Rainbows in the Lehigh Valley Gorge

[TMo]

Thanks Tom!  Nice to hear that I'm making something look like something I'm trying to replicate.

The vertical elements of the window frames of the ACME are going in as we speak, but there's some drying time associated with each and I'm looking for a new project that's not structure-related.

I have two GP30's, both Bachmann Spectrum DC units that I converted almost 20 years ago now.  The Penn Central unit I have has evolved over the years, starting out life as a B&O model that got black dipped and then decaled with the alternating red and white PC worm logos.  However, after some exploration, none of those red P units ever made it to Conrail and the decals didn't go on well anyway, and I ended up redoing it all and weathering that unit.  I also never replaced the incandescent bulbs that came with either unit and I've never done a whole lot with the other GP30 - a Reading unit (#5513), which is now pretty famous - it's used for a lot of excursion trains out of the Reading RR museum having been repainted and renovated lovingly back to it's glory days on the RRR.  Turns out 5513 was the very first GP30 to make it off of the production line from EMD.  All good info, but back in 1976 this unit was RR 3613 and was quickly patched to CR 2181.  While most of the CR patches were white letters over black patches, for some reason (probably a RRR employee in the mix) this unit got green patches with white letters.  Later on in its CR days, the front cab patches were redone in black, but none of the others were touched after the first patch and 2181 never got blue paint.

https://conrailphotos.thecrhs.org/photos...h-09-12-77

So, here's the plan.  The Penn Central unit (#2232) is going to get LED lights, and the Reading unit is going to get patched, renumbered as CR 2181, LEDs added and weathered.  Obviously, some time involved and this is something I'll gnaw away at occasionally. The two GP30's are going to consist with my dummified RS2 (after many unsuccessful attempts to remotor it).  Here's a shot of 5513 before any work: