Are there any decals in HO for SOU passenger cars, lightweight and heavyweight, that has the proper size and spacing for the roadname; the Champ sets just look a little too condensed.

-- Marty Flick (Golddenim@insight.rr.com), July 11, 2002

Answers

Marty, After Hours Graphics made complete sets of decals for all of the SOU streamlined cars including the pool cars from L&N, A&WP, WofARR, PRR, etc. He used to advertise in MR. Microscale mini decal set for Georgia Group passenger cars includes a "West Point Route" letterboard but the car names are very limited. Microscale Railroad Gothic Black can also be used, but the spacing would have to be set up ahead of time. I think you're ight about the Champ set. For the heavy weight cars, only the Microscale Railroad Gothic in yellow comes to mind. Champ's SOU heavyweight passenger car set is letterboard only in gold and is RR Roman. Most of the pictures of SOU heavyweights I've seen have the gothic lettering.

-- Ray Brown (bbrown21@columbus.rr.com), July 20, 2002.

As a follow up to the above, a scale rule yields these dimensions in HO scale (from the After Hour Graphics lettering):

letterboard "southern" is 28 feet overall with 48 inch spacing between letter centers.

-- Ray Brown (bbrown21@columbus.rr.com), July 20, 2002.