PRR Battleship Gondola

Class G23.  PRR built one and only one.

http://prr.railfan.net/freight...spage.html?class=G23

Thanks,Bob!

First off, the VGN and C&O gons had offset sides, while in true Pennsy fashion the G23 had ribbed sides.  The car was built in 1919 and lasted until 1952, so for that era Freight Car Color would have been applied (I have no reference for this, just how all other classes of freight cars were painted).

There is an article on the G23 in The Keystone Volume 49, number 3 (Autumn, 2016).  No mention of color is made in the article, but it does say that by September 24, 1919 (5 months after building), the car was stenciled to be used in captive service between Derry, PA to the coal dumper in Canton, MD.

There are photos of the car in this old OGR thread:

https://ogrforum.com/...-battleship-gondolas

You can see the tiny "captive service" lettering above the road name in the photo with load.  Note that  the load in that photo was a test of the car when overloaded to 116.4 tons (vs. capacity of 110 tons).

To be accurate, the car would need to have ribbed sides and (for all but 5 months of it's 33 years in service) have the captive service lettering above the road name.

The PRR information on the website link provided by "Bob" shows that the car was still in the ORER listing on 10/52. Even if originally painted black it could have been repainted red during its long life (1919-1952).

@Bob posted:

First off, the VGN and C&O gons had offset sides, while in true Pennsy fashion the G23 had ribbed sides.  The car was built in 1919 and lasted until 1952, so for that era Freight Car Color would have been applied (I have no reference for this, just how all other classes of freight cars were painted).

There is an article on the G23 in The Keystone Volume 49, number 3 (Autumn, 2016).  No mention of color is made in the article, but it does say that by September 24, 1919 (5 months after building), the car was stenciled to be used in captive service between Derry, PA to the coal dumper in Canton, MD.

There are photos of the car in this old OGR thread:

https://ogrforum.com/...-battleship-gondolas

You can see the tiny "captive service" lettering above the road name in the photo with load.  Note that  the load in that photo was a test of the car when overloaded to 116.4 tons (vs. capacity of 110 tons).

To be accurate, the car would need to have ribbed sides and (for all but 5 months of it's 33 years in service) have the captive service lettering above the road name.

Thanks for the help Bob, Nice to see there are modelers on here willing to lend a hand.  My gut says it was not originally black.  May repaint the C&O freight car red or whatever its called.

@Bessemer643 posted:

Thanks for the help Bob, Nice to see there are modelers on here willing to lend a hand.  My gut says it was not originally black.  May repaint the C&O freight car red or whatever its called.

I have the Al Buchan/Elden Gatwood PRR gondola book - In the chapter on gondola paint colors they indicate that while they have no specific pre-1920 gondola paint details, in the 1920 and beyond period of which they have documentation, gondolas were painted the standard PRR freight car red.

@Rule292 posted:

I have the Al Buchan/Elden Gatwood PRR gondola book - In the chapter on gondola paint colors they indicate that while they have no specific pre-1920 gondola paint details, in the 1920 and beyond period of which they have documentation, gondolas were painted the standard PRR freight car red.

Thank you sir! Huge help

@Bessemer643 posted:

Thank you sir! Huge help

Quite welcome!

I like digging into the books for things like this.  The link to the original article has the standard PRR lettering before they went to the ball keystone emblem that's most common (those photos are in the public domain online in the Hagley Library PRR collection)... but it lasted until 1952 which in the era of steamers and high sulfur coal makes it likely to have been repainted at some time just to keep it from rusting away.