Ted (and others),

For those of us who have not (yet) invested in the Focus on Freight Cars series, could you talk a little bit about what differentiates it from the Reference Manual series?  Is the format of the two series largely the same?  I imagine that the Focus on Freight Cars series provides more comprehensive coverage; are there other benefits to the Focus on Freight Cars series?

Thanks,
Dan Miller

 > It also appears that there was a pretty significant redistribution flow (From Wash to Wash)
 > that was probably from the coal docks in the Tacoma tide flats or Puget Sound.
 > Charles Hostetler

Could a lot of this be coal on the Pacific Coast Railroad? (A GN subsidiary
that formed the western end of the Milwaukee mainline through the Maple Valley
through Renton to Black River Junction, where the Milwaukee split north to
Seattle and south to Tacoma.) I thought the PCR mainly existed to move coal
(and logs) to Seattle.

Tim O'Connor

Jon,
Try the Kadee 583 for an unpowered or 593 with pick up leads if you want to light your marker lamps/interior.
John John Barry ATSF North Bay Lines Golden Gates & Fast Freights Lovettsville, VA
707-490-9696 
PO Box 44736 Washington, DC 20026-4736

From: "Jon Miller atsfus@... [STMFC]" <STMFC@...>
To: STMFC@...
Sent: Sunday, February 26, 2017 7:46 PM
Subject: [STMFC] ATSF caboose truck

      Are there any trucks close to this one?  Also this is from the side door caboose so wonder if by '41 the trucks were changed?  Not even sure these were used at all by '41!


--
Jon Miller
For me time stopped in 1941
Digitrax Chief/Zephyr systems,
SPROG, JMRI User
NMRA Life member #2623
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Utah coal was shipped all over the Pacific coast for many decades in the steam and early diesel eras. Most of the coal mines were in Carbon County.

Specific shipments I know of included:

(1) to the Kaiser Fontana steel mill in Southern California -- this would have been from Carbon Co Ut to Provo by the DRGW and then handed over to the UP for the run to California.
(2) to Ely NV... DRGW to WP at Roper Yard Ut to Nevada Northern in Utah.
(3) to Washington state... DRGW to WP at Roper Yard Ut to GN at Beiber CA. What I don't recall offhand is whether it went to Spokane, Seattle, or both.
(4) to port of Oakland CA... DRGW to WP at Roper Yard Ut to Oakland. This was late 50's, early 60's and the coal was exported overseas.
(5) to Kaiser cement in Santa Clara county, CA. Not sure of the entire routing but it started on the DRGW and ended on the SP. The open question is whether the WP participated or not. There may have been similar shipments to other cement producing sites on the Pacific coast (coal ash is why ordinary cement is gray).
(6) Last, but not least... in 1943 there was the last shipment of coke from Alabama to a Sugar mill near Fremont CA. (President's papers, CSRM). Just a handful of cars but it seems to have been an annual event. Seeing as the processing of sugar pulp requires a pure carbon filtration there would be similar shipments to ever mill just before the beet campaign begins, including those on the west coast. The question tho is whether the coke was originally coal or petroleum -- the later was commonly found as a byproduct at west coast oil refineries. Was it good enough for sugar processing? I don't know.

Dave Nelson

p.s. AFAIK the shipments to Washington state handled the largest tonnage.

Jim Betz wrote

  For instance - where would coal for such purposes have been shipped
  from - going to locations in Central or Northern California? I know
  there was coal in Utah that was being shipped to Southern California.
  Other sources/locations?

Coal burned in central and northern California came from Utah & Colorado
(and maybe Wyoming too) most commonly via SP's route over Donner Pass.
Rio Grande coal gondolas and coal hoppers were a common sight on the SP.
The Western Pacific also moved some of this coal. It's possible to move
the coal via the Union Pacific (LA&SL) first, and then via ATSF or SP over
Tehachapi, but that's a much longer haul in most cases. The Santa Fe and SP
also served coal mines in New Mexico, so that's another possible source.
But again, a longer haul.


   what 'influence' did the railroad that the industry was on have on the
   source of the coal

This is where the tariffs come in. As "common carriers" railroads could not
refuse to move coal from here to there, but the tariff might be prohibitive
compared to other sources and tariffs. So the "influence" was indirect. If
the mine felt that the tariff was unfair, they could appeal to the ICC. And
shippers did that more or less constantly and relentlessly.

Tim O'Connor

Hi Jim,

Jim,
The Southern Pacific in the 1890s was shipping coal from Australia, Japan and British Columbia. 
Tom VanWormer
Documenting the 1890s

jimbetz jimbetz@... [STMFC] wrote:

 >> How far would coal be shipped in hoppers?


ALL tariffs after the creation of the ICC were subject to regulation
and review. In order to ship commodity X from point A to point B there
had to be a tariff on file. Shippers as well as other railroads could
comment on or protest a tariff filing. But once the tariff from A to B
was in place, then ANY railroads that could fulfill that movement could
offer to move commodity X under the tariff to all potential shippers.

Why the roundabout explanation? Because A to B may not be a straight line.
Railroad P may have a direct route from A to B, but railroad Q might have
to go from A to C to B, possibly adding HUNDREDS of miles to the route. In
that case, the rate is the SAME regardless of the distance. Why would Q do it?
Many reasons are possible. Q might figure that a little extra tonnage on
their daily A-to-C or C-to-B freights is a tiny fractional cost, so why not?
Or maybe they're doing it to spite railroad P. Real examples abound, so we
know it happened all the time. My favorite example is Peoria to St Louis
via the CNW (less than 200 miles), and the Rock Island signed on to the
same tariff and had to haul the cargo Peoria to Kansas City, and back to
St Louis - about 600 miles!

In general, though, "steam coal" was widely available around the country so
the average haul was definitely less than 500 miles. Special grades of coal
such as met coal or anthracite could travel much farther because it wasn't
found in all coal deposits.

Tim O'

    Are there any trucks close to this one?  Also this is from the side door caboose so wonder if by '41 the trucks were changed?  Not even sure these were used at all by '41!

-- 
Jon Miller
For me time stopped in 1941
Digitrax  Chief/Zephyr systems, 
SPROG, JMRI User
NMRA Life member #2623
Member SFRH&MS

Hi,

How far would coal be shipped in hoppers? Especially as
it relates to the West Coast. I'm talking about regular
everyday coal for steam - such as to a railroad or to a
cement plant (or any other large industry such as a steel
mill or power plant).
And what was truly in control of the sourcing of coal?
Of course it was price per ton - but, for instance, how
much closer would the coal mine have to be before
the shipping costs based upon ton miles started to be
more important than how many RRs were involved in
the shipment or other factors?

For instance - where would coal for such purposes
have been shipped from - going to locations in Central
or Northern California?
I know there was coal in Utah that was being shipped
to Southern California. Other sources/locations?

Extra credit - what 'influence' did the railroad that the
industry was on have on the source of the coal in
received? For instance if you have a cement plant
in Northern California being served by the ATSF ...
where did the coal it received -probably- come from?

Steam/transition era answers only - please. I'm not
asking "what is happening today?" or "what happened
in the 70's or 80's?".
- Jim B.

I have an Icing Scene photo that must date just after Western Fruit was formed showing two of their reefers still mostly in their GN scheme with large Goat but with their "GN" reporting marks painted out and WFEX stenciling. Coupled between them is an ex-L&N reefer just taken into FGE ownership with expedient reporting marks similarly applied in white stencil paste as L&N car was BCR.

Hi Schuyler,

I find images 1427 and 1426 to be most interesting, as on the left side of the photo is a string of reefers, including one or two from the Great Northern.  What is unique to me is the GN goat herald on the reefer side.  That herald was common on box cars during that era, but did not realize it had also been applied to reefers.  Wonder how long that herald lasted into the 1920's?

Ted

At 10:32 AM 2/26/2017, you wrote:

http://lists.railfan.net/listthumb.cgi?erielack-02-26-17
 
In particular, image 1424.  Check out the roof in the foreground.  Hatches and different roofs on the two sides of the same car!
 
Schuyler

Rails Unlimited
Ted Schnepf
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126 Will Scarlet
Elgin, Ill. 60120
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Model Railroad Sales and Service with
a personal touch.
Books new and used.  HO and O scales.
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Ed,

 

I am on AOL and my default browser is set for Google and it came through just fine.

 

I really appreciate all the time and energy you have put into this information. I have a couple of unfinished Athearn AAR boxcars that came to me from the Stan Rydariwzc estate and he did just the very basics to them. I want for step back a bit and perhaps remove the ends ala WESTRAILS thinking and upgrade it to some basic personal standards that I think Stan would have gone to. Stan over the years gave me several partially finished project that under scrutiny just didn't stand up, but not that there wasn't some genius in there, there was but he ran into an issue that made him stop.

 

These are fun projects that I will post to Shake N Take as they develop and perhaps in MRH under Mont and my byline "at the Bench"  or RMC under my old byline "jewels from the junk box" or "weekender projects" . This is all just to help promote folks to model again using the information you have provided.

 

 

Greg Martin    

 

Eventually all things merge into one and a river runs through it.
Norman Maclean

 

In a message dated 2/21/2017 10:09:59 P.M. Pacific Standard Time, STMFC@... writes: