Seaboard B8 & B9 - 1
The prototype
D
uring the Great
Depression, when
many railroads were
scaling back operations and
trying to make ends meet
on shoestring budgets,
Seaboard’s savvy receivers
expertly used bankruptcy
protection to extensively
modernize the railroad’s
physical plant, passenger
train fleet, main lines, and
train control systems.
A fun and easy HO
scale prototype
modeling project ...
– By John Golden
Photos by the
author
MODELING
Seaboard
B-8 and B-9
Box cars
The carrier emerged from receivership in 1946 as a powerful
regional railroad, able to compete with and beat Atlantic Coast Line
and Southern in a number of key markets and become one of the
nation’s fastest and most efficient mid-size railroad companies.
Included among these improvements were a number of all-
steel box cars of various types that modernized Seaboard’s car
fleet earlier than its competitors.
These cars included 2,000 all steel 1932 ARA cars (SAL B-6, 17000-
17999 and 18000-18999), 200 automobile cars (SAL AF, 10000-
10199), 500 turtleback box cars (SAL B-7, 18000-18499), 1,200
turtleback automobile cars (SAL AF-1, 11000-11699 and SAL AF-2,
11700-11999 and 22000-22199), and various other types of cars
1. The completed Seaboard
B-9 19794 in HO.
1
MRH-Jun 2014
