Kato's El Capitan "Very Nice !"

[Nato]

  "Ho Ho Ho! A Package Has Been Shipped to You fron the Feather River Train Shop".Thats what my E Mail said and I knew what it was ,my El Cap Train. Got my large Chuck Pack yesterday delivered to my door by my friendly mail carrier. As a passenger train Buff (Fanzee) Nut This train is all that I had hoped for and more. Now don't get me wrong Kato's previous U.S. specific trains have been wonderful, the Cal Zeph, Pooper (Super) Chief and the Broadway Ltd, but the Hi Level El Capitin has always held a soft spot for me ever since I was a kid, with its unusual double deck design and after recieving a railroad promotional folder I was hooked. If I had still been a HO modeler I would have bought the old HO Fleischman Hi Level train with it's incorrect War Bonnett painted FA 1 diesel's. I purchased an N Scale Brass train a number of years back,and then the kits for coaches from "N Scale International",but nothing can compair to this gem from Kato. Once again they have figured out how to make plastic look like stainless steel not the awful Lustra Chrome on some Bachmann locos and cars. The detailing on these cars is spot on. The black rubber gaskets around the windows, car interriors is a nice blue color (not bright like Con Cor Budd cars) nice underbody detailing,fairly close couplimg. The lighted Drumhead (tail sign) on the last car with the red Mars Light above. There is no interrior in the baggage dorm car (thats ok) ,how do I know this. Kato as usual has not put any window glass in the end windows on vestibule doors so I can hold the car up to the light and look in , The service area in the center of the diner is lacking,but would be in a area where there are no windows.  This train rates a solid ten in my book.Now if Kato would just revisit their UP and GN trains and reissue them with correct consists like Walthers has done in HO.Naw that will never happen.Nate Goodman (Nato). "Sorry for the sollid wall of text."

[lashedup]

Here's a little video run-by to help your block of text along...

[Chulvis]

Great video. Banjo playing wasn't bad either. We'll have to dual next year at Trainfest.  ;D

[UP1996]

Man, those are some sweet looking trains.  Nice video!

[Nato]

  Yes ! Very nice viedo. I forgot another landmark Kato U.S. Train. The Daylight. Nate Goodman (Nato).

[Nato]

  Bart Simpson at the black board writing I will spell VIDEO Correctly,I will spell VIDEO Correctly. Two glaring things that stand out on Kato's SF diesels. Those overly bright red (molded in red) plastic horns,and a worse error. The Warbonnett striping running across the side grills on the A units. Look at photos of real locos, the grills are stainess the striping stops at the grill edges. I also looked at my Locomotives,the top edge of the grill from the stripe to the cab is red. It should be silver like the rest of the grill. This jogged my memory,pn my original first run Kato Santa Fe locos many moons ago I did paint out the striping,need to do it on thses locos which I got when I got my Pooper (Super) Chief. Again nice video and the Banjo music as Chuck has commented is also nice. Nate Goodman (Nato).

[asarge]

Nice Video Jamie!! The ModuTrak layout makes a great movie set! And I even spelled video correctly for sister Nate!  ;D

The cars look great. Kato did a fantastic job.

[seusscaboose]

nice video!

[Roger Holmes]

I don't model the Santa Fe but had to have these.  My justifications:

1) I model Chicago so anything that ran there is fair game.

2) I fondly recall watching  heavy TV advertising by the Santa Fe for the Hi-Level El Capitan when I was growing up in Chicago--yes, railroad passenger service did advertise on TV. They used the now politically incorrect little indian boy, Chico, saying, "Santa Fe, All the way!".

3)  IIRC I rode on one in the early Amtrak Superliner days when they didn't have enough cars yet to fill out the consist.  I recall the interior being much more spartan than the "new" Superliner cars.

When my Chuckpack showed up on my doorstep it occured to me that these models travelled from Japan to some west coast port and then on to Kato in Schaumburg, IL which is about 200 miles from here and 5 miles from my Mother's house.  They then travelled to some distributor who sent them to Chuck on the Pacific coast who sent them back to me in central Illinois.  They've travelled almost as much as the real cars

[sd80mac]

That was a very nice video. I going to run my El Cap with Athearn FP45s on the head-end. In some ways I'm kind of a non-traditionalist! I don't model the Santa Fe eitther, BUT I am a big Budd passenger car fan!!! Cal Zephyr, El Cap, now we need the Sunset Limited!!!

Donnell

[Nato]

  FYI  I painted the side grills on my Kato SF A units yesterday to get rid of the striping going across the grills. I used Tamyia Flat Aluminum which is a perfect match to the silver Kato Used. A very small brush and several thin coats was all it took to cover the stripes, I used the same small pointed brush to paint the side grill edges that were red from the cab back to the stripe. Now my locomotives look 100% better.  Yes I checked my locos from the very first run and I had done the same repaint. Life Like's SF E-8 is correct no stripe over the grills. Nate Goodman (Nato).

[Sokramiketes]

I thought the Warbonnet was continued underneath the grill, so while not ideal, I think that's what Kato was going for.

I have an issue with the giant rivets on the Budd baggage car (All shot welded stainless steel construction, why are there rivets??) but the rest of the train is fantastic as usual.

[Nato]

    All photos that I have seen in books and magazines and looking at the actual locomotives in service both on SF and Amquack (Trak) on trips to California shows no striping under the grills,which woould have been hard to do at the builder EMD without painting the locomotives first then applying the grilling,which just wasn't done in the manufacturing process. Santa Fe did have some F-7 Freight diesels with out the stainless grills,there was wire mesh like on an F-3 because the grills were use by the railroad on more passenger F's I believe the F-3's when rebuilt to more closely resemble the F-7's with A units loosing their third porthole.Some F-3's came with two. The book "Santa Fe Diesel Daze" by Mc Call is a good reference source,but now a bit hard to find. Nate Goodman (Nato).

[Sokramiketes]

    All photos that I have seen in books and magazines and looking at the actual locomotives in service both on SF and Amquack (Trak) on trips to California shows no striping under the grills,which woould have been hard to do at the builder EMD without painting the locomotives first then applying the grilling,which just wasn't done in the manufacturing process.

Nate, the Stainless steel grills were separate assemblies that were bolted on the locomotive after painting.  In manufaturing, it's a lot easier to bolt on the part later than to spend time masking it off later, and I think you'll agree that the grills were not painted over. 

Santa Fe did have some F-7 Freight diesels with out the stainless grills,there was wire mesh like on an F-3 because the grills were use by the railroad on more passenger F's I believe the F-3's when rebuilt to more closely resemble the F-7's with A units loosing their third porthole.Some F-3's came with two. The book "Santa Fe Diesel Daze" by Mc Call is a good reference source,but now a bit hard to find. Nate Goodman (Nato).

As the grills stick out a bit from the side of the locomotive, it is difficult to tell what color is behind the grills in a typical 3/4 railfan wedge shot because of the louver effect from the grill making it look all silver.  Look for photos taken directly from the side of the units and you'll see paint behind the grills.  On the Milw it's yellow back there.  On these Santa Fe warbonnets you'll actually see red behind the front part of the grill and silver behind the headdress.  In a select few photos you'll actually see the yellow was continued through the grill area too, when the photographer gets just the right angle to see through the louvered grill.  I grabbed Morning Sun's Trackside around Kansas off the shelf and found one such photo, top of page 23.  The lead unit clearly shows the red/silver split.  The rear unit is at the right angle to catch the yellow through the grill.  The lead unit you can't see yellow, but I believe it is because it's an F3 with carbody opening/screening in that area (Santa Fe added the stainless grills to their F3's to better match the F7 fleet.)  The trailing unit in the photo is a standard F7 and has the yellow.

And if that's not enough, here's the painting diagram that Kato probably used:
http://www.atsfrr.com/resources/funits/pdf/F7-A-Pass.pdf

Again, while Kato put it on top of the grill incorrectly, I wouldn't wipe it out completely from my units, I'd try to just hit the raised edges of the grill with silver and let it fade into the background a bit.

[Nato]

  I spent part of today with a magnifier looking at both color and B&W photos of SF F Units in my vast collection of rail books. In one or two photos at certain angles it appears there may be a black stripe behind the grills,but in other color photots that stripe is really the edge of the carbody bracing that appears behind the grills. The shiney look of the grills in most photos and at all angles maks them look not see thru a few shots show darker slightly weathered grills. My final thinking on this ,even though I viewed locos in person ,to close this topic before it gets Locked Up is that there could have been atleast a black stripe behind the grills,but mostly impossible to see. Painting out the stripes sure looks 100% better.        Nate Goodman (Nato).