Extra 3175 Arrives at Rock Ridge Yard

Greetings followers of the Atlantic Pacific Railroad!

This special post will be more about the train and how the cars and engine came to call the A.P.R.R. home.


The train originated on N.Y.C.T.L. under the watchful eye of Sir John R. We see Extra 3175 leaving Terminal Yard, home of Empire City

Extra 3175 making its way to Rock Ridge traversing thru Empire City...

It left the yard with great fanfare, and headed to Rock Ridge via the K.P.D. Railroad overseen by our PC guru Ralph. It seems that someone at Dave's Diner let it out to some 'train foamers' having breakfast that an 'Extra' was heading thru West Mill on its way to the A.P.R.R. Needless to say, these guys had to chase it.

Disregarding the rules of the road, they went on a hunt!

While we hope they caught it, and we hope they didn't get caught chasing it! We will never know. We did hear they made it to lunch at Mussachia's Ristorante.

Heading south, Extra 3175 rounds the rails past Baskerville Jct on its way to Rock Ridge.

Making a stop at Weehawken, an inspection and crew change was made. Also, 1/87th Senior Engineer Ed and 1/87 Sir Larry did a car inspection for the A.P.R.R. records. 

A little background information supplied to me by 1:1 Sir John R. of the N.Y.C.T.L. As we all know, Sir John and his artistic creativity, as well as his paint work, are legendary on the A.P.R.R. 

Here's some information that 1:1 Sir John had enclosed with the paint job he did on PC 3175:

Penn Central GP40's 3170-3186 bought NEW by PC and delivered in October 1968. Delivered by EMD with the rare 'Orange C'. To this date the reason behind the orange 'C' remains a mystery. #3175 was part of a 54 engine order by the PC 3170-3223. #3175 was assigned to Collinwood for maintenance. 

The Patti-O paint shop also took to task a number of 3 Bay and 6 Bay Cylindrical hoppers. Some of these were painted in PC, APRR and EB. These will all be used by us in both our P.C.C.M. virtual operating sessions as well as our own personal train operations. A little background on the cylindrical covered hoppers (courtesy of Wikipedia):

Introduced in 1961 by ACF® to haul sand, clay, salt, grain and bulk plastics, the Cylindrical Hopper was the first commercially successful tank-type covered hopper car design. A few of the more than 4,000 cars of this type built through 1966 can still be seen in service today across the United States.

Past the inspections process the train head out and makes a beeline for Rock Ridge where the freight cars will reside in the yard until needed for revenue service. 

Many thanks go out to 1:1 Sir John for making these freight cars and engine come to life as well as thanks to 1:1 PC Ralph who not only help stage the train passing thru West Mill, but made it very enjoyable to look at on his railroad!