Reading 1633 at Tamaqua

Detail of poling car

There was a question over on the Reading Modeler site about the Reading Poling cars so I thought I’d post this image. It was scaned from a small print, but it shows the poling car working on the back of 1633. It appears to be built from a Tender frame. It has Tender trucks under it still. The side boards are similiar to the configuration of the steps behind the pilot beams on steam locomotives, only they have a long board attached to the length of them.

I’ve changed my mind a couple of time on which hill I was going to model. If I had stayed with Tamaqua to Mahanoy Tunnel this would have been at the top of the “to build” list. I’ve seen this in many of the yard photos from the top of the hill.