I need info on my new Rio Grande and Espee SD50's

[Espeenut]

Ok, I snagged two Athearn SD50's at the show in Seattle, they were going for a price that made them impossible to pass up, one in Espee and the other in Rio Grande. As you all know the first thing you do, when in a safe place to do so, is open up the boxes and gaze admiringly at your new acquisitions. I was doing that and noticed a few items that will have to be addressed, the first one is the pilot plows, I don't recall ever seeing a plow that looks like these on anything. my other question, where are the window wipers?
The Rio Grande unit has a five chime horn on the front, all the photos I have of these beasts show a three chime at the back in front of the fans. I know the Espee ones were all Rio Grande repaints after Mr. Anschutz bought SP, so when did they make the modifications to the Rio Grande units, and when did they remove the nose lights?
...any and all help is gladly accepted...

Lorne Miller

 

[dean]

Lorne,

I will defer commenting on the timeframe for the changes to the DRGW SD50's to Jim Fitch our resident DRGW expert checks in. Here are a couple of sites to check out some shots of these units that may help.

http://www.pbase.com/espeeboy/sd50

http://gelwood.railfan.net/index.htmlhttp://www.pbase.com/espeeboy/sd50

 

[RioGrande]

I was doing that and noticed a few items that will have to be addressed, the first one is the pilot plows, I don't recall ever seeing a plow that looks like these on anything. my other question, where are the window wipers?
The Rio Grande unit has a five chime horn on the front, all the photos I have of these beasts show a three chime at the back in front of the fans. I know the Espee ones were all Rio Grande repaints after Mr. Anschutz bought SP, so when did they make the modifications to the Rio Grande units, and when did they remove the nose lights?
...any and all help is gladly accepted...

Lorne Miller

I too noticed the pilot plow looked odd. I'll have to do some research on it but it seems like it should be taller. Here are some comments on the horn from the email list:

> Does anybody know what kind of horn DRGW 5505 and 5512 had? I am
> trying to find a details west horn but from the pictures I can't
> figure out which one. I know some had the Nathan M-5 but when I was
> looking at the SD50's in the following link, the horn didn't look
> like a Nathan M-5's. Thanks.

According to my notes, 5505 came with a Nathan K5, but by 1987 had it
replaced with a Nathan P3.

Lou DiGrazia

My attention span to Rio Grande units is limited mostly to before the early 1990's since I prefer Rio Grande units in their mostly original state.