Ok, I am more than a little confused by the RS-3 phases. How many were there (as defined by modelers?) What phase is this SP&S? http://www.trainpix.com/BN/ALCO/RS3/4078.HTM Looking at Bill Denton's website he is offering a Phase III shell, but it is of a phase older than the SP&S I linked to. http://home.comcast.net/~skytop35/Models/rs3.html Were there 4 phases (or more?)
ALCO production changes resulted in railfans and model railroaders referring to five distinct details or characteristics that we fondly car Phases. Sorry, I don't know the dates produced right off hand... Phase I. Only one unit built... an ALCO demonstrator, which was sold to the Santa Fe. It looked just like an ALCO RS2 but with the guts of an RS3... http://www.railarchive.net/vintagediesel/images/atsf2099.jpg http://3.bp.blogspot.com/__TkYG1RhmoU/TTEb_gc1vvI/AAAAAAAAC_o/Zs8AUV9UuSc/s1600/ATSF_2099.jpg Phase !a. Produced for several years the units, such as what Atlas has produced in N-scale, were the first production units of the ALCO RS3. They featured the battery and relay boxes mounted on the deck/catwalk with two handrail stanchions on the deck and one on the battery box... http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=923951 http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=465119 Phase !b. Produced for several years the units, such as what Atlas has produced in N-scale, were the first production units of the ALCO RS3. They featured the battery and relay boxes mounted on the deck/catwalk with one handrail stanchions on the deck and two on the battery box... http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=3348293 http://rr-fallenflags.org/sout/sou34acz.jpg Phase !b. The shortest time of the all the Phases built (approximately 8 months), this phase had no lovers on the long hood doors. replaced by five air filters spread out on the top of some hood doors, which were shortened to provide for the filters to be placed... http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=956685 http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=956660 Phase III. The final phase produced had the air filters in two vertical rows... http://rr-fallenflags.org/sps/sps098rsa.jpg http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2660328 A bit simplistic but it is a basic explanation of the phases.
Funny thing about these things, the phase overlap was remarkable. As an example, the Western Maryland's were later phase, with the carbody filters and no door louvers. The Pittsburg and Lake Erie's were earlier phase, with the door louvers. Western Maryland's left Schenectady before Pittsburgh and Lake Erie's.
Keeping track of the RS-3s on the SP&S could be fun since some came from GN and others were purchased at different dates. Prior to 1953 the cooler for the turbo charger was air. After 1953 they switched to water cooled because of problems with the air type. The main spotting feature of that was the alignment of the exhaust stack whether lengthwise with or across the hood. All the units were later retro fitted with the water cooled type. So date of modeling makes the difference with the stack alignment. Also some later models had square fan shrouds rather than round. SP&S rostered both the phase 1 and phase 3 and those that were acquired from the GN had some different headlight configurations at first. I would imagine that these type of variations existed on other roads that had a fairly large roster that was acquired at different time periods or through mergers. Just one more interesting aspect to our modeling, the research involved and what it reveals.
Thanks for the explanation. So which phase would the ex-SP&S unit be? I didn't see the boxes behind the cab on your listing. Was it an add-on?
SP&S 98 was the last acquired by them and 97 and 98 were described as phase 3s. In fact since 90 through 98 were all acquired within a month or so in late 1955 it is probably safe to say they were all phase 3s since they were acquired new from the factory.
Oops... sorry... this one should have been labeled Phase II. Wanted to just go ahead and edit the post but for some reason it won't let me do it.
"Funny thing about these things, the phase overlap was remarkable. As an example, the Western Maryland's were later phase, with the carbody filters and no door louvers. The Pittsburg and Lake Erie's were earlier phase, with the door louvers. Western Maryland's left Schenectady before Pittsburgh and Lake Erie's. " Some customer input was taken into consideration when orders were placed.
Bill Denton's site states that his later phase shell will fit the Chinese chassis but not the Japanese. The Japanese body assembly (cab, hoods, and walkway/railings) will go onto the Chinese chassis with a minimum of work. I have only put one Japanese body assembly onto a Chinese chassis, but I seem to recall that the major alteration was removing one of the clips on the Japanese cab. In addition, you did have to buy the MT conversion kit for the Japanese body assembly, as the Chinese chassis has no truck mounted couplers. The MT conversion for the Japanese locomotive involves clipping the coupler tongues from the trucks. I wonder if his later phase shell will go onto the Japanese chassis with some modification. Mind you, I am somewhat less than impressed with the performance of the Japanese chassis, and always have been, but I am aware that more than a few in eNnscaleland can not sing enough praises of the Japanese power chassis. Then, there is that guy who has a hammerhead short hood on Shapeways. I wonder if it can be grafted to Bill Denton's later phase chassis. This would allow accurate modelling of WM's hammerheads. I forget what phase the PRR/LV hammerhead was, but if it is later phase, if a graft is possible, it, as well, can be modelled accurately. Of course, if it is earlier phase, it is still possible to model it accurately.
I'm doing this right now. I'm working on a new hammerhead kit that includes the cab, walkway mounted battery boxes and a new fuel tank. Revamping the handrails to accommodate the battery boxes is a pain!
