Five Mechanical Refrigerators Added To The Fleet

 Greetings All,

Five Mechanical Refrigerators Added To The Fleet

My infatuation with 50' and 57' Mechanical Refrigerators continues and led to a mid April purchase of five such used freight cars from Trainz.com which I found on their website during a 40% off sale. 

 

Four of the five cars are Athearn RTR and one is a Walthers Mainline Product. All five cars came with Kadee #5 couplers and metal wheelsets.

Burlington Route BRCX 50' reefer assigned to the Burlington Refrigerator Express sits atop 50' and 57' Great Northern WCFX cars assigned to the Western Fruit Express pool.

A Pacific Fruit Express 50' mechanical refrigerator sits atop a Milwaukee Road 50' mechanical refrigerator.

After a visit to the car shop where the cars received some cosmetic rattle can painting of undercarriages, trucks and weights along with a brush painting of wheel faces and a blast of Testors Dullcote they were tested to ensure their coupler heights were correct and each car rolled freely.

Milwaukee Road (MILW) 50' reefer #9669 is ready to roll.

Pacific Fruit Express 50' reefer #300564 is ready to go. The PFE was a joint Union Pacific - Southern Pacific enterprise. 

It appears the prior owner paid attention to the 2/70 build date on this PFE car and added an ACI plaque which would have been prototypical. PFE 300564 is one of 17,648 reefers in the 1970 PFE fleet*

A CB&Q Burlington Refrigerator Express BRCX 50' reefer sits ready in Terminal Yard The CBQ Burlington Express joined the Western Fruit Express in 1926.

Note the build date of 2/70 and the ACI plaque. I thought this was a  very nice touch from the prior owner.

Great Northern 50' reefer WFCX #8429 assigned to the Western Fruit Express Pool has a build date of 7/64. The WFE was created in July, 1923 as a partnership with the GN and Fruit Growers Express to compete with the ATSF Santa Fe Refrigerator Despatch and Pacific Fruit Express.

Great Northern 57' reefer WFCX 8885 assigned to the Western Fruit Express Pool rounds out the new mechanical refrigerator additions. The GN/WFE reefers are two of the 5,893 such cars in the 1970 WFE fleet.*

Putting the New Cars in Play

Adding the new mechanical refrigerators to my model railroad operations required the preparation of car cards and waybills for each car. While doing this I blocked the new cars with like cars from the existing fleet. The two new GN/WFE reefers are running in a three car block with a GN/WFE 57' reefer that has been on the roster for many years. The cars can now run in this block together or run separately.

The MILW reefer leads a new Burlington 50' reefer and an existing Burlington 57' reefer.

The new PFE 50' reefer is paired with an SPFE 57' reefer. Note the UP herald on the 57'er has been covered over with a "Perishable Freight Experts" sign and has new different marks.

Train RM-12 comes thru Empire City powered by four GP38s/GP38-2s featuring run thru BN power.

Catch the RM-12 on the move.

Final Thoughts and Comments

Having an urban type layout that is well populated and includes manufacturers and supply chain distributors for the people to be well fed necessitates that the proper rolling stock be available to handle this important freight traffic.

The new Mechanical Refrigerator cars of my modeled era are essential in the safe transportation of temperature sensitive products. Traditional ice bunker reefers once the backbone supporting this freight traffic will still be found on the layout handling both temperature sensitive and some dry freight loads.

* Information from the Great Yellow Fleet Major Refrigerator Car Lines of the United States table by John White as published in the 2023 volume 4 Dispatcher's Office, the official publication of the Operations Special Interest Group in an article by Eric Hiser.

Additional Links and Reading

Pacific Fruit Express History

Burlington Refrigerator Express History

Western Pacific Fruit Express History
Milwaukee Road Mechanical Reefers History

Fruit Growers Express History

Thanks for reading and watching!!!

See you soon!!!