"Pike-sized" consist configuration

I have a four car train of heavyweight cars that I intend to use as a business/excursion train on a modern-era layout.

The cars are a utility car (baggage car with HEP generator and undetermined use of the remaining space), a dining car, a coach, and an observation car. Assuming the utility car is always on the head end and the observation car always on the rear, would the "proper" configuration of this train be... bag-coach-diner-obs, or bag-diner-coach-obs?

The kind of train you are looking for from the rear would most likely be;
Obs>Sleeper>Coach>baggage/powerplant. On such small trains, the kitchen sometimes is in the obs, and that's it. Small parties are entertained in the Obs for dinner, a full diner isn't justified. Any reason why you don't have a sleeper for your sales staff on the road?

In your power plant car; the remaining space from what I recall in days of doing excursions including the AFT, there's a workshop or space for fuel drums to run things while the train is idle.

To use what you have, you might consider the diner between the obs and coach. You wouldn't want the noise of the powerplant in your ears during a business dinner.

D/

That's what I was thinking, Dieter... bag-coach-diner-obs. Thanks.

Small parties are entertained in the Obs for dinner, a full diner isn't justified. Any reason why you don't have a sleeper for your sales staff on the road?

My railroad's small enough (just a few hundred miles of trackage total) that I don't feel the need for a full sleeper. However, the primary use of the train would be for a dinner train/scenic excursion run on home rails, so the full diner is a necessity.

The obs should really be considered a fully-equipped business car (couple of staterooms for guests and a couple roomettes for staff, a small dining room, kitchenette, lounge). When in use on the dinner train, it's for people who pay a *lot* more for a reeeeally good dinner.

While being used as a business train away from home rails, it's probably not necessary for the entire consist to tag along every time... they could, certainly, but I think the diner and coach would be more rare to venture afield. Bring along the HEP car if it's needed, or if running on the tail end of Amtrak or VIA, the business car can run solo.

How about a coach converted into a dining car? Splice a couple of sections from a diner interior for tables and chairs, the diner has the kitchen and an overflow dining room or one for smaller groups. Most dinner trains have a kitchen car and then a couple of coaches set up for the dining room.

D/

How about a coach converted into a dining car? Splice a couple of sections from a diner interior for tables and chairs, the diner has the kitchen and an overflow dining room or one for smaller groups. Most dinner trains have a kitchen car and then a couple of coaches set up for the dining room.

Dunno how much more kitbashing I want to do with this train... I found out the old Athearn YELLOW box (no, not blue box, yellow box!) baggage car's plastic had gotten a tad brittle over the years when I went to cut a side door out and replace it with intake and radiator screens for the HEP unit. Nothing disastrous - thankfully the unexpected break was exactly where I was going to cut anyway, but it gave me reason to not want to chop up parts of these cars any more. By now, the exteriors are all fully painted anyway and waiting for decals (which will be printed and applied once my railroad's Board of Directors - i.e. my wife and me - make a final decision on names for each of the cars). I could conceivably detail the interiors to suggest what you're saying, but I have no intention of lighting the interiors, so any detail, if at all, would be rudimentary at best.

It occured to me when I was posting pics for another discussion that I hadn't shared the results of this discussion about a year ago!

Here's all four cars of my business/excursion train. Bottom to top:

Business/Observation Car 1000, named "Chickadee"
Diner 1001, named "Passamaquoddy"
Coach 1002, named "Campobello"
HEP/Utility Car 1003, unnamed. Note the exhaust stack muffler for the HEP generator.

Closeup of the end of the obs, showing mods made such as markers, COMM/MU and HEP receptacles, and roller bearing trucks.

NICE WORK!!!

Taking it one step farther; you said a "Modern Era" train, how about an even more recent version, say from the early 1990's up to date?

Get another heavy obs, sheer the rear end off, glass in the hole, add ditch lights and add seats as such -



Or, your line could purchase a different car for the purpose. Either way, an "Alternate Ending" for your business train expands the flexibility of time periods for you.

D/

JWHITE, one thing you and I both overlooked;

For an Excursion Train, when I was on High Iron excursions out of Hoboken in 1973 over the Erie Lackawanna, immediately behind the auxiliary tender, we had a TOOL CAR. The memory's a bit sketchy, but I believe the tool car was an old RPO. It obviously had tools, but it also had a workshop aboard for emergency fabrication of whatever may be needed, if possible, so there was a lathe in there and work benches. If it wasn't an RPO, it had to be a COMBINE because in addition to a sliding cargo door, there were several small windows and a regular door on the side.

The tool car usually ran with the side doors open, with a crewman sitting on the floor with his legs dangling off the train.

For an onboard concession stand which sold soda, chips, KODAK FILM and railroadiana to the passengers, we had a simple baggage car with folding tables bolted to the floor for stability. One time I was standing by one of the large baggage doors and the train made a strange low rumble. Somebody yelled "OPEN THE DOOR!!" and the door immediately behind me was slid open. I turned around and was startled to find myself inches from the edge and looking DOWN over the edge of Starucca Viaduct. Pretty stupid thing to do by today's standards, huh?

Part of the time, the doors were open with a simple 2X4 across the middle like a railing to keep people from falling out. Today, insurance considerations make such a spectacle impossible.

D/

Great ideas as always, Dieter, thank you! I had been unsure of what to use the remaining space in that HEP/Utility car for -- you just gave me some very good thoughts! I don't run steam engines, so it doesn't have to be a tool car, but yeah, you also mentioned a gift shop or concession space. That'd be good. Even better, I could have that space filled with exhibits of the history of the railroad and the region in which it operates.

If you went with the tool car, they also had welding equipment aboard too. An open door gives the chance for detailing, and there's a lot of "Shop Stuff" out there these days.

That simple 2X4 by the door? It was unpainted, clean fresh untreated wood. The door was only open in warm weather. On a trip in May, it depended on where you were if it was open or closed -- too cold.

A baggage car or combine can also serve as a meeting room for presentations.

Don't rule out the use of one, or more SLEEPERS. A friend working for AON (reinsurance) went to Texas about ten years ago and had a meeting on Big New Santa Fe's business train in the yard at their HQ and they had multiple sleepers on board. Even if you weren't going out of town on the train, they made a big deal of having clients aboard a static train for meetings and dinner, then offering the option of a hotel or putting them up for the overnight onboard for the experience. They even had a store at that location for business people to buy BNSF kitsch in the offices, where the public never gets to.

I've known people who have gone on trips aboard the business trains of UP and C&NW in the late 80's and early 90's. As clients and perspective clients, they were wined, dined wooed and wow'd with rides over Freight-Only trackage, while being pampered elegantly while being put up in quarters fit for royalty. Some of these trips lasted a WEEK, so you can imagine how they had to restock the train, and how they store everything.

The business train gives the opportunity to have some glitzy varnish from the streamline era in contemporary times. You've freelanced a nice example of one!

D/

jwhite07 wrote:would the "proper" configuration of this train be... bag-coach-diner-obs, or bag-diner-coach-obs?

The proper configuration is whatever you want, since you're not modeling some specific train. I mean, I think you've got the logical set-up there, but when you have a four car train, and one car is a bag, and one is an obs, then you've pretty much determined the consist order, haven't you?

Otto is right -- as usual.

Same practice as on a real train - the Obs should only go on the rear. Sleepers away from the engine, up against the Obs. Diner may be up front as a baffle to the locomotive -- nobody wants to sleep next to a running locomotive. You can have a gutted coach or sleeper serving as a conference center.

D/