Re: (erielack) Erie PAs on the Northern Branch

[Hhaines_@_aol.com]

In a message dated 1/25/02 8:31:29 PM MST, quahog_@_sprint.ca writes:

<< 
 4) Were the PAs regularly assigned to Erie's long-haul passenger trains
 prior to the arrival of the E8s?  Or were steam generator equipped F3s
 the normal power for these trains, and the PAs assigned to secondary
 trains even in the early days?
 
If I ever quit adding references, I will get the consist list to this list. 
The photo documentation is that both PA-1s and F-3s carried the long distance 
trains for Erie through the time the PAs arrived until the E-8s started to 
arrive (January 1951).  It appears the F-3s could not keep the long distance 
passenger trains warm in the winter.  PAs continued to haul some of the long 
distance trains on Erie, as photographed by John Long in 1957 and reprinted 
in Sweetland's Erie Railroad in Color.

It appears the PAs were backup for the E8s. When and E8 would come out for 
maintenance, a PA would replace it until the E8 was fit for service and 
replaced with its E8 sister.  Erie seems to have kept odd number E8s facing 
west (for odd number trains) and even number E8s facing east (for even 
numbered-trains).  This data has been documented by DeYoung, Sweetland, 
Crist, Carleton, and others in the past, and so far, the photos have verified 
it.
 
 5) The photo of the PA on the Northern Branch shows the locomotive (road
 number unknown) still in its original black and yellow paint.  Even
 though the photo was taken in 1957, the paint is fairly shiny, and I had
 assumed it was from the early 1950s.  When were the PAs repainted in the
 two-tone green passenger scheme? 

Paul is probably better at this than I, but not all the PAs made it into the 
2-tone green scheme as late as 1959 as evidenced in Sweetland's Erie Railroad 
in Color.  Yet there are photos on the 1960s with PAs in the 2-tone green 
scheme (1965, Sweetland).  Paul probably has the numbers, but #559 was one of 
the B&Y schemes in 1959.
 
 6) After the E8s arrived, what were the regular assignments for the
 steam generator equipped F3s?  Obviously, at least a few of them were in
 commuter service.

After the arrival of the E-8s, the F-3s were re-geared and by 1955, some of 
them had the steam generators removed.  The only "commuter" service photos I 
have recorded of the F-3s were on trains to Suffern, NY in the late 1940s and 
early 1950s.  

Howard Haines
ELHS #1447

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