@GG1 4877 posted:Finally on this thought, mail and express trains tended to be mostly heavyweight cars in the form of express boxcars, reefers, baggage cars, and RPOs. In order to qualify as a passenger train and therefore run at passenger speeds, a single coach or combine known as a rider car would be added as the last car in the train and one could purchase low-cost tickets for very basic service. Crews also used these cars.
Personally, I find these mixed trains to be very interesting trains because of their lack of conformance between car types, paint schemes, and even road names.
Probably one of my favorite trains to run is my version of Santa Fe's Fast Mail Express. Those trains are great because you can basically mix in whatever express/head end cars you want and have it be prototypical.
I'm currently working on assembling a late 40's version of Santa Fe's Grand Canyon. The train was made up of a mix of heavyweight and lightweight cars along with a bunch of express and head end cars. I really can't find any O gauge heavyweight sleepers painted in Santa Fe's green with black roof scheme with Santa Fe lettering (I keep finding Pullman lettered ones) so I'll end up painting my own to mix in with lightweight sleepers on the train. In the late 40's the Grand Canyon could have anything from the transcontinental passenger pool to power it, so 3460 class Hudsons. 2900/3776/3765/3751 class Northerns, F3s/F7s, and PAs are appropriate to pull the train.
