Friday, April 8, 2016

GTW P-S Covered Hoppers

CN former subsidiary Grand Trunk Western rostered 150 Pullman-Standard covered hoppers with reporting marks GTW 138200-138349, such as GTW 138262 westbound through Kingston on April 6, 1997 with a weathered fleetmate (above). The first fully P-S- (not Trinity-) built lot 9866 of 4740 cu ft cars, were built 10-11/76. GTW 138350-138449, built 1979 by P-S were 100 cars with a capacity of 4750 cu ft. with larger Grand Trunk Western lettering. P-S builder's photo:
GTW 138433 and a string of fleetmates near the P-S plant:
Earlier, GTW 315222, built 1972 by Pullman-Standard was one of a series of fifty cars, GTW 315180-315229 with a capacity of 4750 cu ft. - notice the tiny 'Grand Trunk Western' between the ribs:
Interestingly, some of the cars have been repainted into CN's brown website scheme, retaining their GTW reporting marks, with some receiving the IC-style reporting marks font. Most have received yellow conspicuity markings, and have rusted to the extent that their blue paint appears brown, and received various-coloured lettering patches to make their reporting marks legible.

It would seem that most of the GTW fleet has made its way into grain service in the twilight of its career. Joe Stover posted this 2009 photo to Facebook, showing a Hudson Bay Railway grain consist at Churchill, MB. Spot the GTW car? I knew that you could!
My 21st-century GTW sightings, when the paint and lettering was fading (like the number-unreadable car westbound at Kingston on CN No 309 in May, 2008) and spotting them became more of a rarity:
September 26, 2009 GTW 13832x on CN No 305 at Shannonville:
Some GTW covered hopper sightings with date, car number, CN train on and remarks:
Mar 23/97 GTW 138281-138421
Apr 27/97 GTW 138429
May 18/97 GTW 138286-138329
Jun 7/97 GTW 138360-138412-138365
Sep 13/97 GTW 138306 on No 308
Oct 5/97 GTW 139399 dest Bay City MI ety on No 395
Oct 26/97 GTW 138212-138414 on headend of No 395 dest Flint, MI empty
Nov 29/97 GTW 138443 near headend of No 395
Dec 6/97 GTW 138276 near headend of No 395
Apr 4/10 GTW 138207
Oct 13/11 GTW 138208
Jan 15/12 GTW 138394 noticeably faded!
Apr 6/12 GTW 138430 with yellow conspicuity stripes on CN train No 308 (below)
Nov 25/16 GTW 138422-138345 among a cut of grain cars and GTW 138201 on No 369. Although GTW 138422 had one good side of paint, the other two were almost brown.

In grain service, faded-lettering GTW 138x60 (above) and rusty 138399 (below) were through Kingston on April 1 and 2 respectively.
May 4, 2018: CN 138214 westbound - so brown they have to patch the reporting marks in blue:
Some 21st-century sightings:
  • January 9/21 GTW 138438
  • January 24/21 GTW 138331 repainted in CN 'website' scheme. Not as delivered, but still running.
  • February 14/21 GTW 138448 on CN No 306, (image courtesy Railstream, LLC):
  • March 22/21 GTW 138266 on CN No 305 (above), also with GTW 138439 in good paint (image courtesy Railstream, LLC)
  • Jan 3/23 GTW 138423 eastbound at Belleville in the CN 'website' scheme, returned westbound on January 6 (image courtesy Railstream, LLC):
Meanwhile, in HO scale, GTW 138240 has been painted and decalled and will always retain its nice, bright blue: 
 In 'N' yard on my Vancouver Wharves layout, sandwiched between BN and CP wooden ETU's:

Running extra...
This is one underrated book - Canadian Sunset by Adolf Hungry Wolf. A plethora of varied-era photos of this venerable streamliner. Beautiful reproduction and nice, large format. My only difficulty is with the "America's Last Great Train" cutline. I understand that some Americans think Canada is part of the US. Not after we build our wall they won't!

Speaking of fading into the sunset, American Idol's fifteenth and final season ended last night. Thank goodness. Though early idols like siren Kelly Clarkson and Checotah, OK's own Carrie Underwood shone, recent idols like whatshisname, ohyouknowher and thatidoldude have failed to inspire much idolatry. Once Simon Cowell left, the veracity dropped and the treacle flowed.

Check out this all-season folio of north of Superior photos by Earl Minnis - what CP now lacks in motive power diversity, it has always had scenery in spades!

4 comments:

  1. You know what Eric;
    I have had this magnificent book for over 20 years (signed, numbered first pressing) and never noticed that it said "America's Last Great Train"!
    Maybe we're so used to the Americanization of the planet. Or maybe I was more absorbed by the beautiful contents of the book. In any case, I wholeheartedly agree that it is a fantastic publication; as are all of Mr. Hungry Wolf's efforts.
    PS: do you know the number of that CP MLW on a precarious angle in the header photo?

    Cheers,
    Andrew Kerr
    Sydney, Australia

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  2. Glad you have a unique copy of Adolf's book, Andrew. The cutline is pretty subtle.

    Here's more on that derailment (updated my CP Leases VIA F40s post accordingly):
    Not all was uneventful. The Toronto Star included a photo of a derailment involving two VIA units! VIA 6452-CP 4712-VIA 6454 were operating the Obico Yard "Day Coach" assignment, which normally used the power from CP No 929. Making a reverse movement out of West Toronto Yard, heading east toward Parkdale to make a lift, the locomotive consist was pushing the west end of 12 cars at noon on May 19, 1994. The trailing wheels on one side of CP 4712 derailed on a curve, causing the 6452-4712 to list, resulting in a fuel leak and minor injuries to the engineer. Rerailed by CP Speedswing and hi-rail crane, VIA 6452 was taken to the Toronto Maintenance Centre on May 20 and returned to operation on CP for new trucks and a new rear buffer plate, the work performed at CP's Toronto Yard.
    Eric

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  3. Ah, these fine blue cars were always a highlight of CN grain trains for me, along with the old orange Illinois Central Gulf hoppers. A particularly memorable sighting occurred on the Elrose sub local at Dinsmore about 15 years ago.
    I assume these didn't turn up in grain consists at Portage back in the good old days though, did they?

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  4. Thanks for your comments, Elijah. I liked these GTW cars clean, and it was just cylindricals in my Portage trainwatching. No IC, no GTW! But oh, those Manitoba leasers back in 1980!
    Eric


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