The R16s

I seem to have a passion for the R16s. To me they were the underdog of the fleet. I've never rode them, but I would like to someday. A few questions about the R16s:

Did they go fast?

How did they ride?

Did they make any motor noise?

Share your memories here.

The R16s ran from 1955-86 on the IND and BMT Eastern Division. They were among the the heaviest subway cars ever built (over 85,000 lbs). They were notorious for being overweight and costly to maintain.

6387 is at the NY Transit Museum.

In other words, the last revenue run was a bit before it's time, retired by January 1987, most likely due to it's conditions, that's dissapointing unlike the R10, they remained on another 5 years and they were built before the R16, in 1949/50.

I think the R16's were replaced by the WEAM R68, coincidentally, they arrived in Jan 87 when the R16 was going out.

The R68 was built by Westinghouse in 1986-88 and along with the 1988 Kawasaki R68A replaced the 1948-49 R10, 1954-55 R16, 1960 R27 and unrebuilt 1960-62 R30.

Rebuilt R30/30As survived until 1993-94. Some partially overhauled R10s were painted kale green and were phased out by 1990 with R68/68As.

what line did the last R16s run on, the last pictures ive seen of them werre from 1983, were they painted as redbirds?

The R16s last ran on the J until circa 1986. They were most common on the BMT Eastern Division. None ever were Redbirds.

#6339, #6452, #6301, and various others (there's a picture of the BMT Ditmas Av Shuttle with 4 red R16's and another picture of an "RR" train at Ditmars Blvd with at least one red R16, both photos on nycsubway.org), were at least painted in Redbird colors.

F40 ,what i meant was the 1980s red sceme ,the pictures you were talking about were the 1960s light red ,not every red subway car is a redbird , http://www.nycsubway.org/perl/show?17699 ,7 train was this painted later on, and do you know if they used the 1979 color rollsigns?

The R68 was built by Westinghouse in 1986-88 and along with the 1988 Kawasaki R68A replaced the 1948-49 R10, 1954-55 R16, 1960 R27 and unrebuilt 1960-62 R30.

Oh ok, thanks for the clarification there, so that was a lot of cars to be replaced there...

Rebuilt R30/30As survived until 1993-94. Some partially overhauled R10s were painted kale green and were phased out by 1990 with R68/68As.

I guess that the overhauled R30 cars were replaced by the rehabbed R44/R46, since coincidentally, the rebuilt R30s were being phased out at the same time the last of the R44/46 combo overhaul was taking place.

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