Book About RDCs?

I would like to buy a book about RDCs. I see there are two that might be good:

"RDC: The Budd Rail Diesel Car" by Donald Duke & Edmund Keilty

"Budd Car: The RDC Story" by Chuck Crouse

Any opinions on which of these two books is the better book?

Published at the same time, the Crouse book is now worth about six times more new on Amazon.com.

3rdrail wrote:Published at the same time, the Crouse book is now worth about six times more new on Amazon.com.

I did check Amazon.com earlier today and saw the huge price disparity between the two books, which is one of the reasons for my question.

What it really comes down to is your own personal taste, JD. For the Crouse book, that's worth an investigatory trip to your library to check it out. I am familiar with Crouse, not with the others. All things being even, the number of published copies of each is wherein lies your answer.

The Duke/Kielty book is very good, but it has data mistakes, especially in many photo captions. The Crouse book is the quintissential volume on RDC's, especially since it is all color and has the excellent and beautifully rendered "RDC Phase" (Phase 1, 1B, 1C, Phase 2) detailed comparison drawings... although I really would've preferred larger-format pics. The Crouse book in hardcover is the ideal RDC book (I was cheap 20 years ago when I got mine in softcover... with as much as I read and refer to it, the spine has taken quite a beating).

The Crouse book also features at least one photo of an RDC on each of the roads that owned them. So there are some great shots of lines that only owned one like DM & IR, DW & P, SP and M-K-T.

I'm pleased to report that I recently purchased a new copy of Chuck Crouse's book for $125 (including shipping) from a railroad book dealer in New Jersey. An excellent book!

Donald Duke was the man behind Golden West Publishing, a company that published a lot of western railroad books.