Former Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe coach 2865, located in Atchison, Kansas will soon be starting a new career as razor blades. The car passed on due to an advanced and uncureable case of Osgood-Bradley disease. Thankfully, 2865 was a registered donor and parts will be available and listed in the classifieds.

2865 was built by Pullman in 1947 as a 47 seat chair car and served Amtrak as No. 4483. The car was retired around 1981 and has been in private ownership since then.

Pictures below show the car as it sits now. The stainless siding has started to peel off of its own accord. While the car looks intact, it is a major basket case. The roof has leaked for years and many areas of the floor are rotten through to the ground below. Was a neat car, sucks that it has come to this.

Jason Midyette

Jason, thanks for that shot because when I try to explain why stainless steel fluting does not a car make, and get into the steel frames issues inside the wall, it's sometimes difficult to explain it in words. That photo does it nicely.

And that doesn't even get into the roof issues....

Indeed, I have heard of this but never seen it in action before.

Water in the walls of any railcar is not a good thing, in a stainless clad car with a carbon steel structure it is exponentially worse (it adds electrolytic corrosion to the equation among other things). On top of that, the stainless siding hides the damage, it looks OK so everyone assumes that the car is OK and does not need any maintenance until one day the stainless siding falls off and you can suddenly see the extent of the damage.

Below is a close up of some of the rust through on 2865. Similar problem areas are lurking under the stainless on the other side of the car, it just has not fallen of yet.

Jason Midyette

Interesting to see the anatomy of the car and what rusting has done to it. Sad to see the car get scrapped but hopefully plenty of the parts find new homes.

I can attest to what a pain it is valiantly trying to keep the stainless watertight. With thermal expansion you constantly chase and replace caulking. You quickly become intimately acquainted with the proper technique of applying clear or silver silicone as well as the use of acetone for cleaning surfaces so the silicone sticks better. Make sure you have plenty of weep holes and keep them clear. It’s a constant, never-ending maintenance nightmare.

Better yet, strip off all the stainless and paint to taste (providing there is still steel under there). That cladding was the worst idea. Ever.

Were Pullman-Worcester cars worse in this regard?

Interior rust in Pullman-Standard built passenger cars is the reason that the Southern Pacific stripped the fluting off of its "Daylight" cars. The interior members were repaired and flat sheets was installed replacing the fluting.