O UP Die-Cast Auxiliary Water Tender #809 Jim Ada

Like the mythological Phoenix, these former steam tenders haveescaped the scrapper’s torch and risen from the dead— not once, but three times. They were built in 1937 andassigned to the Union Pacific Railroad’s first group of800-series Northerns, Class FEF-1. While their locomotives were retiredand scrapped in the late 1950s, these tenders spent just a few monthsin retirement before receiving a new assignment.

With a bright new Armour Yellow paint job, they became24,000-gallon oil tenders for the most powerful single engines ever torun on American rails: the UP’s 8,500 horsepower GeneralElectric GTELs (gas turbine electrics, also known as “BigBlows”). Since the turbines drank Bunker C fuel oil, a thickbyproduct of petroleum distillation, the tenders were insulated andequipped with steam heating coils to make the fuel warm enough to flowto the engine. When the decade of the 1960s ended, and the turbineprogram as well, the tenders survived again while their second set ofengines went to scrap.

The tenders were nearly forgotten for almost two decades,until the crew from the UP’s Heritage Steam Fleet discoveredthese tenders and four of their brethren on a disconnected piece oftrack in Los Angeles in 1988. The six tenders had been piped togetherto make a large, stationary diesel fuel storage tank. But the“Steam Team” had a problem, and the tenders werethe solution.

The UP was (and still is) using Heritage Fleet FEF-3 No. 844and Challenger No. 3985 as roving ambassadors for the railroad. Butwith steam-era water tanks a thing of the past, the engines’range had been limited by the difficulty of supplying them with water.So the Steam Team moved three of the old tenders to its Cheyenne shopin 1989, refurbished their yellow paint jobs, and converted them intoauxiliary water tankers for steam excursions.

Between 2006 and 2008, the two remaining tenders, nowrenumbered UPP 809 and UPP 814, were refurbished again and re-named fortwo retired members of the Steam Team, pipefitters Jim Adams and JoeJordan. They continue to be used singly or as a pair when No. 844 orNo. 3985 hits the road, and they will likely accompany Big Boy No. 4014when the UP finishes its current restoration of that engine and takesit out to travel.

Adding a full scale die-cast water tender behind your PremierLine steam locomotives makes a great way to complete the prototypicallook of any of these engines. Quality constructed of die-cast metal andfeaturing die-cast 6-wheel trucks with a Proto-Couplerr, each tender isequipped with a plug-in harness that makes hooking up your tender asnap.

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