Bluford Shops - 24090 - Caboose, Transfer - Elgin Joliet & Eastern - 187

Model Information: This model features: Fox Valley Metal wheels and Wire grabs and cut levers.

This short body bay window caboose design was developed by International Car and MoPac in the 1970s. Several other railroads used very similar cars. These were assigned to road service and were NOT transfer cabooses.

Prototype History: A transfer caboose looks more like a flat car with a shed bolted to the middle of it than it does a standard caboose. It is used in transfer service between rail yards or short switching runs, and as such, lacks sleeping, cooking or restroom facilities. The ends of a transfer caboose are left open, with safety railings surrounding the area between the crew compartment and the end of the car.

A recent variation on the transfer caboose is the "pushing" or "shoving" platform. It can be any railcar where a brakeman can safely ride for some distance to help the engineer with visibility at the other end of the train. Flatcars and covered hoppers have been used for this purpose, but often the pushing platform is a caboose that has had its windows covered and welded shut and permanently locked doors. CSX uses former Louisville & Nashville short bay window cabooses and former Conrail waycars as pushing platforms.

From Wikipedia

Road Name History: The EJ&E dates from 1888. For most of its history, it was owned by US Steel whose Gary Works is near the east end of the line. Another company owns the mill now.

The EJ&E traces a wide arc around the Chicago area between 30 and 40 miles from the city center from Waukegan on the north, around Walker and Joliet, then east as far as Porter, Indiana. Because of this, the EJ&E was known for years as “The Chicago Outer Belt.” It also had the nickname, “The J”.

EJ&E’s two biggest missions have been moving steel and acting as a transfer road for all of Chicago’s Class 1’s and shortlines. As a result, the line was heavily trafficked with 100 locomotives required to serve just 230 route miles. In addition, EJ&E had over 10,000 freight cars, a huge fleet for a line that size.

In the early diesel days, EJ&E stuck mostly with Baldwin and EMD with a few Alco RS2’s thrown in. The J had more Baldwin center cab transfer engines (DT 6-6-2000) than anyone else, in fact more than just about everyone else combined. Ballasted EMD SD7’s painted in green over orange were also used in transfer service. EMD NW2’s were the primary switchers. In 1970, the Baldwins were replaced by EMD SD38-2’s, delivered with dual controls to they could just as easily run long hood forward. By that time, EJ&E had gone to solid orange with silver trucks and fuel tanks with various striping and logo placement variations over the years. They would also toy with gold and yellow and green and yellow schemes.

In 2009 the Elgin Joliet & Eastern was acquired by Canadian National in order to link their former Wisconsin Central, Illinois Central, Chicago Central & Pacific, and Grand Trunk Western lines. These lines approached the city from different directions and had required trackage rights and terminal roads to reach each other so acquiring the EJ&E was a logical move.

Brand/Importer Information: Bluford Shops began in 2007 as a side project of two model railroad industry veterans, Craig Ross and Steve Rodgers. They saw a gap between road names available on N scale locomotives but not available on cabooses. They commissioned special runs of Atlas cabooses in Atlantic Coast Line, Central of Georgia, Monon, Boston & Maine and Southern plus runs on Grand Trunk Western and Central Vermont on the MDC wooden cabooses. While these were in process, they began to develop their first all new tooling project, 86' Auto Parts Boxcars in double door and quad door editions in N scale. By January of 2008, Bluford Shops became a full time venture. Along with additional N scale freight cars and their own tooling for new cabooses, they have brought their own caboose line to HO scale. They also have their popular Cornfields in both HO and N. The future looks bright as they continue to develop new products for your railroad.

The town of Bluford in southern Illinois featured a small yard on Illinois Central's Edgewood Cutoff (currently part of CN.) The yard included a roundhouse, concrete coaling tower (which still stands) and large ice house. Reefer trains running between the Gulf Coast and Chicago were re-iced in Bluford. Things are more quiet now in Bluford with the remaining tracks in the yard used to stage hoppers for mines to the south and store covered hoppers. Intersecting the IC line in Bluford is Southern Railway's (currently NS) line between Louisville and St. Louis. Traffic on this single track line remains relatively heavy.