Ron Chamberlain Horn Data

Howdy,

On behalf of Ron Chamberlain, attached you'll find quite a bit of information about Frisco's use of Leslie, Wabco, and Nathan horns. Ron sent this to me a while back to post, but I was truant and just getting it posted. Here is his cover letter:

Hi Mike,

Please find enclosed the Frisco air horn documentation for web site upload and the Missouri State University Frisco archives.

Thanks to the efforts of the Buffington's, Griff Hamilton, and Alan Schmitt, a small but significant amount of Frisco air horn documentation has been saved. I can think of only one other class one road with as much or more air horn related material saved for posterity, the Western Maryland.
The material and sources:

1. The poem: THAT WHISTLE IN THE NIGHT by Robert E. Swanson inventor of the M-5 air horn

2. Frisco air horn history correspondence: Lee Bufington (1995)

3. Frisco air horn history correspondence: Lee Buffington (1995)

4. EMD parts list Leslie: Alan Schmitt

5. EMD parts list Wabco: Alan Schmitt

6. M-5 195 1 advertisement : John Merman

7. HORNS USED ON DIESEL ROAD UNITS: Alan Schmitt

8. Frisco ad/TD-53 1 : Griff Hamilton

9. 1974 Leslie/Frisco Air Horn Maintenance and Service Manual: Larry Buffington.

10. FRA.11978 air horn tests: Larry Buffington


11. 1979 tests air horn tests: Larry Buffington

Best regards,
mike

 

WOW!

A lot of superb, comprehensive information. I went right away to the letters from Lee Buffington, and will work to digest the rest of this shortly.

Please pass along Frisco Nation's thanks to Ron for forwarding this information to the group.

Best Regards,

 

Wonderful! Terrific information.

Thanks Mike, and pass along thanks to Ron.

Ken

ps - It brings tears to my eyes to see new letters from Lee Buffington. What a great gentleman he was and what a great Frisco resource he still continues to be.

 

Interesting!

The "Horns Used on Frisco Road Units" table, dated early 1952, shows that, at least for a short time, remodeled Racehorse E7 SLSF 2005 carried a Nathan M5, all bells forward, as the forward facing horn, with a Leslie single bell horn facing to the rear. All of the other E7's and E8's at the time carried a large single bell Leslie as the forward horn, with the same single Leslie facing to the rear. These other units likely were carrying the as-delivered horn sets, which was a large single Leslie forward and a regular Leslie to the rear.

Anybody have a pic of 2005 with the Nathan 5-tooter facing forward up top on the right side? None of my 2005 pics (12 total) show it sporting a Nathan M5.

Ken

ps - I love these little Frisco trivia details!

 

Doug - The pic of SLSF 2001 westbound on #3 at St James shows the E7 with a five-chime Leslie S-5T, with all bells forward. This is the horn that, eventualy, all the SLSF E7's and E8's carried.

What I am talking about in my posting above refers to the table Mike posted from Ron Chamberlain, which shows the disposition of the horns on the Frisco E-units in 1952. At this time, per the table, all the E's carried their original horn set as delivered from EMD - a large bell single Leslie A-200 facing forward on the engineer's side, plus a standard bell single Leslie A-125 facing to the rear on the fireman's side ...... except, per the table, SLSF 2005, which carried a five-chime Nathan M5 with all five bells facing forward, plus the single Leslie A-125 facing to the rear.

The Nathan M5 looks quite a bit different than the Leslie S-5T "Super Tyfon", both with all bells forward. The difference is easy to see. The Leslie S-5T is what the Frisco eventually standardized on for the E's (as on the 2001 @ St James pic), plus for most of the F's and FA's as well.

There are excellent HO detail parts available for all of these horns. The Frisco tried out most of them over the years before selecting their favorites - I'm really into showing the correct variety of horn on my models - an easily modeled detail.

I guess I'm just kind of a horny type of modeler!

Ken