Locomotive Transfer Flatcars

[Andrew Brandon]

I've been building a model of the V&T's Locomotive Transfer car off and on for some time now and I've hit a wall so to speak, hopefully someone has some insight on this.

A little background:

When the V&T began building the Carson & Colorado, they ordered a special heavy-duty flatcar from W. C. Allison & Co. of Philadelphia. This car had the distinction of carrying C&C #1 "Candelaria" to Nevada from Baldwin. Throughout the life of the C&C and V&T this car would be used to bring narrow gauge locomotives to the shops in Carson City. The southern most stall of the Carson engine house had narrow gauge rails laid and the track ahead of the stall was dug out to allow the transfer flat to meet up, the locomotive rolled into the shop and work performed. At Mound House there was a similar arrangement for loading the locomotive onto the car. Additionally, the car would be used for transporting locomotives from other roads beyond the C&C, the Sierra Valleys has photographs of their locomotives loaded on CP/SP flatcars for transport to Reno and then to be transferred to the V&T for work.

As one can imagine, this wasn't a glamorous car and I've seen only a single photograph of the car with rails on the deck. I've attached part of the image (Scanned from Silver Shortline) showing the car.

My big questions are:
How are the rails attached to the deck? I think I see 3 or 4 bolts casting a shadow along the rail if you look closely or am I crazy?

I've seen a few images of similar cars used to deliver new locomotives, however these cars seem to have wooden/strap iron rails on their decks. Has anyone seen a photo of a car similar to the V&T car with actual iron rails on it?

I'd love to get this thing done, but being a stubborn perfectionist I am hesitant to finish the car without some insight into this detail.

[Brian Norden]

Side story to moving the C&C engine west from Philadelphia is the correspondence from BLW to the C&C now at Special Collections at UNR.

The locomotive was ready to move, but the car was being built by Allison on the other side of town and not ready for several more weeks. A Baldwin representative at least one trip to check on the progress of the car.