New Athearn geeps

[princessclyne69]

First notification out today, (from PWRS), of the set of four Athearn Jenks blue GP7s. Two are in the 1961 number scheme, two are in the mid-70s numbering.

Sometime 2019 delivery.

RG7

[bargetanika]

I’ve been waiting for these for a very long time. Can finally represent the MP dodger that passed my high school every day, running 5 MPH in the street with a flagman at every intersection.

Getting two Frisco ones too.

[bargetanika]

Please publish the link again. It seems to have disappeared.

[princessclyne69]

Pat, I didn’t put a link out there in the first place, just laziness on my part. But here’s one….

http://www.athearn.com/Search/Default.aspx?SearchTerm=ATHG+GP7&CatID=THLD

It notes these units as having the side skirts cut back, which all of them did by the early 60s. But it looks like all of them have the winterization hatch, which I know is correct for the three-digit ones. It looks like everything is proper for eras from early sixties to retirement, if you pick the right numbers.

RG7

[princessclyne69]

Here’s a better one:

http://www.athearn.com/newsletter/102618/01_GEN_GP7-9_102618.pdf

RG7

[bargetanika]

I saw the Athearn newsletter link somewhere but didn’t know where it came from. Thought it was here, sorry.

Excuse my ignorance. What is a “winterization hatch?” I wouldn’t know one if I saw one. Would it even be needed in Louisiana and South Texas? PF

[princessclyne69]

Pat:

To answer your second question first, no, you wouldn’t have needed the winterization hatch in Louisiana or south Texas. So the GP7s ordered for I-GN and StLB&M did not have them.

If you’ll look on the roof of one of these Gulf Coast Lines geeps, you’ll see four fans. The blank space on the roof between the exhaust stacks is where the dynamic brake would be, if MoPac had needed it. So, on the series of geeps bought for MP proper, on the roof to the rear of the unit you’ll see one exposed fan housing, and ahead of it a box maybe a foot high, almost as wide as the hood and twice as long as it is wide. This is the winterization hatch. There’s a square grille covering the fan (the third fan back from the cab) which, in warm weather, allows exhaust air from the fan to pass through. In cold weather this box can be changed over, through a set of louvers, so that the square grill is partially blocked off and some of the warm air is redirected into the hood to keep the guts of the locomotive warm.

In later years this box became less common, except in really far northern locations. For MoPac units, only the GP7s had them.

You can see this feature from the side, as a silhouette.

RG7

[bargetanika]

I got it figured out. The Frisco ones don’t have that hatch. Wouldn’t they need it too?

I really don’t know much about diesels. What are the 4 tall exhaust deflectors for? And weren’t spark arrestors put on later? Did they really throw off that many sparks? Why?

And, if someone knows….. which Frisco striping came earlier? The more complex one I presume. PF

[madonnasuffolk30]

Pat,

I worked with Athearn on the Mopac Genesis GP7s. All 4 of the prototypes selected had the winterization hatch. I have photos of GP7s down in Louisiana with the hatch as they traveled and worked all over the system and they didn’t remove them based upon where they worked.

The 4 tall exhaust deflectors (spark arrestors) are for sparks which would start fires along the right-of-way. The engines would put out a considerable amount of hot carbon/exhaust. The Mopac experimented with the 4-stacks (liberated exhaust – normally the engines only had 2) to increase horsepower and efficiency – if I remember correctly.

The spark arrestor included with the model is from 1972 and on. There was an earlier spark arrestor that the Mopac had starting in the 60s, but no model of this type of arrestor is available.

To help you out with choosing a road number if you decide to purchase a model. The 3-digit numbers (165 and 168) would be accurate from 1967 until their retirement in December 1979. The only difference from when they first received Jenk’s blue would be the size of the road number on the side of the long hood (6″ tall circa 1962 to 8″ tall in 1967). The 4-digit locomotives would be accurate from 1974 to early 1977 when they were renumbered back to 3-digit numbers (600 and 603) to make room for new GP15-1s.

Hope this helps,
Nate

[madonnasuffolk30]

I’m really tempted to purchase one of the 1600 series locos and renumber it to 1684. The model is an early phase II version that had a sloped pilot where 1684 is a later phase II where the pilot is flat. 1684 has snowplows on both ends so that would cover the pilot (plus I can shave the pilot flat). 1684 also has a Mopac radio cabinet.

Nate

[princessclyne69]

My question would be exactly what color these engines would have. I’d hope it would be the new, clean, fairly dark Jenks blue.

And further to the winterization hatches, lots of the geeps without winterization hatch showed up in Kansas, at all times of the year. Basically, although engines were bought with good intentions, after they’d been on the property for a few years, Katy bar the door. Sorry, railroad related pun.

The engines that were bought with dual control stands so that they could be used on branches and make it possible to scrap the turntables, same thing. They showed up randomly. But even by 1970 I don’t remember seeing single units being sent out as road power.

I need to look closely at the four-digit ones to see if I can backdate them. The spark arrestors, which are on all four, may be an issue. But I don’t want perfect to be the enemy of the good.

RG7

[bargetanika]

I’m thrilled to have the Athearn Jenks Blue Geeps come out. They are the power we saw in New Iberia in the years (1961-66) I was still living at home and watching that little MP branchline line closely. They were it, save for a single F unit and single SW1 and S2 I saw at different times. I never saw them run MU, although they may have on the night train up to the NOT&M in Port Barre, which we never saw, we were kids eating supper at home when it would leave around 6 or 7, we could hear it from the house.

When I was first old enough to ride my bike over to what folks called the “roundhouse”, the grey and blue geeps were still around but Jenks blue took over pretty quickly. I seem to recall those engines in both paint schemes being numbered 100-something but I could be wrong, I was 13 years old and didn’t understand the value of note taking.

The most I ever saw these geeps and the dodgers they pulled was through high school classroom windows, running down East Pershing Street at 2 MPH with a flagman walking in front, every day almost I saw this, but of course could not photograph it or run out to see it.

There’s so much I could say about this railroad that only lives in my memory now, and that I wish I’d looked at and documented more closely, but that’s for another time. In the words of the song, “those were the days, my friend, we thought they’d never end.”

[Bud Moss]

I probably missed some of this thread. Will these be available in the Company Store? Jerry Michels

[peggyrothschild]

Jerry
Dealing with Athearn has been a one way street. While they have no issues in contacting us for help with getting their MP models correct I’ve tried twice to get Horizon Hobbies (who owns Athearn) to let the Missouri Pacific Historical Society be a dealer. We apparently aren’t a big enough fish in the dealer pond (even with our $20k+ in annual sales) to handle their products.

Appreciate you asking though,

Charlie

[princessclyne69]

In that case, I’ll be happy to support my LHS since I still have one. That’s where I bought the GP9s a couple of years ago.

I do occasionally buy a car that’s just been released and I haven’t ordered it somewhere else (Walthers comes to mind, when they make stuff that’s prototypicala0. And I buy rail and track supplies, but then the monetary value starts to go downhill from there. But if there’s something like this that I can pre-order, I’ll be happy to do it.

If the MPHS company store is likely to order it, that’s where I’ll go. But if not….

There is no railroad hobby shop in Wichita anymore. So I may still end up supporting this one in Houston.

RG7

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