Re: The challenge of fraud-o-freights: paint and hats ...

John West Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I like this image because it has the rather non-
> descript look of an image I might have taken
> back in the 60's ...

> But then you start nit-picking the details.  Spark
> arrestor, rock ballast, water bag hanging from the
> tender rather than the (missing) flag holder on
> the side of the cab, some semblance of paint on
> the boxcar.  Others can probably add to this list.
> Tough to get everything right.


Well, John -

You can always do as I do every once in a while - if the color is off, just convert to B&W and no-one will ever know ...    

In this one there are enough weeds to hide the ballast, and instead of a baseball cap the engineer is at least wearing a Bowler -
so it COULD be Jim Shawcroft in the mid-to-late sixties instead of Jeff Stebbins in the early twenty-teens:


The smoke smoky spark arrestor has been cropped off in this B&W copy, so the biggest give-away is the aluminium paint on the poling pocket.
Of course nit-pickers with REALLY sharp eyes can tell from the jacket's slightly lighter shade of gray that it's (almost) Moffat Green!!    

{Added 11/27/15}  OOooops - there's also those metal sheets on the ends of the ties to help prevent splitting.  IIRC, the Grande didn't use them back in the fifties & sixties - at least not on the narrow gauge.   BTW, what is the correct name for them??

- El Abuelo Histœrico, Greengo y Curmudgeoño de los Locomoturas Viejos y Verdes,
aka Der Grossväterlich DünkelOlivGrünDampfKesselMantelLiebHabender



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 11/27/2015 12:38PM by Russo Loco.