Athearn - 23815 - Covered Hopper, 3-Bay, PS-2 2893 - Sacramento Northern - 5012

Specific Item Information: N RTR PS-2 2893 Covered Hopper, SN #1

Model Information: Features:

• Separately applied round roof hatches;
• Photo-etched metal roof walk;
• Separately applied wire grab irons;
• Separate brake cylinder, valve and air reservoir with brake plumbing;
• Detailed outlets;
• Multiple road numbers;
• Fully-assembled and ready-to-run out of the box;
• Accurately painted and printed;
• Highly detailed, injection molded body;
• Separately applied brake wheel;
• Machined metal wheels;
• Screw mounted trucks;
• Truck mounted McHenry operating knuckle couplers;
• Weighted for trouble free operation;
• Clear plastic jewel box for convenient storage;
• Operates on Code 55 and 80 rail;
• Minimum radius: 9 3/4"

Prototype History: Pullman-Standard dominated the covered hopper car market beginning in the 1950s, thanks to the design success of their PS-2 series of covered hoppers. Designed to carry bulk commodities, such as grain, cement and plastic pellets, these cars roamed the rails of North America for decades, attesting to their utilitarian functionality. The 2893 c.f. model has a capacity of 70 tons and has a 4-3-4 post arrangement. The roof hatches are not spaced evenly. These cars featured side ladders at the right hand end whereas later PS models used grab irons.

Road Name History: The Sacramento Northern Railway (reporting mark SN) was an 183-mile (295 km) electric interurban railway that connectected Chico in northern California with Oakland via the California capital, Sacramento. In its operation it ran directly on the streets of Oakland, Sacramento, Yuba City, Chico, and Woodland and ran passenger service until 1941 and freight service into the 1960s.

The Sacramento Northern (SN) was an electrified interurban railroad in California that extended 183 miles from Oakland north to Chico. There were two branches, one to Woodland-Colusa, and the other to Oroville. The SN had been two separate interurban companies connecting at Sacramento until 1925. The Oakland, Antioch, and Eastern Railway was a trolley-wire powered line that ran from Oakland through a tunnel in the Oakland hills to Moraga, Walnut Creek, Concord, Pittsburg, to Sacramento. It was renamed the San Francisco-Sacramento Railroad briefly. The Northern Electric Railway was a third-rail powered line that ran from Sacramento north through Marysville-Yuba City to Chico. The train crossed the Sacramento River on the Red Gate Bridge. It was renamed the Sacramento Northern Railroad in 1914. In 1928, the two lines combined to become the Sacramento Northern Railway and came under control of the Western Pacific Railroad which operated it as a separate entity. An extensive multiple-car passenger service operated from Oakland to Chico until 1941 including providing dining car service on some trains. Passenger traffic was heaviest from Sacramento to Oakland. Freight operation using electric locomotives continued into the 1960s. The SN was a typical interurban in that its trains, including freight, ran on downtown city streets in Oakland, Sacramento, Yuba City, and Woodland. This involved multiple car trains making sharp turns at street corners and obeying traffic signals. Once in open country, SN's passenger trains ran at fairly fast speeds. With its shorter route and lower fares, the SN provided strong competition to the Southern Pacific and Western Pacific railroads for passenger business and minor freight business between those two cities. North of Sacramento, rail business was less due to the small town agricultural nature of the region with is small towns and by competition from the SP Railroad.

From Wikipedia

Brand/Importer Information: Athearn's history began in 1938, when its founder-to-be, Irvin Athearn, started an elaborate O scale layout in his mother's house. After placing an ad selling the layout, and receiving much response to it, Irv decided that selling model railroads would be a good living. He sold train products out of his mother's house through most of the 1940s. After becoming a full-time retailer in 1946, Irv opened a separate facility in Hawthorne, California in 1948, and that same year he branched into HO scale models for the first time.

Athearn acquired the Globe Models product line and improved upon it, introducing a comprehensive array of locomotive, passenger and freight car models. Improvements included all-wheel drive and electrical contact. One innovation was the "Hi-Fi" drive mechanism, employing small rubber bands to transfer motion from the motor spindle to the axles. Another was the double-ended ring magnet motor, which permitted easy connection to all-wheel-drive assemblies. Athearn was also able to incorporate flywheels into double-ended drives.

The company produced a model of the Boston & Maine P4 class Pacific steam locomotive which incorporated a cast zinc alloy base and thermoplastic resin superstructure. It had a worm drive and all power pickup was through the bipolar trucks that carried the tender. This item was discontinued after the Wilson motor was no longer available, and was not redesigned for a more technologically advanced motor.

Athearn's car fleet included shorter-than-scale interpretations of passenger cars of Southern Pacific and Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad prototypes. The company also offered a variety of scale-length freight cars with sprung and equalized trucks. The cars could be obtained in simple kit form, or ready-to-run in windowed display boxes. The comprehensive scope of the product line contributed to the popularity of HO as a model railroad scale, due to the ready availability of items and their low cost.

Irv Athearn died in 1991. New owners took control in 1994, but continued to follow Athearn's commitment to high-quality products at reasonable prices. Athearn was bought in 2004 by Horizon Hobby. Athearn was then moved from its facility in Compton to a new facility in Carson, California. In mid-2009, all remaining US production was moved to China and warehousing moved to parent Horizon Hobby. Sales and product development was relocated to a smaller facility in Long Beach, California.

Read more on Wikipedia and Athearn website.