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I bought a Lionel PRR Doodlebug from the 2024 catalog.  I then bought a bunch of PRR cars (Dining, Passenger, Combo Mail/Passenger) and added people and LED lighting to them.  I posted a video on the entire train consist here (at the bottom).  The question I have is what did the Doodlebugs do in real life?  It appears that they were no longer in service before I started looking at trains (and I saw a lot growing up).  Actually, the area I was in didn't have much passenger service, but it did have a lot of freight.  Did they pull passenger cars, or perhaps freight?  I gotta think that there had to more to them than a single unit.  Since the engine only took half the Doodlebug, and it was gas, I imagine it didn't have a lot of power to pull many cars.

Last edited by texgeekboy
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When that new fangled freedom device called the automobile decreased the number of paying passengers sometime in the mid to late 1920s, the railroads started ending service on many of their branch lines.  The doodlebugs were an early attempt to maintain such service with less cost. The typically ran as a single unit or with a single trailer. Ultimately however, many railroads invested in their own bus lines (e.g. the New Haven had The New England Transportation Company), and later some even invested in airlines (e.g. The Boston and Maine RR). Many bus routes intersected railroad stations that still had passenger service to larger cities and towns.  Doodlebugs also transported mail, milk, and LCL freight on the lesser used lines until even that ended with more trucks on the roads.

Last edited by Farmall-Joe

I hope it isn't a disappointment, but doodlebugs were not equivalent to locomotives.  Most were incapable of pulling more than a couple of cars, and usually were operated as single-car trains.

  • Most only had around 400 horsepower (vs 1500 for a GP7 or 2250 for an E8), and only the front truck had small traction motors.
  • They had a one man engine crew, running without a Fireman, saving money.  The train crew was two men instead of three, as on a locomotive hauled train.  If they hauled more than one trailer coach, it required adding (and paying) another Brakeman.

Their purpose was to replace a steam-hauled conventional train manned by a full crew, with a self-propelled combination car that could haul express, sometimes mail, and a small number of passengers, manned by a reduced crew.

You can find a prototype for almost anything: the Boston and Maine had a 600hp motor car that could haul up to four regular coaches.  The motor car had an RPO and a baggage section.  Was it a doodlebug? A locomotive?  The railroad considered it as part of its motor car fleet.  It ran from 1934 until replaced by RDCs in the late 1950s.  There are photos and information on the B&M Historical Society’s web site:


https://www.bmrrhs.org/digital...tin-volume-32-4-2020

The PRR ran several types of gas-electrics cars (later oil-electric), also known as doodlebugs. Most ran alone, but at times there was either a P54 or P70  trailer coach, B60 baggage, or BM54 postal-baggage tagging along. Once in a while on some branches, a R50b reefer was seen behind, or even a milk reefer.

Of the classes of rail cars, really only the Brill 660 model had enough horsepower to pull another car with it. (#4666-4670) It had a small baggage section between the engine compartment and seating section.

The Sunset model is a replica of the Brill 660. Have no idea what the Lionel model version is.

If you're so inclined, the group Steam Era Freight Cars  (RealSTMFC) had a recent thread "Mixed UP Passenger/Livestock Train" which had photos of "Doodlebugs" hauling short trains as the subject.

One, courtesy of the Great Northern Railway Historical Society, showed a motor car hauling perhaps a dozen boxcars on a long trestle.  Another showed a McKean car hauling two livestock cars.  Another showed a Burlington car towing a few tank cars and a coach on the hind end.

As Tom noted, most were barely powerful enough to move (or brake) themself  let alone tow trailer cars.    And as a side note, the PRR had a sizeable fleet of gasoline powered motor cars and for safety reasons worked to convert them to diesels.   The PRRT&HS had a great article on these recently in the society magazine.

The streamlined Rail Diesel Car (RDC) that began being produced around 1950 could only pull themselves. Railroads who tried to pull even one passenger car with their RDC negated the warranty - and normally saw the RDC fail. This disappointed some railroads that had commonly run a doodlebug with one or more coaches behind. Minneapolis & St. Louis Ry. ended up using an old doodlebug to pull a streamlined coach when their RDC failed.

@PRR Man posted:

The PRR ran several types of gas-electrics cars (later oil-electric), also known as doodlebugs. Most ran alone, but at times there was either a P54 or P70  trailer coach, B60 baggage, or BM54 postal-baggage tagging along. Once in a while on some branches, a R50b reefer was seen behind, or even a milk reefer.

Of the classes of rail cars, really only the Brill 660 model had enough horsepower to pull another car with it. (#4666-4670) It had a small baggage section between the engine compartment and seating section.

The Sunset model is a replica of the Brill 660. Have no idea what the Lionel model version is.

The Lionel/MTH railking version is a shortened model of the Pullman/St.Louis Car Co. Doodlebug. St Louis Car provided the motors, controls, and transmission while Pullman Corp. Made the carbody and interiors.

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