Cabooses

My caboose collection is slowly getting to the point where I need it to be. It has taken several years to do so however.

One thing I had on my list for Springfield was a Van Hobbies Hawker Siddeley caboose.  I had heard that they had been seen down there in the past few years but I wasn't that lucky unfortunately. I asked every vendor selling brass at the show if they had any CN cabooses and all of them said no - or so I thought.  Apparently I had given my contact info to a vendor who said he might have something at home.  I got an email several weeks later and low and behold, he had a Hawker Siddeley, painted, which didn't break the bank.  He was also located in London, ON as well.  I promptly purchased it and it arrived about two weeks ago.

The caboose was numbered and such, but I added several other decals, including ACI plates and misc car info.  I weathered the wheel sets but nothing else.

He gave me a list of everything else he had and there was a Overland Point Sainte Charles caboose on the list as well.  I decided to purchase it at the same price I bought the Hawker for (I got a decent deal on the Hawker considering it was painted, but I got a really good deal on the PSC as a painted OMI PSC usually sells for north of $350CDN).

The main reason I decided to buy it was because it had the "funny stacks".  To my knowledge, a small number of CN PSC cabooses had their stacks relocated from the as built positions to either side of the cupola.  This was done because the stacks were directly in the sightlines of the conductor/rear end brakeman who would be sitting in the cupola at any given time.

This caboose was also numbered, albeit incorrectly for a caboose with the funny stacks.  I promptly renumbered it and added some other misc decals, as I did with the Hawker.  It also received the same weathering tactics.

My current fleet, which consists of two wood cabooses from True Line, an Athabasca PSC brass kit, a Van Hobbies Hawker Siddeley, and two Sylvan transfer van resin kits.  The weathered wood caboose was custom painted by yours truly.  The second one will be weathered as well, however I plan to add modern storm windows to that one.  The Athabasca is near completion, but I still have two in the boxes to build.  The HS is self explanatory and the Sylvan transfer vans were also built by me.  I have one more of those in the box as well.  

Once those remaining caboose kits are completed, I will have the necessary fleet I desire for my operations!