The Penn Central 9999 Project

Greetings All,

With help from 1:1 Sir Neal the Penn Central 9999 project was born. PC #9999 is the last engine on the PC roster and was a General Electric 44 Ton Locomotive that was formerly Pennsylvania RR #9353. Prior to the Penn Central merger the PRR had forty six of the 380 HP engines on their roster.  The 9999 is the only one to make it to the PC roster.

Taking advantage of a labor agreement which allowed a diesel engine under 45 tons to operate without a fireman the Pennsy ordered a small fleet of the GE 44 ton switchers in the late 1940's to replace small 0-4-0 steam switchers. The engines were not very successful because of their light weight, but the 9999, which was built in May 1949, made it thru to the Conrail takeover. 

The 9999 was definitely a survivor if nothing else. It's only assignment during it's time with the Penn Central and later Conrail had it leased to the Union Transportation Company that operated the Pemberton and Hightstown Line in NJ that ran from Lewes NJ to Fort Dix NJ. That service ended in 1977 and the 9999 was sold in 1978 to Midwest Steel and Alloy in Ohio. Here's the 9999 still in full PC paint in November 1979. 

Enter 1:1 Sir Neal who sent me a message asking if I had any use for a Bachmann Western Maryland 44 tonner someone had given him. Neal was unsure if the engine actually worked and he had never taken it out of the box but I told him to send it my way as I would try to cobble this one and my long out of service NH unit into at least one operating unit. Neal included the 44 tonner with the box of 57' mechanical reefers and Atlas GP40 that were the subject of my prior blog entry.

Here's the unit from 1:1 Sir Neal which was missing a wheel/axle assembly and side frame. This side faced the bottom of the box so there was no way to know this unless you took it out and examined it.  No problem here though. I have eight wheel/axle assemblies leftover from a 2011 NH 44 tonner project.

After getting the wheel/axle assembly installed I tested the WM unit and found it too had a burned out motor. Back to workbench where I was able to use one of the WM motors and one NH motor to make a working unit. 

Here's the newly rebuilt and painted PC 9999 on duty at Bedford Park Yard. The small size of this engine makes it perfect for working the tight confines of Bedford Park. It's lack of weight however mimics it's 1:1 counterpart and it's not a strong puller by any means. Three to four cars is pretty much it. 

On the plus side the industries here except for Ford only need one or two cars spotted at a time. The 44 Tonner can easily work the Ford steel yard in the background and the Ford tank car track which both have two car limits. As for the bigger Auto Parts cars and Auto Racks? Fuhgeddaboutit! 

The 9999 has two Breadbox Trough Coil Steel Coaches in tow from Kings Port Steel for the Ford Plant.

Empty coil cars from Ford going to Shapeless Steel Works are now shoved to the Bedford Park lead at Bedford Tower for pick up

The two car tank car track is in the foreground and Bedford Tower is just beyond the water tower. These cars can easily be picked up in a trailing point move by the next local or transfer run going back towards Terminal Yard from either Bedford or Empire City. 

The 9999 was painted with rattle can black spray paint and lettered with Microscale decals. The small PC herald and numbers were from PC diesel sheet #87-84 and the smaller 'Penn Central' lettering came from PC Streamline Passenger Cars and Metroliners decal sheet #87-1383

The 9999 shoves a 40' P&LE boxcar towards All City Storage. The small Bedford Park Yard is in the foreground. This little engine seems a natural fit for the tight confines of this area. 

Adding the 44 tonner has opened up some interesting operations options for Bedford Park. By adjusting how I interchange cars and switch the industries in Bedford Park the 9999 should be a lot of fun to operate in this tight little industrial area.

Thanks go out to 1:1 Sir Neal for donating the parts engine needed to get this 44 tonner project up and running and supplying the shell that became Penn Central #9999.

Thanks for reading!