The recent(sort of) releases of the Atlas Hart ballast gons have me asking
the following:

1) Isn't it true that cars of this type were, for the most part, in
captive/MOW service on their home roads? I have browsed my
books and have not found pictures of ballast cars that weren't
either singles or cuts of cars all from the home road and on the
home road.
If they were used in interchange service - would someone please
expand on what kind of service a side dumping car of this particular
type was used in ... and when that happened would they have been
mixed in with other cars from other roads in a typical mish-mash
fashion or would they have been in cuts of cars from the same road.
Yes, I'm aware of operations such as the building of a dam
where rock from some location would be moved to the dam site -
and that might involve more than one road ... but even then would
-ballast- cars be used for that type of service? Occasionally? Often?
I guess that what I'm asking is if side dump cars of this type were
regularly used in any service other than the ballast work they are so
obviously purpose-built for?

2) The dump door operating levers seem very large to me. I'm
thinking of attempting to shorten them. Has anyone done this
and if so what did you do? My idea was to cut them shorter
and then round off the end as a "handle" - this would allow
tapering the 'web' that goes around the end and making it
look some what acceptable. In my mind this would be better
than having them be so far oversize the way they are now.
Are they really oversize? They seem so to me based upon
all of the similar service car pictures I could find in a 45 minute
search of my books (I'm not certain I found a Hart car in that
search)..

3) Have you tried to build a custom load in one? I did and as soon
as I put any white glue in it started running out thru the doors.
DOH on me. How did you solve this problem? I'm thinking of
putting some cut up paper towel in the bottom and adding enough
white glue to attach it to the inside of the car - thus forming a 'dam'.
If I do this would the white glue I use later to do the load 'dissolve'
the glue holding the towel and start leaking? I usually use white
glue thinned 50% with water and a drop of detergent for doing
custom loads.

4) The cars I have all have 'load level' markings labelled "gravel
load limit" (sic). I'm assuming that RR ballast would be loaded
to that level. Correct?

5) The pics I found have a lot of light colored weathering on the
bottoms third of them. Obviously they kicked up a lot of dust
when being dumped/loaded and if there was any moisture on
side of the car the dust stuck and built up. One of the few car
types with significant amounts of light colored weathering!
(Grain/flour and cement service being the others that I know.)

Jim Betz wrote:

3) Have you tried to build a custom load in one? I did and as soon
as I put any white glue in it started running out thru the doors.
DOH on me. How did you solve this problem?

I always put such a load on a platform which sits at the right height in the car, since I weight cars so they can be run loaded or empty, and thus don't want a heavy load. Obviously, I also want removable loads. But even if you don't intend to remove the loads, making a small load on a platform is easier.

4) The cars I have all have 'load level' markings labelled "gravel
load limit" (sic). I'm assuming that RR ballast would be loaded
to that level. Correct?

Yeah, officially, but overloading was very common. I have photos of cars with such load lines, and with ballast loads heaped far above the top of the car.

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2942 Linden Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@...
Publishers of books on railroad history

Jim Betz writes:

1) Isn't it true that cars of this type were, for the most part, in
captive/MOW service on their home roads?

In addition to other stuff, UP used these cars for carrying coal...as they used every open top hopper or gon they owned. During our time period, I doubt that UP was hauling coal off line so such UP cars probably didn't venture far from home. The Atlas car does match the plans rather well except for the lack of bolsters and the missing center sill between bolster and hoppers.

Mike Brock

But those are just small nits to pick, right?

8^)
--
Thanks!

Brian Ehni

On Mar 24, 2005, at 12:15 PM, Mike Brock wrote:

Mike Brock writes:

In addition to other stuff, UP used these cars for carrying coal...as they
used every open top hopper or gon they owned. During our time period, I
doubt that UP was hauling coal off line so such UP cars probably didn't
venture far from home.

Interesting that you should say that, Mike, since late-'40s photos have recently turned up which show UP ballast hoppers en route to/from the Kaiser steel plant in Fontana, CA. Granted, they came almost all the way from Utah on the LA&SL, but were handed off to the Santa Fe for delivery to Kaiser. The same photos also show D&RGW 70 ton Hart selective ballast hoppers (though of a different design than that modeled by Atlas) in the same service. At that time, the Rio Grande owned no cross hoppers. Of course, both UP and D&RGW (as well as Utah Coal Route) shipped a lot of coal in GS gondolas, and both RRs subsequently acquired 70 ton cross hopper cars, so the use of ballast hoppers in Kaiser coal service may have been a short-term expedient.

Ordinary gravel was one of the most common carloadings in the steam era and
HK hoppers were well suited to such loads. Ballast -- as in railroad
ballast -- would likely be (by comparison) relatively small compared to the
need for gravel going into roads, sidewalks, house foundations, anything
using concrete.

The ICC did classify broken stone as a different commodity from ordinary
gravel. I don't know the facts of the situation but going on the names
alone it seems to me that railroad ballast is normally broken stone and what
I've seen going into cement wasn't; FWIW tonnage/carloads of broken stone
reported to the ICC as rail shipments were a tiny fraction of gravel, tho of
course this is only revenue shipments so company MOW wouldn't have been
included. But the take away here is gravel was a very common shipment by
rail.

In the west HK hoppers were also pressed into service during the sugar beet
campaign.

Dave Nelson

--- In STMFC@..., Jim Betz <jimbetz@j...> wrote:

4) The cars I have all have 'load level' markings

labelled "gravel

load limit" (sic). I'm assuming that RR ballast would be

loaded

to that level. Correct?

Not necessarily. It depends on what the ballast is. Cinders were a
common steam-era ballast and fill material, and are a relatively
light aggregate. A Hart gon full of cinders would probably not be
overweight. Crushed stone ballast typically has a higher void ratio
than gravel (more empty space) so the bulk density is less. Might be
loaded 10-20% higher than gravel.

Hart gons (and other types of dump gons) often show up in steam-era
engine terminal photos hauling cinders from the ashpit. (A string of
these would be a great weathering project.)

Jack Mullen

Richard Hendrickson notes:

Interesting that you should say that, Mike, since late-'40s photos have
recently turned up which show UP ballast hoppers en route to/from the
Kaiser steel plant in Fontana, CA. Granted, they came almost all the
way from Utah on the LA&SL, but were handed off to the Santa Fe for
delivery to Kaiser.

When I made the statement I thought...hmmm...wonder if UP was handing any coal off to C&S at Cheyenne? UP, at that time, was moving coal from Rock Springs and Hanna...west of Mecca...Cheyenne...and some coal might have been moved north on C&S in Wyoming and even south into Colorado in areas not served by UP. UP had a relatively small number of interchanges on its lines west of central Nebraska. True, some coal may have been handed off to both SP at Ogden or D&RGW at SLC but that's about it until California. Yes, some might have even gone on the Butte line to handoff to NP but I doubt that it amounted to much. NP was using lignite from its lignite mines at the time. Didn't consider coal from Utah. That's a long haul to Califormia for that time.

Mike Brock

On Thursday, March 24, 2005, at 07:14 PM, Mike Brock wrote:

Richard Hendrickson notes:

Interesting that you should say that, Mike, since late-'40s photos have
recently turned up which show UP ballast hoppers en route to/from the
Kaiser steel plant in Fontana, CA. Granted, they came almost all the
way from Utah on the LA&SL, but were handed off to the Santa Fe for
delivery to Kaiser.

When I made the statement I thought...hmmm...wonder if UP was handing any
coal off to C&S at Cheyenne? UP, at that time, was moving coal from Rock
Springs and Hanna...west of Mecca...Cheyenne...and some coal might have been
moved north on C&S in Wyoming and even south into Colorado in areas not
served by UP. UP had a relatively small number of interchanges on its lines
west of central Nebraska. True, some coal may have been handed off to both
SP at Ogden or D&RGW at SLC but that's about it until California. Yes, some
might have even gone on the Butte line to handoff to NP but I doubt that it
amounted to much. NP was using lignite from its lignite mines at the time.
Didn't consider coal from Utah. That's a long haul to Califormia for that
time.

Mike Brock

A lot of the HKs handled company coal. You would see more of them than cross hoppers on the Kansas division. They were not dumped right a way. Some would set in the yard with coal in them for two or three weeks slowly finding their way to the coal chute.
Also please note, a lot of them had tops made for them making them into covered hoppers for the wheat rush.
thank you
Larry Jackman
ljack70117@...
Everybody lies, but it doesn't matter since nobody listens

Mike Brock wrote:

UP had a relatively small number of interchanges on its lines
west of central Nebraska. True, some coal may have been handed off to both
SP at Ogden or D&RGW at SLC but that's about it until California.
Didn't consider coal from Utah. That's a long haul to Califormia for that
time.

Well, the coke at Kaiser's Fontana plant was made from western Colorado coal, courtesy of DRGW and Utah Coal Route, and was supplemented with Wyoming coal, I assume off the UP.

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2942 Linden Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@...
Publishers of books on railroad history

Actually, from the ATSF & D&RGW - depending on year.

At 06:51 PM 3/24/2005, you wrote:

Mike Brock wrote:

UP had a relatively small number of interchanges on its lines
west of central Nebraska. True, some coal may have been handed off to
both
SP at Ogden or D&RGW at SLC but that's about it until California.
Didn't consider coal from Utah. That's a long haul to Califormia for
that
time.

Well, the coke at Kaiser's Fontana plant was made from western
Colorado coal, courtesy of DRGW and Utah Coal Route, and was
supplemented with Wyoming coal, I assume off the UP.

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2942 Linden Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@...
Publishers of books on railroad history




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Bob Webber

Mike Brock wrote: "Didn't consider coal from Utah. That's a long haul to California for that time."

Hi Mike,

Utah was the source of coal for the Fontana, Calif., works of Kaiser Steel from its opening during WWII. Utah coal was loaded on the D&RGW (and perhaps at times on the Utah Ry.), interchanged to the UP - I'm not sure offhand exactly where - and interchanged again to the Santa Fe at Barstow. The Santa Fe hauled it over Cajon Pass to San Bernardino - the only reason I have any interest in this movement - and delivered it to Fontana in local trains known as Kaiser Turns.

So long,

Andy



Andy Sperandeo
Executive Editor
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