Speaking of Early Conrail

[Green_Elite_Cab]

I consider to get one of my Walthers SW1 in early Conrail paint scheme.
That might be either the old black NYC paint scheme for road number 84xx or the old PRR paint scheme for road number 8501 and up (There are some exceptions in the road numbers).

I am unsure about the old PCC paint scheme used on SW1 switchers. They look black on all photos to me. But I read about DGLE "Dark Green Locomotive Enamel" as the PCC standard color. A very dark green close to black but only close.
Did PRR paint their SW1 in a very dark green or true black? I would use that as the base for an early CR SW1 switcher.

Looking at PRR SW1 at time when the paint was in better shape looks more like a none black but very dark paint. But what did Pen Central do to the NYC and PRR paint? Most NYC SW1 lost the white stripes until CR time. Did Pen Central paint NYC and possibly also PRR engines flat black?

An unmarked black ghost is in town :o

Penn Central is black*

*for the most part

This has been a particularly frustrating topic for me, because I have heard so many things, but I have not been able to find an official source for the answer to this question. I also know people who worked on the Penn Central, as well as historical society connections, and their claims vary.

Here is what I suspect is the case-

All New Locomotives, and most ones freshly repainted are Straight black (not flat black, PC units did gleam at one point!). Due to internal politics, the Penn Central ordered all older locomotives to have their old logos removed and replace with Penn Central markings (in hopes of reducing NYC vs PRR infighting).

Furthermore many shops on the PC system, particularly the smaller ones, may not have had any Black paint (or the correct stencils and decals!). This means there could be PC locomotives in DGLE, because thats what they had laying around, or strange combinations of lettering styles on Black or DGLE.

It would be fair to say in this case, that "There is a prototype for everything".

That said, your best bet is to go Black.

SW1s Are Old

This is definitely a case where you want to use photos. A quick glance on Conrail Cyclopedia, CRHS Photo galleries, and RRpicture Archives shows a huge variety in paint schemes into the Conrail Era. In fact, SW1s had all sorts of schemes in the Penn Central Era as well, so there really isn't a cut and dry "generic" method of painting them.

By the Penn Central (and definitely the Conrail) Era, these locomotives were fairly old, and these locomotives probably only persisted because there were so many of them purchased by both the NYC and PRR, as well as the other Conrail Component roads. SW1s were also the only locomotives "light" enough to go anywhere.

Ultimately though, the SW1s were all gone by 1984.

The SW1 fleet was spread out to almost every corner of the Conrail system, but it doesn't look like they moved around to much. It would be wise to find a photo from the time and place you intend to model.


Links-

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