcartim · **Joined:** Fri Sep 20, 2013 2:34 pm **Posts:** 197

It looks like all of the cars they bought are mostly ready to run, not many of the "projects" that IP had.

Does the R&N have a power car? I would think at this point they will need one.

bigjim4life · **Posted:** Thu Jul 22, 2021 12:15 pm

diningcartim wrote:

It looks like all of the cars they bought are mostly ready to run, not many of the "projects" that IP had.

Does the R&N have a power car? I would think at this point they will need one.

They do have a generator car - but I'm not sure of its current operable status: http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPi ... id=4621329

Alexander D. Mitchell IV · **Posted:** Thu Jul 22, 2021 12:15 pm

As I recall the R&N has a power car or two.

What is the other Crusader car besides the one at the RR Museum of Pa.? I'm losing track in my older cluttered brain.............

mcgrath618 · **Joined:** Mon Feb 15, 2021 6:54 pm **Posts:** 231

Alexander D. Mitchell IV wrote:

As I recall the R&N has a power car or two.

What is the other Crusader car besides the one at the RR Museum of Pa.? I'm losing track in my older cluttered brain.............

The other Crusader car is the opposite observation car. It was included on the list of Iowa Pacific cars that were up for auction (its original number was 4, I’m not sure what it was renumbered to under SLRG but it still exists). Last I heard it was sitting with a bunch of other cars somewhere out west…

mcgrath618 · **Joined:** Mon Feb 15, 2021 6:54 pm **Posts:** 231

mcgrath618 wrote:

Surprised they didn’t go after the Crusader observation car. Anyone know the status of it? If a railroad like the RBMN wouldn’t touch it, I worry that it is in a bad way at the moment.

They have two. One is the ex baggage that was posted by bigjim4life, and the other is what I believe to be an ex PRR baggage. It’s painted in LGSR Blue at the moment and is sitting in Jim Thorpe.

Edit: said car is RBMN 6: http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPi ... id=5220383

The red power car is operable. Last time I saw it used was in 2019 behind 425 on a November excursion.

Corey Page · **Posted:** Thu Jul 22, 2021 12:48 pm

mcgrath618 wrote:

Surprised they didn’t go after the Crusader observation car. Anyone know the status of it? If a railroad like the RBMN wouldn’t touch it, I worry that it is in a bad way at the moment.

Here's the most recent picture that I know of it online, It appears to be in decent shape (aside from the trucks being off at the time of the photo), though that's my non-experienced perspective looking at one photo.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPi ... id=4126901

mcgrath618 · **Joined:** Mon Feb 15, 2021 6:54 pm **Posts:** 231

Corey Page wrote:

mcgrath618 wrote:

Surprised they didn’t go after the Crusader observation car. Anyone know the status of it? If a railroad like the RBMN wouldn’t touch it, I worry that it is in a bad way at the moment.

Here's the most recent picture that I know of it online, It appears to be in decent shape (aside from the trucks being off at the time of the photo), though that's my non-experienced perspective looking at one photo.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPi ... id=4126901

Okay, so, I had some spare time at work, and I did a little sleuthing.

RDG 5 was stored in Wheeler, WA until about 2012, when it was transferred to the SLRG. Railfan and Railroad’s list erroneously still says that it is in Washington. I’m not sure if it was ever given reporting marks or a new number, but I assumed that it somehow made its way to Alamosa, CO.

Unfortunately, there aren’t any photos of it in Alamosa, or, at least, they aren’t easy to find. However, using Google Street view, I scoured around the area looking for clues. I saw that there were about five cars from Washington stored off track on the south side of their site, but unfortunately the last Street View was taken in 2012 just before they arrived. I had thought I’d found it on rails, but it’s another very similar round end observation car.

So I suppose it’s missing? Assumedly it’s in Alamosa, but I can’t prove it.

Topfuel · **Joined:** Sun Aug 29, 2004 4:49 pm **Posts:** 529

"RDG 5 was stored in Wheeler, WA until about 2012, when it was transferred to the SLRG. Railfan and Railroad’s list erroneously still says that it is in Washington. I’m not sure if it was ever given reporting marks or a new number, but I assumed that it somehow made its way to Alamosa, CO."

It's in Moses Lake, WA. It currently has a bid from a private party of $15,000.00.

mcgrath618 · **Joined:** Mon Feb 15, 2021 6:54 pm **Posts:** 231

Topfuel wrote:

"RDG 5 was stored in Wheeler, WA until about 2012, when it was transferred to the SLRG. Railfan and Railroad’s list erroneously still says that it is in Washington. I’m not sure if it was ever given reporting marks or a new number, but I assumed that it somehow made its way to Alamosa, CO."

It's in Moses Lake, WA. It currently has a bid from a private party of $15,000.00.

Where in Moses lake? All of the Spirit of Washington cars were stored in Wheeler, WA in front of some old sugar silos until most were transferred to CA or CO. The OP of this thread has the car as being in California, but I’m not sure how reliable that is.

Also, how did you hear about that bid?

EJ Berry · **Posted:** Thu Jul 22, 2021 5:07 pm

The Reading Crusader cars were numbered:
1-Obs car
2-Coach
3-Diner
4-Coach
5-Obs

The train was built in 1937 and sold to CN in 1962 who rebuilt and retrucked it.

The obs cars had panels to cover the front windows on the car coupled to the engine and the two G-1sas Pacifics (117 and 118) had stainless steel shrouds to hide the rounded Obs Car end. The two obs cars do not have end doors.

In the diesel era only FP-7's 900-905 could pull the train as only they had Electropneumatic brakestands. [in reality the old EP brakes were backward compatible with conventional air and could operate using automatic air]

Phil Mulligan