I dug out of both of my Detail Associates kits... both are #200 composite side. Looks like it's ebay to shop for a steel side. Are the DA cars OOP now? Red Caboose kind of rained on their parade but as Tony pointed out the DA cars have extra parts for other fun stuff.

Andy

Rock Island's GS gondolas use what the folio diagrams refer to as a Creeping
Shaft mechanism to control the doors. They had as many as 6700 (1930)
mostly composite GS gons built in the 1920's by ACF, Bettendorf, Ryan and
Pressed Steel Car. There were a few straggling all steel cars from the
teens, but those designs were, apparently, found to be inadequate. The
numbers dwindled to about 4800 by 1940 and 2357 in 1953. By 1953, most had
their side sheathing replaced by steel, too, following WWII. Many of the GS
cars had become GB by then, with solid bottoms.



They mostly hauled coal and gravel.



Some were quite similar to the Details Associates model, EXCEPT for the
opposite angle on the sloping side members (Howe truss.) I cut up and
reassembled one of the DA cars to match the RI prototype and have several
more kits waiting for a similar weak moment. The largest single group of RI
GS gondolas were 48'6" IL with a blank center panel longer that the DA style
car. This makes them much more challenging to model.



FWIW.



Steve Hile

Tom Olsen wrote:

One must remember that there is a three (3) month lag time between the effective date and the cover date in the ORER's due to the time given to gathering the information from the submitting railroads prior to publication.

This statement depends on era. In the era of monthly publication, the effective date of an entry (found at the very end of each entry) was usually the preceding month of the cover date. In the era of quarterly publication, the effective dates vary but are often the month preceding the cover month. When Steve Peery worked on the ORER submissions for SP, he said they would get the material pulled together each quarter and then wait until the last moment to update anything they could, before it was sent in. Of course I don't know if this was typical of other railroads or other eras.

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@...
Publishers of books on railroad history

On Mar 17, 2012, at 2:33 PM, <tmolsen@...> wrote:

Ed, you stated that the Reading "speed lettering" of the Road Name
began to be applied to Reading boxcars in late 1956. My question
regarding the speed lettering is when it was applied to Reading
hoppers.

Kadee not long ago applied this lettering to twin hoppers with
offset-sides with the balance of the lettering in Railroad Roman (Road
initials and other lettering). The balance of this scheme on the black
car had the red and white "Anthracite" herald applied to the car to
the right of the speed lettered "Reading" name.

Is there any information as to when this change to speed lettering
began?

Tom,
Reading 50-ton offset-side hoppers in series 86000-86699, built 10-55,
were the first new Reading hoppers with the speed lettering.
Regards,
Ed Hawkins

Group,

Sorry for the wasted bandwith with the incomplete message.

Ed, you stated that the Reading "speed lettering" of the Road Name began to be applied to Reading boxcars in late 1956. My question regarding the speed lettering is when it was applied to Reading hoppers.

Kadee not long ago applied this lettering to twin hoppers with offset-sides with the balance of the lettering in Railroad Roman (Road initials and other lettering). The balance of this scheme on the black car had the red and white "Anthracite" herald applied to the car to the right of the speed lettered "Reading" name.

Is there any information as to when this change to speed lettering began?

Tom Olsen
7 Boundary Road, West Branch
Newark, Delaware, 19711-7479
(302) 738-4292
tmolsen@...

Ed,

You have said that the speed lettering on the Reading box cars began to be used in

Buddy,

My January 1938 ORER (effective October 1937) shows the following information:

"XM Box #3000-3249, 237 cars included in this series: "VA" Ventilated, steel underframe, 13 cars - See Note A:

Note A: Individual numbers of cars in series 3000-3249 equipped with end doors and differing in A.A.R. Mechanical Designation from other cars in same series; A.A.R. Designation VA.
3015, 3023, 3027, 3067, 3077, 3090, 3128, 3163, 3166, 3181, 3191, 3215, 3241.

The October 1939 ORER (Effective date July 1939) shows the 3000-3249 series (245 cars) still in service but as XM Series boxcars. The lone exception was car #3163 which was still a ventilated boxcar with a steel underframe with the AAR designation VA.

One must remember that there is a three (3) month lag time between the effective date and the cover date in the ORER's due to the time given to gathering the information from the submitting railroads prior to publication.

Hope that this is of some assistance.

Tom Olsen
7 Boundary Road, West Branch
Newark, Delaware, 19711-7479
(302) 738-4292
tmolsen@...

On Mar 16, 2012, at 8:15 PM, Buddy wrote:

Gentlemen - I am trying to determine the year that the NC&StL's
ventilated boxcars (3000-3249 series) were converted to XM boxcars.
Unfortunately I only have a 1941 ORER which shows the cars were
converted to boxcars by that date. I am hoping that someone with
access to 1939 and 1940 ORERs can confirm the last year that the
3000-3249 series operated as ventilated boxcars. Thank you in
advance for any assistance.

Buddy, the July 1933 ORER lists all cars in the series as ventilator
cars of AAR class VA. The July, 1935 ORER shows 102 cars in the
series as ventilator cars and 147 as plain box cars of class XM. The
October 1938 ORER shows all but 6 cars as plain XM box cars, with the
6 exceptions being class VA. The January 1940 ORER shows all but one
as plain XM box cars. The one remaining car, NC&StL 3163, was still
a class VA car. So the conversion obviously took place over a long
period of time ca. 1934-1938 as the cars came into the shops for
routine repairs, and was essentially complete by the end of 1939.

Richard Hendrickson

Andy

I still have the pocket watch my grandfather found in a gondola load of coal he was shuveling out at his father in law's lumber and coal yard in eastern Colorado.

Jeff fry

Rio Grande's GS gondolas were covered in the vol.1, #2 issue of The Prospector. That's the Rio Grande Modeling & Historical Society's magazine. In there it is stated that these were Vulcan cast steel trucks. Vulcan was a American Steel Foundries design.

For a good magazine article on GS gons, see Richard Hendrickson's article in the March 2000 Railmodel Journal. Eight pages with 28 prototype photos.

Brian Leppert
Carson City, NV

The prototype M-26 photo posted in the "B&O Door" folder shows a six panel Superior replacement door.

The door that Chad is producing in resin is a five panel Superior door.

It is not yet clear the time frame of the hardware difference. Memo with released drawings for this Superior replacement door was issued in 1942.

Gary,

I love these photos. There are several more in the collection that show the tenders. The locomotives are Baldwin built USA class S160 2-8-0s headed for the Soviet Union via the Pacific. We've actually talked about these a few time here, as they are such neat loads. I'd love to model these loads, and an HO S160 model is available from DJH
http://www.djhengineering.co.uk/loco/prodloco.asp?ProdID=3073
but OUCH! that's an expensive load (if anyone wants to give me one for my upcoming 0.5 century birthday... I'd be happy to supply a mailing address!!).

Regards
Bruce
Bruce Smith
Auburn, AL
________________________________________
From: STMFC@... [STMFC@...] on behalf of vasa0vasa@... [vasa0vasa@...]
Sent: Friday, March 16, 2012 5:14 PM
To: STMFC
Subject: [STMFC] Flatcar Load for You PRR and Wide Gauge Connoissuers

For all you connoissuers of PRR flatcars and wide gauge equipment, here are pictures from a posting on the Northern Pacific yahoo group showing Nixon pictures from Missoula, MT on October 25, 1943. It appears the routing did not use the Bruceton detour for PRR equipement, though the flatcars may have been supplied as empties from there.


gary laakso
south of Mike Brock
vasa0vasa@...






"USSR 24-25 Baldwin Builder # 69932-69933 for export to Russia, passing through Missoula on a revenue freight train."
Date: October 25, 1943
Location: Missoula, MT

http://muse.museum.montana.edu/rvndb/rvnjpeg_img_rec.php?objno=RVN07753

http://muse.museum.montana.edu/rvndb/rvnjpeg_img_rec.php?objno=RVN07746

http://muse.museum.montana.edu/rvndb/rvnjpeg_img_rec.php?objno=RVN07752

http://muse.museum.montana.edu/rvndb/rvnjpeg_img_rec.php?objno=RVN07749

http://muse.museum.montana.edu/rvndb/rvnjpeg_img_rec.php?objno=RVN07747




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



------------------------------------

Yahoo! Groups Links

More likely it was being winched up.

--
Thanks!

Brian Paul Ehni

From: Andy Harman <gsgondola@...>
Reply-To: STMFC List <STMFC@...>
Date: Sat, 17 Mar 2012 00:37:44 -0400
To: STMFC List <STMFC@...>
Subject: Re: [STMFC] Re: GS Gons






At 12:19 AM 3/17/2012 +0000, you wrote:

Here is an NP GS gon--really neat

http://muse.museum.montana.edu/rvndb/rvnjpeg_img_rec.php?objno=RVN11007

No locomotive in sight... car just sitting there halfway up the
ramp. Probably was a posed shot.

Andy









[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

I saw the link was split and copied and pasted the whole thing when I got
the error. Tried three more times and gave up. Today, the same process
worked fine.

Go figure.

--
Thanks!

Brian Paul Ehni

From: Andy Harman <gsgondola@...>
Reply-To: STMFC List <STMFC@...>
Date: Sat, 17 Mar 2012 00:35:58 -0400
To: STMFC List <STMFC@...>
Subject: Re: [STMFC] GS Gons






At 03:06 PM 3/16/2012 -0500, you wrote:

They sure don't like people posting links, do they? " The collection "
p15330coll22" cannot be displayed. Log in and refresh the page to access
restricted or unpublished collections."

They don't like split links... some sites if you post half the link, you
get an error but it leaves the half-link in the url bar so you can paste
the rest in. This one you have to open the browser first, past both pieces
in and if there is a space between, remove it.... but it's worth the
trouble :-)

Andy









[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hi Andy,

That is a very steep incline for a railway car. Could they have pulled
the car up with a cable. I cannot see any cable in the photo, but it is
possible.

Joel Holmes

The 70 ton trucks on these 47'-21/4" 1922 Pressed Steel gondolas also had two brake shoes per wheel. The cars were used on the DRGW to Los Angeles run to supply the Pacific fleet with coal until it was converted to burn oil. A few cars were equipped with coal racks to serve the steel mills in Pueblo and the Geneva Works. Of course, they were used in sugar beet service and ended their service on the Monarch branch hauling limestone.

gary laakso
south of Mike Brock
vasa0vasa@...

And I have photos from 1970-ish of open loads of what seem to be 2x4s, on the RI and MP in Kansas (meaning near their destination rather than origin), especially noteworthy for having been set out because of shifting. I wouldn't have known where they came from, but the cars were SP and UP.

Ron Merrick

The photo also is in the Billboard Reefers book and the BRHS's Burlington Bulletin on billboard reefers. I suspect it has not been digitized yet at the Denver Public Library.


Richard Townsend
Lincoln City, Oregon

Richard,

I would say that they were an early version of a Buckeye 70-Ton truck. I used to see an updated version of this type of truck beneath Bessemer & Lake Erie triple hoppers when I worked as a PRR operator at Stadium Tower in Greenwich Yard in South Philadelphia in 1967-1968. Greenwich was a destination for coal trains of export coal at the time and a good third of the loaded hoppers were B&LE triples with the later version of the Buckeye truck. Indeed, the horns were the support for the brake beams and outside clasp brakes.

Best regards,
Tom Olsen
7 Boundary Road, West Branch
Newark, Delaware, 19711-7479
(302) 738-4292
tmolsen@...

At 10:11 PM 3/16/2012 -0700, you wrote:

long). However, they're supposed to be flat, because the shafts for
the Enterprise door operating mechanisms were square.

Hmm... file down or just replace with some square styrene?

Andy