GTW S3-A Mikado

GTW S3-A Mikado

Hello folks, and welcome back to the USRA era! We have the Grand Trunk Western version of the United States Railroad Administration’s (USRA) 2-8-2 Light Mikado known as the SA-3.

READ THIS PLEASE!
As a heads-up folks, you will find this locomotive in your buy menu under “multiple unit” under the steam category. The reason you see it under the multiple unit category is the Random numbers mod. In order for it to work, the locomotive must have a cargo space. That cargo is 1 passenger. So no, you are not crazy if you see this on your freight trains. This is the workaround for getting the random numbers to work. Honestly well worth it! Normally I’d say you must have a dependent mod active for the random numbers to work, but Meatballhero has allowed me to include the files! No dependents necessary for this one!

Slight history
During the first world war, the federal government enacted the USRA as an experiment to nationalize the railroads during a wartime emergency. This lasted from December 1917 to March 1920. They introduced standardized locomotive and rail car classes known as the USRA Standard.
Changes occurred quickly as once President Wilson issued the order for nationalization. All the railroads were organized into 3 divisions, East, West, and South. A reduction in passenger service occurred to help with decongestion of freight. The current number of locomotives and rolling stock was augmented by new production of up-to-date and standardized types/designed to be the best that could be produced to replace outdated equipment.

Enter the USRA Light Mikado! These locomotives were considered well-designed, modern, and successful. The mikado type locomotive was the most numerous across the country. They worked all the way until the diesels started taking over. A total of 625 light Mikado’s were built during the time of the USRA’s tenure with 641 being built afterward. During the second world war, the railroads started referring to the mikado’s as MacArthur’s after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. At the conclusion of the war, the name Mikado soon returned.

These locomotives are excellent in freight work and mountain passenger service.

The Good Track Road
I have 2 Mikados here for you to enjoy.

Mikado
– New Tender vairiation!
– MC Couplers
– Superb sounds by Mrcheesecake as always!
– The S3-A will have random numbers in the 37##’s range.
– All Locomotives have an asset version with a fixed number.
– 1 Generic Versions with no name or logo.
– 8 different camera views

Stats
Availability – 1918
Speed – 65 MPH – From my research, it appeared these Light Mikes were a bit faster than the rest!
Horsepower – 3500
Tractive Effort – 54,724 LBF
Weight – 238,700 lbs.

Whats next with credits
I want to thank Scott Brunner – This locomotive model was originally made for open rails. With taking the model as a solid base I transformed and updated it significantly to almost a brand new model; well practically. Thank you very much for providing a solid foundation to build off of. This helped significantly with timing and movement of this model.
Beyond Scott Brunner this is also a mash up of my models, and Meatballhero’s meshes. The nice part is during this time a lot of locomotives used very similar parts so using mesh that is already done, and tweaking them to fit the needs of this model was a breeze! Cisco for providing me the Bettendorf trucks with some edits.

So this is 7 packs down of the USRA Light Mikados. For the finale pack, it will be the New York Central! Then I’m done! All packs will have a generic version with no names on the side, so you can run them with any consist.

The USRA locomotives are also ones in which is you simply google USRA and the type of locomotive, you get so many hits on model locomotives.

After the Mikes…. I’m working on the USRA Light Mountains, and more!

HEADS UP
From this point, please understand that my mods are rather heavy in poly count. Sorry, I enjoy the detail. I put a lot of effort into these, to make them as best I can to be enjoyed. Sorry, if you don’t have enough disk space or computer power to run these. The models have LOD’s on them to help reduce poly count as you zoom out.