Montford Switzer wrote:

Responding to:

What can be learned from these NKP List of movements which can be used
on your or anybody else's layout of the 1945-1955 era?

Tim Gilbert

Tim:

I learned the specifics of a steady source of loads that moved in both
directions out of Frankfort, IN on the MONON's Indianapolis branch
including the portion that I am modeling. It appears that some of the
moves were regular in nature. The data also allows me to pursue
modeling specific cars the appeared in this service and well as justify
others that "hopefully" appeared covering this work. So it works for me
and should do as well for anyone who's RR appears in the car routing
info.

Mont,

I am unclear of what you mean as a "steady source of loads." Is this an industry or equivalent? By "regular moves" do you mean specific cars (e.g. ABC Boxcar #123), or the industry, or do you mean regular shipments of goods in any suitable car available? If the answer above is specific cars, then what kind of car - boxcar, gon, hopper, etc., and what road name and car number?

There is nothing wrong about modeling "specific" cars which may have appeared once or sporadically over time on the prototype's line. For instance, if modeling a line like UP's Sherman Hill, any of the 720,000 different boxcars in the US could have appeared on that line. Most people's budget including Mike Brock's cannot afford 720,000 different boxcars. So a selective compression of the model boxcar fleet has to be done whereby ABC boxcar #123 represents itself plus, at another time ABC #456, or, perhaps, the neighboring road's DEF #789 if ABC and DEF do not own enough boxcars in the national boxcar fleet to warrant a separate model for each road.

Tim Gilbert

Please see eBay listing Iowa Terminal RR Snow Plow Motor #60 DUPLICATE
Slide-NR Item number: 6568698378.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Iowa-Terminal-RR-Snow-Plow-Motor-60-DUPLICATE-Slide-
NR_W0QQitemZ6568698378QQcategoryZ71011QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

I've had an opportunity to take a close look at the short flat car and
some parts, notably the stake pockets, have 'PRR' cast into them.

Could this be a former PRR class F22 or F23 flat car? If yes, does
anyone know how such an item would have made its way to Mason City,
Iowa?
Did the PRR convert any F22 or F23 flats to snow plows?
TIA.
Gene Green

Details on the PRR cars from Bill Darnaby's posting on Saturday:

DATE CAR LOAD ROUTING
1-28-49 PRR 573904 bean meal Allied Mills Inc, Fort Wayne,
xJefferson NKP
Class X29, built 1924-25.
http://www.steamfreightcars.com/gallery/boxauto/prrx29main.html
http://prr.railfan.net/freight/classpage.html?class=X29

1-28-49 PRR 517945 bean meal Allied Mills Inc, Fort Wayne,
xJefferson NKP
Class X25
http://www.westerfield.biz/cg510001.htm
http://prr.railfan.net/freight/classpage.html?class=X25


Ben Hom

Responding to:

What can be learned from these NKP List of movements which can be used
on your or anybody else's layout of the 1945-1955 era?

Tim Gilbert

Tim:

I learned the specifics of a steady source of loads that moved in both
directions out of Frankfort, IN on the MONON's Indianapolis branch
including the portion that I am modeling. It appears that some of the
moves were regular in nature. The data also allows me to pursue
modeling specific cars the appeared in this service and well as justify
others that "hopefully" appeared covering this work. So it works for me
and should do as well for anyone who's RR appears in the car routing
info.

Mont Switzer

Richard Hendrickson wrote:

On Oct 10, 2005, at 6:38 PM, Tim Gilbert wrote:

(snip)

Three SHPX tank cars were consigned to Lever Brothers in Hammond IN.
Another four tank cars consigned to Lever's Edgewater NJ operation were
leased from NATX or AESX (a NATX-reporting mark). On 6/11/1948, there
was a GATX tank car consigned to Lever Brothers in Edgewater NJ. It
looks like Lever leased tank cars on the short term - whether the lease
was per trip, per month, or of some other duration I do not know.

North American did, indeed, operate the AESX tank car fleet, but the
cars with those reporting marks were owned by, and assigned to the
service of, corn oil manufacturer A. E. Staley. It's certainly
possible that North American assigned Staley cars to other shippers,
but I think it's relatively unlikely.

Richard,

But it did happen in the first quarter of 1949 when these AESX "Staley"
tank cars carried loads between Swift-Frankfort to Lever
Brothers-Edgewater NJ. Now, maybe Staley, Swift and Lever and a possible
unknown fourth part did some kind of trade which necessitated the Staley
cars. I can only report what was listed.

Two of the other three tank cars were not billed; - one, owned by AESX;
and the other, a tank car with "ATX" marks. The problem with ATX is
that
reporting mark was not included in the April 1949 ORER.

Or in any other late '40s/early '50s ORERs. That was probably a
clerical error in recording either GATX or NATX reporting marks.

Agreed.

The last of the 21 tank cars was an UTLX Empty. UTLX only leased cars
to
the oil companies and independent refiners in 1949. It probably carried
fuel or lubricants for Swift, and was being returned empty to Madison
IL.

Not entirely true. Petroleum shippers certainly provided most of UTL's
business in that period, but UTL had some cars that were leased to
shippers of acids, chemicals, and vegetable oils. Still, Tim's
speculation about this particular car is probably correct.

"Some" probably was like being like the odds of the San Francisco 49ers
going to the Super Bowl this year.

Tim Gilbert

Richard Hendrickson


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william darnaby wrote:

Tim,

Thanks again for the analysis. It keeps me interested in releasing the
data. The thing that surprised me were the 2 Canadian cars that were loaded
and sent on their way. I had always heard that Canadian cars had to be
returned to Canada either with a load or without. So much for that urban
legend...

Bill,

Thanks for the kudo, and if you keep releasing more data, I will put all that data on a spreadsheet, cross reference the cars with the 4/1949 ORER, and do a bunch of summaries including geographic distribution of boxcars, consignees and other things now undetermined which might pop out at me. I can post the spreadsheet to the STMFPH Files so others can play (sort) with it to find out other things which interest them.

Regarding the two Canadian cars, CP #223472 which was loaded with bean meal and consigned to Gwinneville IN on the B&O via Indianapolis, and CN #522526 which was loaded with meal on 6/9/1948 for the Van Patten Co. of Allen MI via the PRR-Michigan Central. My 4/49 ORER does not distinguish between "American" cars on the Canadian roads so I have no idea of whether CP #223472 was American or Canadian; because CN's American cars were marked GTW or CV, I assume CN #522526 was Canadian.

I would argue that the "Canadian" urban legend was valid most of the time. If it was not valid, the number of Canadian Boxcars recorded as loads out of Swift-Frankfort would have been 9 or 10 instead of the two you have listed so far.

Meanwhile, thank you very much for sharing this information with us, Tim Gilbert

The October 2005 issue of The Keystone Modeler is online at
http://www.prrths.com/Keystone%20Modeler/Keystone_Modeler.htm

Articles of interest include:
Modeling PRR Flat Cars – Class F25
Scratch Building an F25
Work Equipment Flat Cars – Part 2
The Landscapes of the PRR – Movement of Perishables ca. 1950
PRRPro Recap
2005 Meeting Models – Part 3


Ben Hom

Allen Rueter wrote:
"The SP&S converted five 10000 series box cars (10019, 10078, 10128,
10155, 10218) to dry ice service. (10078, 10218) were assigned to Gas
Ice, Klickitat Sprs WA in 1949."

These are USRA DS boxcars.


Ben Hom

Was that a red or black rectangle herald on the door?

That's another issue... it's black & white -- I believe -- based on
the tones of the photo. B&W images with a red herald seem to show up
lighter in photos.

But I'm open for suggestions!

More importantly, when did each color of herald get used?

Red & white heralds were on steam engines by the 1930s. It seems that
early (1930s) versions of freight cars had red & white heralds also.
My guess (based on b&w photos only) is that only the GBW boxcars, and
black gondolas and hoppers of the late steam period (post- 1935) had
black & white heralds. Certainly by the time all-steel boxcars arrived
in 1950 the heralds were red & white.
__________
Mark Mathu
Whitefish Bay, Wis.

Doug Rhodes wrote:

So I'd be cautious about generalizing from this data to conclude that the
cabotage laws were "urban legend" :-)

I don't think that's what was alleged, only that the "rule" that no Canadian mark cars ever got reloaded for U.S. destinations appears a bit legend-like. We're trying to reproduce what actually happened, not what the law said should happen. <can we "g" on this?>

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

Elden Gatwood wrote:

"No, tooling costs and pattern-making are not low cost. Several manufacturers spoke to me
yesterday about this very subject. The choice of projects is a very difficult one. No one wants to
risk a bomb, so much up-front time and energy is spent trying to pick a winner."

I came across a write-up for a low pressure limited run injection molded kit. The kit was 168
pieces, of which three were resin and 54 were photoetched, the rest being injection molded. It was
listed at $45.00.

This sounds like something that would be suitable for train models. So why aren't MRR producers
using this?


Eric Petersson



________________________________________________
Get your own "800" number
Voicemail, fax, email, and a lot more
http://www.ureach.com/reg/tag

This evening I recorded a few observations about the distances between cars (actually between opposing draft gear faces or plates) to be ordinarily expected in the prototype (freight cars c. 1940), and what we actually can measure between the draft gear faces of several types of current HO model coupler draft gear boxes. The prototype measurements are taken from a 1940 Car Builders Cyclopedia. The measured coupler is a AAR Type E. The model measurements are made with my venerable precision Mititoyo PFM HO calipers.

The AAR standard distance between the face of the box and the neck of the coupler drawbar (the "horn"?) where the bar expands into the head seems to be a steady 3". The distance between that point and the pulling face of the coupler knuckle is exactly 12" on the type E coupler (9" on earlier, and/or contemporary smaller couplers for export and industrial use).

Interestingly, actual knuckle thickness is not defined (although contours certainly are) so that I was unable to determine what should be expected if one measured from the box face over the outside knuckle face.

INDIVIDUAL DRAFT GEAR BOX/COUPLER MEASUREMENTS

Box/Coupler Distance box face to pulling surface.

Prototype (Type E) 15"
Accumate Proto 15-1/2"
Kadee #78 20"

MEASUREMENTS BETW. SPECIFIED COUPLED DRAFT GEAR BOX/COUPLER PAIRS

Box/Coupler Distance betw. box faces (at rest) Distance betw. faces (stretched

Prototype (Type E) 30" Unknown
Accumate Proto 29" 31"
Kadee #78 35" 42"
Kadee #45 (short shank) 36" 38-1/2"
Kadee #5 39" 41"

I do not know the internal spring workings of the #78s, but there was some apparent added sprung internal slack within the boxes aside from the usual slack expected between the pulling faces.

For comparison, I also included the measurements that we would ordinarily expect from our common Kadee #5s, and also from the popular Kadee #4x series of short shank couplers.

These observations only measure dimensions against the prototype, and do not predict operational reliability or ease either in of itself, or on your layout!

Denny




--
Denny S. Anspach, MD
Sacramento, California

The SP&S converted five 10000 series box cars (10019,10078,10128,10155,10218) to dry ice service.
(10078,10218) were assigned to Gas Ice, Klickitat Sprs WA in 1949.

Allen Rueter

--
------
Allen P Rueter Phone: 314/935-6429 email allen :) artsci.wustl.edu
.oO* there are at least three sides to every issue.

Several listers have written messages like, "I would convert to....if I
didn't already have 100 cars with ......couplers already installed. It
would be too expensive and too much trouble to change now." However,
this is what modelers have been saying since the dark ages of model
railroading, i.e. "I have 100 cars with X2fs, straight pin KDs, MK-5s,
etc., etc., too many and too expensive to convert now." Yet, obviously
people have converted. I am sure hardly anyone uses X2fs or Mantuas or
Kadee straight pin couplers anymore. Along the line something
motivates folks to change the couplers they are using and they do.
Some like Doc Denny test several varieties and start changing. Some
are new to the hobby or are starting again so aren't invested in one
type or another and they choose one for whatever reason.

Jared Harper
Athens, GA

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, timboconnor@c... wrote:

William, only one problem: If your magnet is moved away from the
ball (upwards) then the effect of the magnetic field is diminished as
the inverse square of the distance. To work, your uncoupling lever
would have to move a magnet DOWN closer to the top of the coupler
so that the ball would rise as the magnetic field got stronger.

Just wait for the Barger coupler. (Hopefully not too many years hence.)
It will have a real pin, just like the prototype. At least, the 1/32

scale

version had one!

Tim O.

I've been thinking about trying to make real, functioning top operated
coupler release bars to use with the Sergent couplers. I looked at
the size of the pieces and think it can be done, just by someone with
better eyes and steadier hands than I have. Anyway, the idea is to
use a small piece of those super-strong rare-earth magnets at the
point above the coupler, so moving the down bent end of the coupler
release bar up would lift the magnet, thus lifting the little ball
inside the coupler.

Tim,

I knew it was too good to be true, and I'm glad you explained it so I
can understand before I did something really crazy like actually
trying to make it work. That would have been frustrating, to say the
least.

Walter M. Clark
Time stopped in November 1941
Riverside, California

Use of a non duty paid conveyance to carry goods between two points within a country is "cabotage", which is indeed illegal in most countries. Thus, a freight car would normally move across the border to its destination, then reloaded or not, move more or less directly back across the border to avoid breaching the cabotage laws.

Two points come to mind from your data: first, the Canadian railroads had (and still have) cars on which duty WAS paid in the US. Today, these cars might have a distinct reporting mark (such as CPAA) to signify this, but I'm not aware of this reporting mark practice being widespread back in the 1940's. So the cars you have identified MAY have been legal for carriage of goods within the US (I don't have access to info tonight to comment on the specific cars.)

The other possibility is that one or more of these two car movements was in breach of the rules - "it happens", and there may have been other pressures at the time (boxcar shortage?)

So I'd be cautious about generalizing from this data to conclude that the cabotage laws were "urban legend" :-)

Doug Rhodes

On Oct 10, 2005, at 6:38 PM, Tim Gilbert wrote:

There were 11 GATX tank cars among the 21 listed with loads to Proctor &
Gamble, Ivorydale OH (6 - GATX bought P&G's tank car fleet in 1935);
three movements to Swift's Fostoria OH operation; one to Swift-Atlanta
and one car interchanged with the PRR for "IS(?)" what or wherever that is.

Three SHPX tank cars were consigned to Lever Brothers in Hammond IN.
Another four tank cars consigned to Lever's Edgewater NJ operation were
leased from NATX or AESX (a NATX-reporting mark). On 6/11/1948, there
was a GATX tank car consigned to Lever Brothers in Edgewater NJ. It
looks like Lever leased tank cars on the short term - whether the lease
was per trip, per month, or of some other duration I do not know.

North American did, indeed, operate the AESX tank car fleet, but the cars with those reporting marks were owned by, and assigned to the service of, corn oil manufacturer A. E. Staley. It's certainly possible that North American assigned Staley cars to other shippers, but I think it's relatively unlikely.

Two of the other three tank cars were not billed; - one, owned by AESX;
and the other, a tank car with "ATX" marks. The problem with ATX is that
reporting mark was not included in the April 1949 ORER.

Or in any other late '40s/early '50s ORERs. That was probably a clerical error in recording either GATX or NATX reporting marks.

The last of the 21 tank cars was an UTLX Empty. UTLX only leased cars to
the oil companies and independent refiners in 1949. It probably carried
fuel or lubricants for Swift, and was being returned empty to Madison IL.

Not entirely true. Petroleum shippers certainly provided most of UTL's business in that period, but UTL had some cars that were leased to shippers of acids, chemicals, and vegetable oils. Still, Tim's speculation about this particular car is probably correct.

Richard Hendrickson

Bill,

Both the Car Service Rules and US Customs regulations required that cars of Canadian ownership built in Canada be either loaded to Canada or returned empty to Canada. Same with Mexico. Eventually the railroad loading the car domestically within the US would have to pay duty and a fine to US Customs.

Although not germane to this list, this is why some Canadian railroads have more than one reporting mark, to differentiate between US built and Canadian built cars.

NAFTA finally changed this.

Gregg Mahlkov

Tim,

Thanks again for the analysis. It keeps me interested in releasing the data. The thing that surprised me were the 2 Canadian cars that were loaded and sent on their way. I had always heard that Canadian cars had to be returned to Canada either with a load or without. So much for that urban legend...

Bill Darnaby

A few years back we tried a sampling of the IM, McHenry (and clones), and
Accumates on our relatively large 60' x 30' HO scale club layout. While not
scientific the test cars which ran for a few years in some cases provided
valuable insight. During the testing time we had club members that ranged
from beginning modelers to railroad engineers. Our standard mainline
freight was 20-25 cars, cars were weighted to NMRA specs, and grades
approached 2.5%. Some things we noted included (in no particular order):

The IM and McHenry couplers with the little plastic knuckle spring finger
were the worst. A hard coupling was enough to cause a permanent set in the
knuckle spring which rendered the coupler useless since the knuckle stayed
open.

The plastic shanks on the IM, and clone type couplers tended to flex up and
down, resulting in train separation on more than one occasion. On one long
train we pulled the knuckle off the shank. Since it only happened once I
tend to think there was a defect in the coupler.

Accumates: We often run with pusher engines on one of the grades. They
aren't really needed but add to the operation. When the pushers were shoving
and the slack was run in accumates would uncouple if the head end
accelerated quicker than the tail due to the scissors action of the
couplers. I also had a 3 unit set of Atlas U23B's due this from time to
time if the second or third locomotives were shoving the first. We also had
accumates uncouple after shoving a long string of cars then changing
direction in the yard.

What we decided after the tests was to stick with the kadee #5's as they
operated the best on the club layout. At this time #5 and #58's are our
standard. Although Sergent's seem neat they would work on the club layout
due to some deep scenes and the need to convert approximately 1500 pieces of
rolling stock.

Brian J Carlson P.E.
Cheektowaga NY