R&W Red Devil Locomotive Coaler by Overland Models

[Mike Trent]

Morning, following the discussion of the Coal Loader at Leadville, as it was touched on in the excellent Coal Chute thread, I went back through my fairly recent picture archives to find those taken of a model you might be interested in.

Sometime after my days with Overland Models in the 80's, Tom Marsh produced a model in O Scale of a Red Devil Loader, which had been requested. I don't know if it was produced in any other scales, but I'm pretty sure it was at least in HO Scale. During this same period, however, Tom was producing C&S locomotives in Sn3, so it may well be that there are some of these floating around out there in that scale too, and if so, one of them must surely have Keith's name on it.

I never saw one of these models anywhere or even a photograph until I was browsing through ebay one lazy evening in about 2009. Bill Davis had one that had come from an estate, and I went for it, thinking that it could be modified for use as the two at Alamosa and Antonito were set up, with side delivery. The great thing about the Red Devils was that they were adaptable in multiple ways, to fit applications wherever they could be used. The D&RGW set them up as mentioned in the other thread, for side delivery, the one at Leadville was set up for straight, or inline delivery. How they were set up depended on the track arrangements at the site, and also on whatever the arrangement was to be for the for the pit, and the delivery of coal into it.

Overland's model is set up inline, same as was used at Leadville. The pit is pretty much roughed  in by the builder, I'm sure this was the detail that probably varied from one to the other more than anything else. As Chris pointed out, the pictures of the Leadville loader we have in the other thread were taken in later years when the Highline was being run with the Standard Gauge 600 Class engines. Those tenders are much taller, so the ramp could have been reset, or maybe the chute was shortened. Or both. I believe this is set up very much as the one at Leadville prior to 1943.

I will post four pictures of the Overland Red Devil, which I took for a friend, who was thinking that this might serve his need for a small loader. As it turned out, he didn't have room for the inline setup, so I still have it. These things are probably scarce as hen's teeth to find. But you just never know. I'll be glad to take more detailed photos and post them if anyone is interested, along with measurements.

[Mike Trent]

These pictures were taken in June 2014, before rail was laid in Dickey.

[Mike Trent]

[Mike Trent]

[Mike Trent]

OK, there's always a story.

In about 2008, I found a pretty much orphaned and abandoned Overland #73 on ebay as well. The plow and pilot were messed up, headlight bracket bent up, cab roof overhang bent down on one corner, no box, and no tender. The seller said some guy came in with a cardboard box that had a bunch of loose brass remnants from a collection which was being beaten with hammers so they could sell the brass for scrap after their old uncle or whoever he was, the one who "liked trains", had been sent off to the home up in Missouri. They threw away all the boxes first. Eventually it dawned on this guy that maybe they could get more cash out of the old guy's trains by trying to sell them instead of scrapping them. Really. Anyway, I bought it and got it cheap. I found an old PSC tender kit that had a tank almost exactly the proper dimensions, scrounged a few castings, etc, fixed everything else, and ended up with a real nice #73. When I took these pictures for my friend, I discovered that the Red Devil's box was exactly the same size as the Overland B-4-E, so I had now found my box for the #73. I modified the label so it matches the others, and now this model rests still within it's box, but the label is now for #73. Hey, you gotta do what you gotta do, and I have no regrets. At least I had sense enough to take a picture.

[Jim Courtney]

Keith, Keith, Keith . . .

This thing is so cool!  Don't you think your Leadville really needs one?

Any chance of installing a short piece of foreground standard gauge track to feed the bin?  A standard gauge C&S 1918 USRA steel hopper, half its load discharged to feed "Red Devil", would look good, don't you think??

[Mike Trent]

I found a couple references to this model in HO Scale, so far I have found no confirmation on S Scale.

[Jim Courtney]

An HO scale model of the "Red Devil" is currently for sale on eBay:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Red-Devil-Locomotive-Coaler-HO-Brass-Import-from-Overland-/172037845610?hash=item280e41326a:g:sGoAAOSwHPlWedq6

Some nice detail photos in the ad:












Now if we can find one in S scale, Keith's employees in Leadville can finally stop throwing coal in the air with a shovel!

[Chris Walker]

Here's a link to a colour photo taken at Leadville by John West.

https://flic.kr/p/qCntRi

[Jim Courtney]

Keith,

Is this the shed by the roundhouse that you modeled, or a later addition?

https://www.flickr.com/photos/124319201@N04/16324073046/in/photostream/

Happy New Year to everyone on this fabulous forum!!

[Chris Walker]

Jim Courtney wrote

Happy New Year to everyone on this fabulous forum!!

That is "so last year"