Bruce Hendrick of Brea, CA, commented:

"To build this car today I would think scratch-building in Evergreen styrene would be far easier than the wood & metal kit in the unlikely event one could be found. Printing the zero perspective Smithsonian photo and the kit instructions diagram to the proper scale provides a workable template.

If I were to build this I would seek out a 36’ gondola or reefer as a donor for floor, underframe, truss-rods, and such. Does anyone make the proper trucks or something close?

A question. I do not recall seeing a North American freight car “numbered” with letters. Can someone explain how these cars came to be A, B, and C?"

The LIRR had regular ‘fisher-man’ trains East that included modified combines/baggage cars with internal tanks, and coolers for the catches. No visual outside differences-except some small signs to inform the fishermen. The tiny town of Blue Point had oysters that were considered one of the best. The LIRR ran regular reefers daily from the Blue Point (&East) to the city in the 1890’s. I hope they were dedicated cars. Oyster smell and produce don’t mix well! I know of no reefer photos of the cars used. William Smith

And here are some models as seen on WorthPoint:

    The middle one is Red Ball and I would guess there might be a lot of these kits around, someplace!:-D

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

Oyster Cars

Here is a modeling article from the Cannon Ball, the official publication of the Sunrise Trail Division/NMRA:

http://sunrisetraildiv.nernmra.org/Cannonballs/4403Fall2014.pdf

The article starts on Page 1.

And here are some models as seen on WorthPoint:

https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/ho-scale-custom-kcp-32-stilwell-1825096945

https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/ho-hon3-stilwell-oyster-car-wood-cast-1864614923

https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/ho-craftsman-kcp-stilwell-oyster-car-2021794799

Bob Chaparro

Moderator

Railway Bull Shippers Group (Including Fish & Salt Water Bivalve Mollusks)

https://groups.io/g/RailwayBullShippersGroup

On Fri, May 8, 2020 at 12:50 PM, Hudson Leighton wrote:

https://www.shorpy.com/node/25590

What a great photograph. The clarity of the 8 x 10 glass plate negative is remarkable. A lot of interesting details. Can't make out the name on float barges, but appears to be 12 letters - Pennsylvania?  All the way on right - two tugs towing at least three sailing ships. New York require this as ships under sail were difficult to control in the harbor traffic.  

As usual, you should be able to get a higher resolution scan of this photo from the Library of Congress site.
I've not tried with this one, but the information needed to find it should be in the Shorpy description:
"Williamsburg Bridge and East River waterfront."

Tom E.

J, et al,

Actually, there were three Stillwell Oyster Cars that were built. Car A, Car B, and Car C. Cars B and C were involved in a train wreck enroute to the railroad from the builder and were completely destroyed and never replaced. Car A survived and was used for a short time, however, was discontinued because the loading and unloading process and the inability to keep the oysters fresh by changing out the water in the brine tanks brought about its demise. There are great pictures of Car A, however B and C may not exist. I've post up pictures of Car A for everyone. I am having the top vents and decals made for all three cars. Cars were painted dark blue, which is very rare for the era, as blue pigment paints were not readily available and the pigments didn't last under the effects of the sun. Letting is either white or silver.

Levi

The NP Ry. records list these as ACF cars.

-Hudson

Thanks for the link. I was able to download the instructions. Not good at navigating websites...
CW Propst

On Fri, May 8, 2020 at 01:14 PM, Riverboy wrote:

So ballast hopper were purpose built for such service? I always thought they were rebuilt by the railroad or someone from standard hoppers.

Just catching up... Someone has finally hung a name on these, they are Hart Selective ballast cars, marketed by the Rodgers Ballast Car Co. In the photo of NP 85020 you can just barely see the cast iron patent plat to the left of the capacity data. The 70 ton cars, and the shorter 50 ton cars that came before them, were essentially the standard railroad ballast car from the thirties through the sixties. The diagram Jim Dick posted shows the advantage of the design; a nice easily controlled flow of ballast placed just where needed without burying the track to the rail heads. These cars were a direct descendant of the Hart Selective gondola, common before WWI.

The rebuilt cars came later. The general move to 100 ton capacity freight cars in the seventies left the railroads with about a gazillion surplus 70 ton cement hoppers. Morrison Knudsen of Boise, Idaho developed and marketed an outlet gate that easily converted these cars to ballast service, and these conversions quickly became the standard ballast car of the late twentieth century, which is, of course, far in the future as far as this list is concerned.

Dennis Storzek

Here is a photo of GN’s 1953 built ACF Hart ballast hoppers being used in sugar beet loading.

http://digitalhorizonsonline.org/digital/collection/shemorry/id/8906/rec/21

Regards, 
Bob Heninger
Minot, ND

There's an article on this type of car in RPC #3.

I quote: "...they could also be used to jaul coal, sugar beets, ore, gravel....The cars were oversized for the purpose of hauling ballast..."

It's been my belief that these type cars owned by a number of the western roads were bought to be dual purpose.  Or perhaps "multipurpose".



Ed

Edward Sutorik