VIA Rail Steam Generator Unit Quartet
Canadian National Railways had a massive railway network that had extensive passenger service well into the 1970's. When steam locomotives were being replaced by diesels, unlike many other railways CN elected to use separate steam generator units (SGU) for secondary and branchline trains. This was to allow freight units to be used on these trains instead of dedicated passenger service units. Between 1955 and 1957 CN ordered 94 SGU from CC&F (15400-448, 1958), GMD (15450-479, 1959) and NSC (15480-494, 1960), each with a different configuration. These cars served in CN passenger train service through to the divestment of CN's passenger services into VIA Rail Canada in 1977. These cars continued in VIA service to the end of steam heated passenger cars in 1996 when they were retired. Over the years a few options for modeling these cars were available including resin and brass, particularly several different versions of the CC&F and NSC (and maybe the GMD?) SGU release