Tank cars can be built as pressurized cars for gases, or non-pressurized cars such as this one for carrying liquids.

This single-dome tank car was built by American Car & Foundry in November 1936 for the Union Tank Car Company, as part of an order of 475 cars with a nominal capacity of 6,550 gallons. For billing purposes, this car′s actual capacity measures out at 6,545 gallons.

In the early 1970s this car was sold to Protex Industries of Denver, Colorado. After it was retired from service, it was sold to scrap metal dealer Busby Metals of Mesa, Arizona, who donated it to the museum in 1993.

This car is of riveted steel construction with a light weight of 42,800 pounds, and a fully loaded maximum weight of 80,000 pounds. It met the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) class 103 specification for non-pressure cars (later the Department of Transportation DOT-103 specification). Most tank cars today meet the somewhat safer DOT-111 standard, and are now being replaced by newer DOT-117 models. In 2020 UTLX, along with Canadian affiliate Procor, owned 120,000 tank cars, the largest fleet in North America. Early cars held less than 5,000 gallons; large modern cars carry more than 34,000 gallons.

The company began as Union Tank Line in 1891, with reporting mark UTLX. The X indicates a private company, not an operating railroad. The name was changed in 1919 to Union Tank Car Company to avoid the inference that Union Tank Line operated a railroad. When built, this car carried reporting mark UTLX 7682. When transferred to Protex it became PDAX 1057.

When the car was donated to the museum by Maurice Busby of Busby Metals, it was on a Santa Fe siding near Grand Avenue and Indian School Road. The Santa Fe moved it to Phoenix, then the Southern Pacific delivered it to the museum′s temporary storage track near Pecos Road. After the Armstrong Park switch was installed in 1993, the museum′s Plymouth locomotive moved it onto the museum grounds at Erie Street in 1994. It was moved south by the now Union Pacific Railroad to the museum′s new Tumbleweed Park location on Ryan Road, along with the rest of the fleet, in 2006. (The Union Pacific acquired the Southern Pacific in 1996.)

John Maurice Busby was born in 1926, served in the Navy in WWII, died in 2012, is buried at the National Memorial Cemetery of Arizona. His death eventually resulted in the shutdown of the company.

	Photo of car as delivered to old ARM display yard.
	Photo of car at old ARM display yard right after new paint/lettering in 2004.
	Photo of car on February 27, 2013.

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