Doug Harding wrote:

In California, of the major meat packers: Armour was in LA and San Francisco. Cudahy had a slaughter house in LA and a branch
house in San Francisco, Hormel had a slaughter house in LA and branch house in San Francisco. Swift had slaughter operations at LA and San Francisco, Wilson had a slaughter house in LA. Plus, as you say, there were smaller or more localized meat packers as
well.

Doug, thanks for the summary. I remember something in all the PFE material I read, on the subject of whether PFE would accommodate the packers' request that they have more meat cars available for times of car shortage (PFE declined since traffic would have ALWAYS moved in packer cars except in the most dire conditions). It stated that some packaged and prepared meats (I'm assuming ham, sausage, etc.) came from the "main packing plants," while most cut meat and hanging meat was supplied to customers from the branch houses. Is that consistent with what you know about the meat business in, say, 1950?

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@signaturepress.com
Publishers of books on railroad history

Bob, you're probably right. I have 3 Sunshine models, But I guess another one of two could be worked in...
Clark Propst

(Group),

I think the car is the General American 37' wooden meat reefer. We have already determined on this list the truck is a Barber S-1, which most of these cars had; in one of the newsletters on the Rapido website, there is another hint in the form of a drawing of an Equipco 3160 brakewheel, which these cars were equipped with; and the shape and positioning of the bolster tab, sill step, and bunker drain all match photos of these cars. RP Cyc Vol. 14 has a good article on these cars if anyone wants to see for themselves.

If I am right, this is an excellent choice for Rapido. There are lots of accurate schemes that can be applied to these cars, as well as dozens more for the "close enough" crowd. And they ran from the late 30s into the 60s, at least.

If I am wrong, I guess we will still get a beautiful model of a freight car, so either way we cannot lose!

Sincerely,
Bob Heninger
Iowa City, IA

Dave interesting question about Military Supply Depots. No doubt they would have received large quantities of meat, and I would
guess arrival at the supply depots in regular meat reefers from whom ever had the military contract.

In California, of the major meat packers: Armour was in LA and San Francisco. Cudahy had a slaughter house in LA and a branch
house in San Francisco, Hormel had a slaughter house in LA and branch house in San Francisco. Swift had slaughter operations at LA
and San Francisco, Wilson had a slaughter house in LA. Plus, as you say, there were smaller or more localized meat packers as
well.

Mather was not a meat packer, they built and leased meat reefers and stockcars.

Do you have evidence of Kingan having a branch house in California? I am always looking to add to my list.

Doug Harding
www.iowacentralrr.org

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, "rockroll50401" <cepropst@...> wrote:

Sorry for the delay in answering Richard. Been up nortt.
You don't have to murder me. With both you and Bill saying I'll like it the suspense is killing me !

Clark Propst

Clark (and Group),
I think the car is the General American 37' wooden meat reefer. We have already determined on this list the truck is a Barber S-1, which most of these cars had; in one of the newsletters on the Rapido website, there is another hint in the form of a drawing of an Equipco 3160 brakewheel, which these cars were equipped with; and the shape and positioning of the bolster tab, sill step, and bunker drain all match photos of these cars. RP Cyc Vol. 14 has a good article on these cars if anyone wants to see for themselves.

If I am right, this is an excellent choice for Rapido. There are lots of accurate schemes that can be applied to these cars, as well as dozens more for the "close enough" crowd. And they ran from the late 30s into the 60s, at least.

If I am wrong, I guess we will still get a beautiful model of a freight car, so either way we cannot lose!

Sincerely,
Bob Heninger
Iowa City, IA

Friday afternoon when we were getting to the escalators to the show room a couple guys were getting off that were unmistakably closet vesties. Maybe it was the pins on their hats?

Thought the show was more like "Trainfest". Not near as large as the shows of the late last century when we had three conventions round here in a row.

F&C didn't have the car I wanted to buy (C&O DD box) Westerfield had a display model of a neat CB&Q SS box, but no models for sale. Sunshine and Speedwitch were no shows. The only car I bought for myself was a ATSF IM WE RTR car that was discounted because of a paint blemish. We did stock up on the special Athearn "Airslide" run 'Lombard Hobbies' had done with CGW lettering.

'True Scale' had a nice looking 'mini-box displayed.

Clark Propst

Just checked the three photos of those cars I have in the computer and the sides are wider than the ends, but not just a 90 offset. Looks like they used a formed piece to connect the sides to the ends.
Clark Propst

Guys, I have a dozen extensively modified (with Stan's parts) IM PFE reefers. They are as close to the 49 blt Armour cars as I can get, just replaced all their roofs.
If Rapido is coming out with that car I would not be happy !
Now, if it were a GATC stock car...
The Armour reefers had brine tanks, don't know if they would stll have side drains without looking at my photos. I hope they don't. Cause then I'd have to add them....
Clark Propst

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, Richard Hendrickson <rhendrickson@...> wrote:
Sorry for the delay in answering Richard. Been up nortt.
You don't have to murder me. With both you and Bill saying I'll like it the suspense is killing me !

Clark Propst

On Jul 17, 2010, at 7:54 PM, rockroll50401 wrote:

Bill told me they were coming out with a freight car and we'd like
it. That's all I could get out of him about their product line.

They are coming out with a freight car, Clark, and you (especially)
will like it. But if I told you what it was, I'd have to kill you,
and that's probably a bad idea for both of us.

Richard Hendrickson

Thanks Allen

AFAIK, on west coast the slaughter houses tended not to be the big Midwest
packers but local businesses. What you'd find were distribution houses for
Swift, Cudhay, Mather, Kingan, etc.

On a slightly different angle, what about military bases? In Oakland CA.
the routine needs of the entire Pacific fleet was stocked in dozens of
warehouses, including a very large, multi-story, windowless, concrete
coldhouse. Would one have seen all sorts of meat reefers there, just one
(the house w/ the Navy contract), or cars owned by the Navy?

Same question for any large military base.

Dave Nelson

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, "James F. Brewer" <jfbrewer@...> wrote:
The info on the Fowler models, unlike that provided on the Mini Box, does not list what stenciling schemes w ill be produced.  Does anyone have further info on this?  > I don't mind pre-ordering from my LHS, but want to be certain I have the appropriate stenciling scheme for my circa 1956 layout.

James:
The Dominion or Fowler car was a single sheath car and CPR after the 20s kept the same lettering scheme on their single sheath cars so apart from number changes they should all be the same. By 1956 there were still lots available for the grain rush and as service cars.
Allen Ferguson

We look forward to seeing all of you O scale modelers at the show

WE have dealers of every scale O On 3 ad On30.

Sincerely, Rich Yoder



cid:102452400@13072010-21CE

Once again our train show is fast approaching.

If your friends don’t get this please pass it along.

Saturday August 7th at the Strasburg PA Fire Company

Located at 203 West Franklin street in Strasburg PA 17579

We are having our mid summer Swap meet and train show.

Doors open to the general public at 9:00 AM







Sincerely,

Rich Yoder

7 Edgedale Court

Wyomissing PA 19610-1913

Call between 6:00 PM and 10:00 PM EST

610-678-2834

<http://www.richyodermodels.com> www.richyodermodels.com



RYM-Plateest 1999





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

In response to my original inquiry regarding True Line Trains' announced CP Mini Box, Bill Dixon provided a link with info:



http://www.central-hobbies.com/products/tltrains.html#XM40M


Bill Schneider pointed out that by scrolling up, info about a retooled Fowler boxcar was also mentioned. The info on the Fowler models, unlike that provided on the Mini Box, does not list what stenciling schemes w ill be produced.  Does anyone have further info on this?  I checked True Line's web site but didn't see anything.



I don't mind pre-ordering from my LHS, but want to be certain I have the appropriate stenciling scheme for my circa 1956 layout.



Thanks.



Jim Brewer

Glenwood MD

--- Donald Ford wrote:

Peter
I read your post about CT and Paniesville and Fraiport Harbor and the Western
Reserve.
Let me add that area is also known as the "Fire Lands" because after the
revelution that area was granted to the people from CT that were burned out by
the British during the war. Just some bit of info I picked up alonge the way.

========================


Donald,

You are correct in part of your description of The Firelands, but the area encompassed only the western-most counties of the Western Reserve; those counties west of Lorain County.
http://homepages.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~maggieoh/western.html

The entire Western Reserve hosted a network of railroads during the steam era. PRR, NYC, B&O, NKP, ERIE, and W&LE owned large fleets of freight cars that served the industrial scene. It has been fascinating to discover details on a very small portion of this network that came together in Newburgh, Ohio just south of Cleveland.
http://designbuildop.hansmanns.org/

Hopefully I'll meet Peter sometime soon as he seems to live about 40 miles north of me and we can trade freight car building ideas.

Eric


Eric Hansmann
Chagrin Falls, Ohio

The corrugated card board should work great.  Here's an additional method that I
use.  I have a shirt cardboard, not corrugated, and have cut a matrix -- so many
rows, so many columns-- of slots just wide enough to accept the coupler shanks,
and with a section for whiskers.  I insert the couplers in the slots and then
airbrush the coupler bodies on the front of the cardboard with the desired
color.  Then flip the cardboard over and spray the shanks with lubricant.  I'm
careful to spray paint the bottom of the uncoupling arms with the body color and
then come back with a brush and grimy black paint and hand paint all of the arm
except the tip, which is left with the coupler body color to represent the
fitting at the bottom of the air line.  Since I batch process a number of
couplers this way I generally paint the front in patches, transitioning
the color from rust to black as I move from patch to patch so I end up with a
range of coupler colors for house cars, tankers, hoppers, .....  I don't worry
about segregating the patches, the over-spray from painting an adjacent patch is
more often enhancing then distracting.  This is a nice way to use up any small
quantities of paint left over from earlier projects-- only if the paint is still
fluid, you don't want to gunk up a coupler.  The final step before removing the
couplers from the cardboard is to go along with a puff bottle of dry lub and
puff a little into the interior of each coupler body, tapping the uncoupler arm
several times to spread the lub around.  When all are done, hold the cardboard
face-down over the trash can and tap it lightly so any excess lub falls out
there rather then on a model later on.

About the stamped metal centering springs on the regular couplers, maybe you
don't need to switch so many cars to whiskers.  I find the tension of the delay
spring arm (the arm with the little jink in it) is a little high for reliable
operation.  I bend that arm outward ever so slightly so that it barely touches
the rear retaining tab when at rest.  That minor adjustment seems to improve
uncoupling performance noticably and yet the return-to-center remains fine.

Happy rails-- Wayne

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, "Ronald" <radepierre@...> wrote:

I would be interested in an undec product offering of these
As undec versions are on in decline, those of us who desire
this should make TLT folks aware of our market interest.

TLT was not usually interested in doing undecs.
I did an interesting experiment. I bought unlettered CN & CP cabooses from them at dealer price. MRSP was $45. I then tried to resell, including a decal set (3 different schemes)for less than MSRP price.
- Trying to encourage people to use decals-.
This spring there were regular RTR cabooses at Calgary train show for less than I paid. Why would they buy from me? The market told me that 99.9% of the people would rather have a RTR car than a unique number. If you want to reletter your going to have to remove the old lettering.
I declined to do the same with boxcars.
Ya wanna buy a CN caboose with no paint or lettering to remove?
Allen Ferguson
Black Cat Publishing

I would be interested in an undec product offering of these
as I like to "roll my own" so-to-speak.

As undec versions are on in decline, those of us who desire
this should make TLT folks aware of our market interest.

Ron A. dePierre

Half the time, I do that. And you're right, I can manage to avoid getting paint stuck in the bearing most of the time, and a little exercising takes care of it if it happens. Most people probably realize it's not the knuckle spring that is critical.

I was thinking of canned spray paint such as Floquil or Scalecoat, which I prefer if it's a normal color that I need. Depends on the number of pairs of couplers, also. One may get hand painted. Four, as I was doing the other night, probably would get sprayed.

It's always interesting to see the diversity of practices here.

Ron Merrick

KISS. Pick up coupler by the shank in left hand, pick up brush in right hand, dip tip of brush into paint, and apply. Two nanoseconds. No masking is required, and by the time the spray booth would have been otherwise set up, etc. etc., or the worries about bending the whiskers would have been rationalized, the average modeler will have had all of his couplers already painted, and will have moved on to more interesting things (:-).

Now, this does require some skill and judgment to not gum up the works with thick paint, but in this community of pretty dedicated kit builders and operators, I presume that such manual efforts would not be scorned.

Denny

Denny S. Anspach MD
Sacramento

Mike,

Brilliant idea. Thanks

Gordon Spalty