Well here's another for the "better in my head" pile
i was looking through areo liner steam locomotives. like the S1/2 or the T1 4-4-4-4's, the old new york world fair stuff and such, and then this thing jumped out at me.
The Pennsylvania rail crusader. Which ran a twice daily express run from new york to somewhere else that doesn't matter because i can't remember it during the 30's and 40's before being scrapped in fifty something.
i couldn't let that one go.
So yeah, if i tried to make it minorly realistic, it just looks like a Budd DC.
if i go the "Higher education" route, it's just plain wrong.
In either case, the pure shape of the cab rails simply distort the shape, ruining the effect and the distinguishing lines. i would've carved out a windshield and had the "cab" from the steam train be faux air intakes that modify the roofline from behind the current terminus. but those would both further the "diesel" look. I also wanted to have the side sills come in and bend into the hood lines like a '32 ford full fender, but that just didn't work.
oh well. Throw it on the failure pile