Date
1 - 17 of 17
USRA single sheathed box cars flooring questions
|
jayrs9
Hi, I have a couple questions about the floor in a USRA single sheathed box cars. 1. Many of the prototype photos seam to show the side sheathing sitting on top of the floor, suggesting that the floor boards run from the edge of the side sills, not inside the side sheathing. Would that typically be the case in 1919-1920 when these cars were built? 2. How were the wooden floor boards attached to the side and center sills' ship builder's channel. Was there some sort of clip? The USRA drawing suggest something next to the edge of the channels. Thanks for any help, Jay Ruppel
|
|
|
|
destorzek@...
---In STMFC@..., <jayrs9@...> wrote : 1. Many of the prototype photos seam to show the side sheathing sitting on top of the floor, suggesting that the floor boards run from the edge of the side sills, not inside the side sheathing. Would that typically be the case in 1919-1920 when these cars were built? ============ Really? Care to cite an example? Running the lining on top of the flooring would be just asking to have it bulge and leak grain, which in the decade leading up to the USRA cars had been a great concern, even spawning some patented solutions. The simplest was what the CN called "side lining anti bulge plates", steel squares riveted to the side sills mid-span between the posts to prevent the lining from bulging. Moving the bottom of the lining 2" up would tend to defeat their purpose. =========== 2. How were the wooden floor boards attached to the side and center sills' ship builder's channel. Was there some sort of clip? The USRA drawing suggest something next to the edge of the channels. =========== I don't have any drawings handy other than the general arrangements that were published in the Car Builder's Cyclopedia (the drawing with the incorrect end sills) but in the sectional view of the single sheathed cars that shows the floor, it shows the flooring bolts alongside the side sill flanges, and flooring clips drawn with hidden lines, since they are on the other side of the flooring. The clips aren't shown adjacent to the center sill, but the bolt placement indicates they were used there also. Dennis Storzek |
|
|
|
Jack Mullen
Jay,
The construction you describe, with flooring extending under the side sheathing, is common for stock cars and composite gons, but I don't know of any SS boxcars built that way. From builder's photos, most if not all of the USRA SS cars had a pressed steel angle riveted to the top of the side sill to form an attachment for flooring, and perhaps retain the sheathing as an alternative to bulge plates. A narrow ( perhaps 1 1/2" or 2") flange extends upward outside the lowest board of the side sheathing. A wide flange extends toward the center of the car and has holes for floor bolts. See photo on p.8, RPC17. The vertical flange along the bottom of the sheathing forms a narrow linear feature that could look like the ends of flooring in photos, but in a closeup or good hi-rez print you see that there aren't individual board ends, just a smooth strip. Again, see RPC17. The bulge plates and flooring clips Dennis describes are shown of the GA drawing he cites, but don't seem to have been used in production. This appears to have been another design change between the early release of GA drawings and actual production. Many USRA cars did get bulge plates in later years. A quick scan of published photos suggests that this construction was the norm for new construction by the mid-1920s. I speculate that the USRA-type flooring angle may have been vulnerable to corrosion. Also, the need to have the bolt holes in the flooring align with pre-punched holes in the attachment angle would be a disadvantage compared to using floor clips. Jack Mullen |
|
|
|
destorzek@...
---In STMFC@..., <jack.f.mullen@...> wrote : The bulge plates and flooring clips Dennis describes are shown of the GA drawing he cites, but don't seem to have been used in production. This appears to have been another design change between the early release of GA drawings and actual production. Jack Mullen ============== Ya know, my first reply on this subject suggested the gentleman contact the Pullman Library at the Illinois Railway Museum, since I know they have the General Arrangement, Steel Details, Brake Details, and other sundry drawings for the cars Haskell & Barker built, and likely another set from Pullman also. Years ago, we used to struggle to create models from less than complete drawings, supplementing missing details with best guesses from photos, but a lot of drawings have become relatively easily available in recent years, and there is really no reason for guessing any longer. Buy the drawings... as they used to say on Battlestar Galactica, "All will be revealed!" Dennis Storzek |
|
|
|
jayrs9
Thanks for all the responses. I have come to the point when I must decide which particular version (builder, railroad, etc) of the standard USRA car I'm trying to build and have decided to try and model what the original USRA designers called for, which means following the original drawing as closely as possible, warts and all. Floor boards and sheathing connection: As Dennis suggested , the original GA side view of the car show the top of the floor boards as a dotted line, suggesting they were inside the side sheathing, but with bulge plates (thanks for giving me their name) placed between the the vertical supports. This does not seem like a bad design for keeping the end grain of the floor boards protected and the sides tight against the floor boards. But when I looked at the pictures, in most cases this does not seem to be what was done. Examples: From the July 1980 Mainline Modeler article- --PRR #564287, page 43 --C&NW #144694, page 48. This photo is described as from Jan 1919 as the car came form the American Car and Foundry plant. --B&O #XM 2157, page 49 Other photos- --D&H #17432 (http://steamerafreightcars.com/modeling/vm/vm10dhpics.html) --CC&O #8257 wreck picture (http://www.steamerafreightcars.com/gallery/wreck/crr8257main.html). --CC&O #8024 is shown as delivered in the April 1919 Railway and Locomotive Engineering article on USRA cars delivered to CC&O and built by Bettendorf Company --D&H #17225 (http://mattforsyth.com/?attachment_id=425) --C&NW #144694, April 1919 Railway and Locomotive Engineering Jack as you suggested, in looking at these, I don't think they show that the sheathing sits directly on the floor boards, if that were the case the line would not look as continuous as it does, but rather as you suggested, there is some sort of "L" bracket tying the side sill, floor boards and sheathing together. This does not seem as would give as much protection from the elements as the original design. (Jack, if doesn't violate any rules, could you send me a scan of the picture you mentioned, RPC17 is out of print and I'm trying to track down a reasonable priced one). All very interesting. The comments about the floor board clips were very useful. I found a bunch of recent material on them, but noting from the 1920s. This may be pushing things, but in 1919 might they use round head carriage bolts or counter sunk screws for attachment. Dennis, I do appreciate the lead to Illinois Railway Museum and I am following up on it, but I'm also trying to move ahead with the construction of my model. Apparently Haskell & Barker build 6,000 single sheathed USRA box cars, does anyone know for what lines? Also I have a list of drawing numbers for the USRA standard cars published in the 1919 Railway Review. Would these numbers carry over and be used by the builders? Buying single drawing can get very pricey, so I want to make sure I get the right ones. (As an aside, The NYCHS has a great deal where you can buy a cd with multiple drawings on single topic for a very reasonable price. I bought their cd on class H-6 Mikado and it was wonderful.) Thanks again for all your help, Jay Ruppel |
|
|
|
Jay, here is a brief tabulation of the 6000 H&B cars.: Homewood ILMARKS LNUMBER HNUMBER TOTAL CLASS FUTURE AA 12000 12149 150 RENO 90000-90149 B&O 187000 187499 500 M-24 Several RBLT & RENO C&NW 144700 145698 500 C&O 1150 1599 450 B5-1 Most RBLT & RENO CM&StP 700000 700999 1000 ERIE 92500 92699 200 RBLT and RENO 71800-71999 GA 19000 19299 300 RBLT & RENO into 19500-19799 GET 20350 20502 153 RENO to CM&StP 703847-703999 GET 20503 20702 200 RENO to GR&I 4851-5050 GET 20703 21167 465 RENO to PRR 38696-39160 GET 21168 21449 282 RENO to LIRR 4304-4585 MEC 36001 36300 300 NYC 160000 160499 500 LOT 376-B RENO 277000-277999 NYC 160500 160999 500 LOT 406-B RENO to 277500-277999 SP 26460 26959 500 B-50-12 RBLT without RENO to combined 26360-27359 Eric Lombard On Wed, May 27, 2015 at 11:57 AM, jayrs9@... [STMFC] <STMFC@...> wrote:
|
|
|
|
Well, that sure didn't work out very well... let me try another approach. On Wed, May 27, 2015 at 1:27 PM, Eric Lombard <rericlombard@...> wrote:
|
|
|
|
MARKS
LNUMBER
HNUMBER
TOTAL
CLASS
FUTURE
AA
12000
12149
150
RENO
90000-90149
B&O
187000
187499
500
M-24
Several
RBLT & RENO
C&NW
144700
145698
500
C&O
1150
1599
450
B5-1
Most
RBLT & RENO
CM&StP
700000
700999
1000
ERIE
92500
92699
200
RBLT
and RENO 71800-71999
GA
19000
19299
300
RBLT
& RENO into 19500-19799
GET
20350
20502
153
RENO
to CM&StP 703847-703999
GET
20503
20702
200
RENO
to GR&I 4851-5050
GET
20703
21167
465
RENO
to PRR 38696-39160
GET
21168
21449
282
RENO
to LIRR 4304-4585
MEC
36001
36300
300
NYC
160000
160499
500
LOT
376-B
RENO
277000-277999
NYC
160500
160999
500
LOT
406-B
RENO
to 277500-277999
SP
26460
26959
500
B-50-12
RBLT
without RENO to combined 26360-27359
|
|
|
|
Nor did that attempt. Guess there is no way that a Yahoo chat can convey tabulated formatting. I will post an Excel table with the data. Sorry about this...
Eric |
|
|
|
destorzek@...
---In STMFC@..., <elombard@...> wrote : Jay, here is a brief tabulation of the 6000 H&B cars.: ============= Eric, Would you have the same for Pullman built cars, assuming Pullman built any of the single sheathed boxcars? That would give Jay twice the number of target drawings to shoot for... For that matter, Standard Steel Car, also... You wouldn't happen to have lot numbers for any of these, would you? These cars were ordered by the Gov't rather than the railroads, and I seem to recall, when sorting H&B drawings a couple years ago, that a lot of the drawings were simply marked "U.S. Gov't Cars", but this can get easily confused with the export cars and narrow gauge trench railway cars H&B was building at the same time. As I recall, there was rather extensive coverage of these cars in the H&B files, even including an isometric drawing, which was a real rarity. I don't recall if the isometric was of the single or double sheathed car, but the double sheathed cars were old hat, so I suspect it was the former. Did the N&W receive any of the single sheathed cars from the USRA? The M&WHS has a really nice drawing archive and reproduction service, although it seems much of the holdings are post WWII cars. N&WHS Archives Database Dennis Storzek |
|
|
|
jayrs9
Thanks Eric for all your attempts at getting the list of railroads up. Very helpful.
It is my understanding that there were 6 companies that manufactured the 25,000 single sheathed box cars that were made: American Car and Foundry 9,000 cars The Bettendorf Company 3,000 cars Haskell and Barker Car Company 6,000 cars The Pullman Co. 6,000 cars St. Louis Car Company 1,000 cars Any more info on which roads took ownership of these would be great. Dennis, NW did received 800 of these cars. Your right their archives are good, I bought one of their drawing of the standard stoker for the Mikado. I'll have to do some digging there. I'm going to try and put a couple of pdf files up (I'm newbie on the ways of google groups) relating to the usra freight cars: -Allocation of Standard freight cars(1919 Railway_Locomotives_and_Cars) -Standard freight cars delivered (Railway Age Gazette (mechnical edition) vol93 (1919)) -Drawing numbers for USRA standard cars (Railway Review 1919) |
|
|
|
Tony Thompson
jayrs9 (not signing his name) wrote:
Is something wrong with the James Lane compilation in R&LHS publication _Railroad HIstory_ issue 128? 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, tony@... Publishers of books on railroad history |
|
|
|
destorzek@...
---In STMFC@..., <tony@...> wrote : Is something wrong with the James Lane compilation in R&LHS publication _Railroad HIstory_ issue 128? ===============I don't think he has it, since he asked if anyone had a copy they could share a while back. Dennis Storzek |
|
|
|
Hello Everyone,
I have uploaded a spreadsheet that tabulates all USRA Single-sheathed cars built NEW as well as all so far uncovered that were renumbered or rebuilt and renumbered but retained their original general side and end construction. Some of these received new roofs or doors. Not included are cars rebuilt to steel sheathing. The table does include the 25,000 ordered by the government as well as five additional. Two of the latter were sample cars likely renumbered into one of the known series in the 25,000. Three were built as replacements, one in 1921 and two in 1922. The range of build dates included are from from photos or texts are as are known builder lots. The series are sorted by road and series but can be re-sorted by any if the data columns to suit one's interests. Eric L. |
|
|
|
destorzek@...
---In STMFC@..., <elombard@...> wrote : Hello Everyone, I have uploaded a spreadsheet that tabulates all USRA Single-sheathed cars built NEW as well as all so far uncovered that were renumbered or rebuilt and renumbered but retained their original general side and end construction. ================= Very useful Eric. As I suspected, it appears that all 6000 cars Pullman built for the Gov't were built under Lot 5294, and likewise, all 6000 cars H&B built for the Gov't were built under Lot 5179. The apparent correlation between the lot numbers is just a coincidence; each company had their own lot number series at this time. That means that the railroad names and number series will not appear on the builder's drawings... but the lot number will. Not to fault Ted and the crew at the Pullman Library, but no one is a freight car expert, and as you get down into the component level drawings, it's often not real evident what you are looking at anyway. The lot number is what keeps everyone on the same page, since it appears on almost all the drawings. I am NOT part of the regular library crew... but did spend considerable time organizing the H&B drawings a couple years ago, and have also had searches done for Pullman drawings of this vintage, so let me pass along what little experience I have. The library does have a mostly complete drawing index for the Pullman freight car drawings. Looking up that lot number in the index will yield a drawing list. Pullman drawings were numbered in a different series for EACH SIZE DRAWING SHEET. The drawing list makes it possible to find all the applicable drawing numbers in one place. The drawings are stored rolled in tubes, but each tube is marked with the start and end number of the drawings it contains. The drawing list allows the proper tubes to be pulled. They then have to be opened and unrolled to find the correct sheet(s), and those sheets can then be scanned. The library uses the drawing number as the image file name, so a search of the image data base will turn up any drawing that has already been scanned. There is no master index for the H&B drawings. Because of this, those drawings are stored in drawers to make them a bit more accessible. H&B tended to assign a continuous block of drawing numbers to each lot. However, since the sheets are different sizes, they end up in different drawers, so this is little help. All the drawings of a given size are filed in numerical order, which mostly coincides with chonological order, so the search strategy is to riffle through the drawers until in the approximate date range, looking for the lot numbers on the drawings. Again, each size sheet is a separate search. Again, the scanned image database has a field for the lot number, so if the desired drawings have already been scanned, this will be determined before the paper search begins. I hope this explanation is helpful. Dennis Storzek |
|
|
|
jayrs9
Thanks Eric for all your work. This will greatly help me in my search for original drawings. I found and order both Vol 128 of Railroad History and Vol 17 of Railway Prototype Cyclopedia which may have some of the same info, but you have done all the collection process for me and I can get started on my search while I wait for the postal service.
Dennis, thanks for a peak inside the working of the Pullman Library. I sent an email query to them a couple days ago using the address in the link you gave (pullmanlibrary@...) but have not heard back. Is there a more specific email address, I fear my email might have fallen into some deep hole. Jay Ruppel |
|
|
|
destorzek@...
---In STMFC@..., <jayrs9@...> wrote : Dennis, thanks for a peak inside the working of the Pullman Library. I sent an email query to them a couple days ago using the address in the link you gave (pullmanlibrary@...) but have not heard back. Is there a more specific email address, I fear my email might have fallen into some deep hole. Jay Ruppel ========= Give it a week. The Pullman Library is 100% volunteer staffed, usually Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday. There is not much reason to check the e-mail at other times, as the answers will all be out at the library. If you don't get a reply by next Wednesday, give them a call at the number at the contact link I posted. Dennis Storzek |
|
|
