----- Original Message -----
From: timboconnor@...
To: STMFC@...
Sent: Friday, 23 March, 2007 09:43
Subject: [STMFC] Re: PRR freight cars (was Pennsy, Arrogance,
and Bad Management)



Ok, Bill. To get back to freight cars, there are hundreds,
thousands, of examples
of proprietary freight car designs as well as modifications to
'standard' designs
that ultimately did not pan out. So the PRR bought an
over-designed flat car? Is
this the first time someone overdesigned a freight car? Why did
the UP insist on
using Cor-Ten steel in its freight cars to save a few hundred
pounds of steel, at
the added complexity of extra side posts stiffeners and rivets
(hence, alternate
center rivets or ACR) when just about every other owner was
content using the
AAR standard design? And why did SP buy so many thousands of
10'0" box
cars years after most other railroads had accepted 10'6" as a
standard? For
that matter, think of the vast numbers of 40' box cars built
after WWII that were
retired before their normal lifespans because they were
technically obsolete
before 1970. The PRR's design department is not to blame for the
decline of
the PRR. That is all that I meant by that being a 'silly'
argument.

Tim O'Connor