[PRCo] SPTC low floor models

[Fred Schneider]

[Moderator's note: this is Fred's unmodified text, but if you look at the
headers you'll notice they're forged. He typo'd the list address, and so
I'm forwarding a copy, since he intended it to come here]

Open letter to Jim Holland:

Send to Leonid if you think it proper.

For those of you who have not ordered a St. Petersburg model of a
Pittsburgh low-floor car ... they are everything I had hoped for and a
little more.  Leonid and his gang did a great job.

The orange paint is just as I remembered it from the 1940s and early
1950s ... a yellowish orange and not the orange that Bob Brown preached
was correct at Arden.   I've never been successfully able to argue at
PTM that the color had more yellow in it than the orange on West Penn
cars and the later orange on PRC / PAT work cars.  I've always been told
by Bob's followers  it was more yellow because the orange or red in the
vat faded over time.  Surprising that with inks, the yellow always goes
first turning your book to magenta!  Interesting that paint pigments
would behave differently.  I'm trying to suggest that they didn't fade,
and that there really was more yellow than on work cars.  At any rate,
the cars are great.  And they look as proper as possible.  The white on
the lower end of the trolley pole should be metallic silver ... probably
put there to improve conductivity between the pole and the base.

One of the few things I would nitpick is the clear plastic over the side
sign that looks, in the model, like glass.  They were simply painted
steel plates which got dirty and seldom if ever looked shiny.  If
protection is needed, a dull coat of photographic print spray might do
the trick.

My 5440 comes with a conductors stand at the center door -- that is as
built for Pittsburgh Railways (these were center entrance cars, not
Peter Witts). I never gave it a thought that the interior would be so
detailed when I ordered it. .  I can no doubt remove it to get to the
1940s configuration.  I think, if anyone is ordering a 5500, that they
never had provision for two-man operation.  Now the conflict ... all of
the cars have a stop light on the rear just below the belt rail and that
probably was never on a two-man car.  The as-built configuration had a
red marker light on the rear in the letterboard over the center window.
The stop light under the belt rail was added when cars were converted to
high speed machines circa 1930.

This all goes back to the fact that motor vehicle registrations in
Pennsylvania grew by staggering proportions from 1920 to 1930 ... from
slightly more than 500,000 autos and trucks in 1920 to over than 1.5
million ten years later.  There were not enough automobiles on the roads
to worry about when the first low-floor motor cars were built in 1916.
By 1930 auto-trolley accidents were happening right and left.  To make
it worse, most autos only had two-wheel brakes.  When PRC speeded up the
cars circa 1930 it was imperative that something be done to reduce rear
end collisions.  So the stop light actuated by a pressure switch in the
brake pipe was added.  And what about the incongruity between two-man
cars and stop lights?  Pittsburgh Railways was one of the earliest major
transit operators in the nation to convert to one-man operation ...
heavy routes were being converted to one-man cars in the early to middle
1920s.  I'm not positive but I doubt that there were many conductors out
there when the high speed program was underway.  I have no documents to
prove it. The high speed notes only say what was added to cars, but I
would not be surprised if the conductor's stands were also removed at
that time.  More proof is needed.

What the cars need is a conversion kit that includes brass trucks and
under floor motors, a working trolley pole, suggestions on how to run a
fine wire from the pole to the motors, and a selection of people for the
inside (these could be unpainted).  They are too good to remain as
bookcase models.   We also need a small can of paint that mixes rust and
mud to paint those new brass side frames and wheels!