Santa Fe Blue Goose Cab Interior

@coach joe posted:

3460 was certainly a unique engine on the Santa Fe, the only streamlined steam engine, and the only engine painted Robins Egg blue.  I haven't found any pictures of the cab interior and backhead.  What color is the most probable for the interior and backhead of this engine.  I know some model manufacturers have continued the blue to the cab interior but I feel that is very impractical therefore not very probable for a railroad to use.

Have you contacted the Santa Fe Modeling & Historical Society?

Not yet.  I was searching the internet for pictures and didn't find any.  I thought I'd ask here since there are a number of members like you that have been in and around so many different aspects of railroading and steam restorations that someone would have an idea of general practices.  Thanks for the reply and the idea.

@coach joe posted:

Not yet.  I was searching the internet for pictures and didn't find any.  I thought I'd ask here since there are a number of members like you that have been in and around so many different aspects of railroading and steam restorations that someone would have an idea of general practices.  Thanks for the reply and the idea.

You're welcome. Although I have been involved with quite a few steam locomotives since about 1957, on the NY&LB K4s locomotives at South Amboy, NJ., I have never been on, nor around, the Santa Fe "Blue Goose" (the only Santa Fe steam locomotive I've ever been on has been the 3751).

Standard cab interior for Santa Fe steam engines was medium-dark green and the backhead was black.  The air brake valves and appliances were painted black, with some valve handles painted red.  There would not have been a reason to paint the interior of 3460 anything other than medium/dark green.  I'll check the Santa Fe Steam Locomotive Painting, Lettering & Detail Guide, by Larry E. Brasher & Stan Kistler, before retiring for the night and see if it confirms this.

. . . (Later) . . . Okay, I checked the Guide and it has no special interior color for engine 3460.  In the steam era, railroad shops mixed a lot of their own paint.  Here are the cab painting instructions from 1943:

"Cab roof and interior of cab to be sandblasted or shot-blasted to remove flash scale and rust, and before lining (tongue and groove wood) is applied . . ." and then it goes on to give the formula for the red lead and linseed oil primer to be used on the interior of the metal cab roof and walls, as well as the un-tinted paint coat to follow.  Then, the tongue and groove wood strip cab interior was applied and painted as follows: "When lining is applied prime all wood with chrome green mixed linseed oil, then apply one coat Acme green enamel on all of cab interior; finish with one coat engine finishing varnish."

Thank you so much Tom.  Is that one of the guides from the Santa Fe Modeling and Historical Society?  I saw the had 3 different guides available.

“then apply one coat Acme green enamel on all of cab interior”

Maybe the Looney Tunes scale PS-1 boxcars in the new catalog aren’t fantasy after all….

As added information, EMC/EMD cab interior and engine room interior colors were either "Suede Gray" or "Jade Green". The "Jade Green" color was carried-over from the steam locomotive industry cab interior color, most commonly used.

@coach joe posted:

Thank you so much Tom.  Is that one of the guides from the Santa Fe Modeling and Historical Society?  I saw the had 3 different guides available.

Yes.  The book is still available at $42, but I just checked and it indicated a reduced price of $20.  I know that the Society is trying to clean out small inventories of old publications, because they have to pay to have them warehoused.  So this tells me that this book will soon be out of print.

This one would certainly be worth every bit of twenty bucks, if you have an interest in details and Santa Fe steam.

If I was a serious Santa Fe modeler I would definitely purchase that publication and some of the others they had listed.  I'm more of a "traditional" train guy that sometimes like to add details to available product more to make them mine than for prototypical fidelity.  In this instance my "Blue Goose" isn't even a Hudson.  Years ago I bought the Williams version, yes I know it's a "J" but I guess I was buying the paint job more than any thing.  I read where another forum member slid a Lionel "J" backhead into his Williams "J" and it was a perfect fit so I thought I would dress up mine.  Thanks to your information I'll paint the gauges and some of the valves and hit it with a matte clear coat before sliding it in.  I may even try the dark green on the interior if I can figure a way not to mess up the beautiful exterior.

As a Santa Fe man would you have heard any stories as to why that engine was painted that way?

I had heard that the "Blue Goose" was painted that way in order to match the passenger equipment it hauled.

@Hot Water posted:

I had heard that the "Blue Goose" was painted that way in order to match the passenger equipment it hauled.

  Me too.  

@Hot Water posted:

I had heard that the "Blue Goose" was painted that way in order to match the passenger equipment it hauled.

@Number 90 posted:

  Me too.  

Apparently only one car was painted to match the 3460. It was a "Pendulum Car" manufactured by the Pacific Railway Equipment Company.  It wasn't considered a success and was later painted silver and used on the LA-San Diego trains.

The 3460 was a one-off paint scheme and spent most of her career hauling heavyweight equipment on secondary trains in various states of undress. As with most streamlined steam locomotives, shop crews were not particularly fastidious about replacing superfluous pieces of sheet metal after making repairs.

I've found a number of in-service pictures of her online. One part that seemed to be missing in particular was the panel over the air pump on the front of the engine.

Here is a link to the "Pendulum Car" article.

There were 3 sold. One each to the GN, the CB&Q and the aforementioned AT&SF.

Here is a shot of 3460, westbound with a string of heavyweights at Joliet Union Station, looking a little worse for the wear.

I've linked to it on Flickr because I do not own the rights to it.

@coach joe posted:

As a Santa Fe man would you have heard any stories as to why that engine was painted that way?

Haha, I'm not THAT old of a Santa Fe man.  Larry Brasher's father was a Mechanical Department supervisor at the Department headquarters in Topeka, and spent time at Baldwin making on-site inspections during construction, when Baldwin was building Santa Fe steam locomotives, as the locomotives were designed by Santa Fe, not Baldwin.  He made some early drawings of what turned out to be the 3460, and, the design was all done in-house.  

Larry wrote an excellent book on Santa Fe steam development.  His father kept journals of his work with a lot of detail, and those were used in the writing of the book.  Your public library might be able to get a copy for you to read, if yours is part of a library network.

However, as a young boy, I did see the 3460 racing eastward at 100 MPH through La Mirada, on its one and only trip to California, in 1949.  It was a typical California coastal overcast morning, and I always thought the locomotive was grey, until I was much older.  Seeing it was nothing short of a miracle, as I just happened to be with my mother in the car, and we just happened to be next to the track to go to a store.  Some days, you're lucky!

Tom I just thought there may have ben some company folklore as to why that scheme was chosen right around the time the Super Chief was donning the famous War Bonnet.  Maybe to differentiate another "name" train.  Like the NYC's 20th Century and Empire State wore different paint.

@Nick Chillianis posted:

The 3460 was a one-off paint scheme and spent most of her career hauling heavyweight equipment on secondary trains in various states of undress. As with most streamlined steam locomotives, shop crews were not particularly fastidious about replacing superfluous pieces of sheet metal after making repairs.

I've found a number of in-service pictures of her online. One part that seemed to be missing in particular was the panel over the air pump on the front of the engine.

After WWII that's correct. 3460 and the rest of the un-streamlined members of the 3460 class were often on secondary trains with heavyweight equipment. Prior to 1946 3460 and the rest of the class were often used on the streamlined Chief between Chicago and La Junta, CO. It wasn't until the arrival of PAs and the conversion of some FT ABBA sets to passenger service in 1946 that steam was bumped from The Chief. Prior to 1946 The Super Chief and El Capitan were the only transcontinental Santa Fe passenger trains to always have diesel power. I've got multiple pictures in books (which I can't post for copyright reasons) of 3460 class 4-6-4s and 3765/3776/2900 class 4-8-4s pulling the streamlined Chief.

Here's a link to a photo of 3460 on the streamlined Chief in 1946:

ATSF, Chicago, Illinois, 1946 | Santa Fe's eastbound Chief p… | Flickr

Santa Fe had plans for a second locomotive streamlined like the 3460. That was going to be 4-8-4 #3765, the first of that class. The streamlining was canceled during construction because it was found that the streamlining would add too much weight to the locomotive. However, work had progressed far enough that it was equipped with the smooth pilot (instead of the standard boiler tube one) and stainless-steel handrails along the boiler.

Stuart

And you'll need a nickel plated six chime whistle.

Buddy of mine used to own one of the engine’s number boards.