Operations: more on car storage and use

Several years ago, I posted some comments to this blog about how I manage the flow and storage of the rolling stock on my layout (you can read it at this link: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2011/12/operations-car-flow-and-car-storage.html ). I have a fair number of freight cars beyond what is needed to operate the layout, partly to create variety in operations, but certainly not least because I am a freight car enthusiast. I have always enjoyed researching and building new freight cars, and the result is a car fleet rather distinctly too large for the layout, even with extensive staging capacity.
     One change I have made is to add some of the A-Line storage boxes. (These products are shown on their website, at: http://www.ppw-aline.com/hobbytote.htm ), though I have never bought the sleeve which makes them into a “tote;” I just buy the boxes.) These do a good job of holding about 16 cars each (for 40-foot cars), and they are well protected. Here is one such box, with the lid set aside.

     I continue to use my paper-carton boxes with trays (as described in the post linked at the top of this post), though because these are less quickly accessible than the A-Line boxes, they have become a kind of “deep storage” option. Gradually the cars which are less frequently used are migrating into the paper-carton trays. Those cartons and trays were shown in the previous post, a link to which is at the top of this post.
     The most active “pool” of cars is on the staging table, either made up into mainline trains, or simply in place on the storage tracks. This pool varies over time, with cars migrating off and onto the staging tracks as layout operations continue. Here is a shot of the table as it is at the moment.

The table is not quite fully extended, as the furthest track visible is the 11th (there are 12 in all).
     The other part of the active “pool” storage is the shelving in my adjoining room (the kitchen, when this space was a sub-size apartment). These cars supplement the cars on the staging table. The top and bottom shelves are not really curved, the lens focal length just makes them look that way.

     How is this managed? I have a chart laying out the sequence(s) of car movements at each industry or other car spot  (this procedure, a version of what can be called “demand-based car flow,” was described previously: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2011/11/operations-demand-based-car-flow-2.html  ). From that chart, I make up a list of the movements which are the next sequence of operation, and go to my “pairs list,” described in an earlier post ( at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2012/02/waybills-17-pairs-list.html ), and thereby find the cars with waybills for each of those car spots, along with the overlay bills for each spot. The waybills are filed by industry, so are readily retrieved. Then the car itself is located in storage by a (searchable) roster of all cars in active service. One of the entries for each car is its location, in a paper carton, in an A-Line box, or in the pool. I summarized an earlier version of this process in a blog post a few months ago (see it at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/07/waybills-part-42-flexibility.html ).
     Obviously the car roster is a critical part of this process, and I have learned that the roster has to be kept up to date as cars move around between various storage locations. I usually indicate such movements with pencil corrections on the most recent print-out. When a page gets too heavily marked up, I just update the electronic file and reprint the page.
     All in all, the process described above does work, and seems to provide good operational movement of cars, while permitting some selection of cars for each movement (because there are multiple waybills for every industry and car spot). I am always experimenting with ways to make the process more efficient, but for now, what I’m describing works well.
Tony Thompson

Display train, 2015, conclusion

Previously (at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/11/display-train-2015-part-2.html ), in Part 2 of this series, I described the middle six cars in my display train. In the present post, I conclude describing the train by showing the last third of the consist.
     The first car in this group was a 53-foot, 6-inch flat car, SP 80486. It was shown with a load, which I describe under the photo.

Prototype: SP Class F-70-6 flat car, built by American Car & Foundry, May 1937
Model: Red Caboose RTR car, weathered; load by Duha

     These Duha loads, imported from the Czech Republic for several years now by JWD Premium Products in Maine, are very nice and offer considerable variety. And although a number of them are distinctly European, there are plenty of North American-suitable loads too. You can see them all at  the website, http://www.jwdpremiumproducts.com/ho-freight-car-loads-duha/ . There are six web pages of these loads! quite a range.
     The next car was another box car, this one a Cotton Belt rebuild. The Cotton Belt rebuilt a great many of its older cars into more modern versions, as seen here. In this era, most of their box cars were painted with black ends. The car is SSW 36532.

Prototype: Rebuilt from 1923–1925 box cars in Cotton Belt shops during 1932–1938
Model: Sunshine resin kit
     The next car was an acid tank car, GATX 24961, an ICC 103A car, in the form of an excellent recent model from Tangent Products. It has an “empty” placard on this side. I have offered further comments on this model in a previous post, at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2014/11/a-terrific-new-tank-car-model.html .

Protoype: Leased to Dow Chemical, acid service, built by General American, 1953
Model: Tangent ready-to-run, lightly weathered, added placard
     Following the Dow tank car was a Pennsylvania X29 box car, a representative of more than 29,000 cars of this one class built by the railroad, PRR 51642.

Prototype: PRR Class X29 box car, built 1924
Model: Red Caboose kit, factory paint & lettering, weathering added
     Following the X29 was a car, DT&I 7152, built as part of the “Shake ’n’ Take” project at the Prototype Rails meeting Cocoa Beach, Florida, in 2010. It was described in a prior post (you can read it at the following link: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2012/01/shake-n-take-modeling-project-dt.html ).

Prototype AAR GB (mill) gondola, 41 feet, built by Greenville Steel Car Company, 1941
Model: Athearn kitbash, 2010 “Shake ’n’ Take” project, decal lettering
     And finally, the traditional last car, the caboose, was SP steel cupola caboose no. 1205.

Prototype: SP Class C-40-3 caboose, built by Southern Pacific, 1942
Model: modified Balboa brass, added details, painted, decal lettering

     This concludes my description of the display train I exhibited at the SPH&TS meeting in Sacramento earlier this month. I hope the photos and accompanying description are informative and perhaps even offer some ideas for modeling projects.
Tony Thompson

Display train, 2015, Part 2

In the previous post in this series (at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/10/display-train-from-sph-2015.html ), I gave some background about this display train, and showed its locomotive and the first four cars in the train. In the present post I continue with additional cars. I will again provide information about both the prototype and model, for each car.
     The fifth car in the train, following the SP tank car, is ballast car SP 168692. It was shown empty so that the interior detail of the longitudinal-dumping bottom doors could be seen.

Prototype: SP Class H-70-11 ballast hopper, built by Pullman-Standard, October 1953
Model: Bruce’s Train Shop, assembled resin car, added details, paint and decal lettering
     The sixth car in the train was a gondola carrying an overlength load of steel pipe, I showed this car in an earlier post about Richard Hendrickson’s multi-car loads (it is at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/03/richard-hendricksons-multi-car-loads.html ), but here I have used a different flat car of mine as the idler (next in the train). The number of the gondola is SP 94033.

Prototype: SP Class G-50-13 gondola, built by Ralston Car Company, 1930
Model: kitbashed Athearn by Richard Hendrickson, overlength pipe load, thus idler car
     The following car is the idler flat car to accommodate the length of the load of pipe, SP 140335. It is a model cut down from an Athearn 40-foot flat car, with a new styrene “overhanging” deck (extending out to the outer edge of the stake pockets), staff brake wheel, and metal sill steps.

Prototype: SP Class F-50-16 flat car, 40 feet, built by American Car & Foundry, 1948
Model: Athearn kit, kitbashed to length,  new deck and details, decals
     The eighth car in this grain was a simple box car, T&NO 60928, but one representing an interesting kitbash to match SP’s preferred (at this time) 10-foot inside car height.

Prototype: SP Class B-50-28 box car, 40 feet, built by General American, 1952
Model: C&BT Shops, kitbashed to correct height, added details, decals
     The T&NO box car was followed by a cement car, SP 165121, one of a whole group of different classes, all with square hatches, acquired by SP in the years after World War II.

Prototype: SP Class H-70-8 covered hopper, built by American Car & Foundry, 1951
Model: InterMountain RTR car, lightly weathered
     Finally, the last car in the train to be described in this post was a reefer from American Refrigerator Transit, the company from which PFE often borrowed cars at peak loading periods in PFE territory, ART 19818.

Prototype: Wood-sheathed refrigerator, built by AC&F, 1927
Model: Accurail undecorated kit, painted, decals from Oddballs
     This concludes my description of the middle part of my display train. I will show the last third of the train in the concluding post in this series.
Tony Thompson

Display train from SPH&TS 2015

In my prior post about the 35th annual meeting of the Southern Pacific Historical & Technical Society (which you can find at the following link: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/10/sph-meet-2015.html ), I showed an overall view of the freight train I entered in the contest. I mentioned in the post just cited that I had been asked to show the entire train, with information about its makeup, in a future blog post, and this is that post.
      My train was entered in the freight train category, and it won first place, by vote of attendees. Below, I show the certificate awarded, which is only included here because I thought the convention committee had chosen uncommonly attractive certificates, compared to some I have seen.

     Before showing the train, I should mention that I deliberately chose a wide range of models for display, from Athearn “Blue Box” origins, to the latest ready-to-run (RTR) cars, and included a full range of car types (perhaps a little artificially for a single train). I will begin with the locomotive, SP 2763. It has been painted and upgraded, adding a number of detail parts, including cab window shades, crew, and cab curtains made from facial issue, and then lettered, and weathered.

Prototype: 2-8-0 Consolidation, Class C-9, built by Baldwin, March 1905
Model: modified Balboa (built by KTM) brass engine, detailed and weathered
     The first car in the train was a reefer with steel roof but wood-sheathed sides and ends, PFE 73617. Construction of this model was described in an earlier post, at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2011/08/small-modeling-project-pfe-r-30-16.html .

Prototype: PFE Class R-30-16, rebuilt from older cars by PFE, 1940–1942
Model: a Red Caboose body, with parts from the late, great Terry Wegmann
     The second car, another reefer, was a steel car, PFE 48137. Construction of this car was also briefly described in a prior post (see it at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2013/09/a-classic-ho-scale-car-kit-one-more-time.html ).

Prototype: PFE Class R-40-23 refrigerator, built by Pullman, 1947
Model: Athearn kit, decorated by Evergreen Roundhouse, details upgraded
     The third car was a stock car, SP 73557.

Prototype: SP Class S-40-5 stock car, 36 feet, built by Ralston Steel Car Company, 1917
Model: Red Caboose RTR car, factory lettering, Kadee Vulcan trucks
     The last car I will describe in the present post is a tank car, SP 58478, which has the lettering familiar for many years, with the “diamond S” emblem on the dome. I always emphasize that this diamond-S emblem only indicates that the car has been modified to be suitable for liquid sugar service, not that it necessarily is currently assigned to sugar service. But this model does show lettering indicating it is in sugar service at this time. I should mention that upgrading Athearn “Blue Box” kit cars like this into models of SP prototypes has been described in my blog (at this post: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2011/05/modeling-sp-tank-cars.html ).

Prototype: SP Class O-50-12 tank car, modified for liquid sugar service, built by General American, 1928
Model: kitbashed and redetailed Athearn kit, painted, decal lettering
     I will stop at this point to keep this initial post reasonably short, and will continue with more of the train in the next post.
Tony Thompson

The 2015 “Naperville” meeting

The 22nd annual meeting known as Naperville (though held in recent years at a hotel a few hundred yards outside the Naperville town line in adjoining Lisle, Illinois) took place during October 22–25. It was very similar in plan to previous meetings, with an extensive clinic program (four simultaneous talks during most time slots), a fair number of vendors, especially purveyors of photographs, and a large model display room which also hosted two very large layouts.
     There was some significant news announced at the event. This meeting was originated by Martin and Patricia Lofton of Sunshine Models in 1994, and continued to be run by Martin and Tricia in Naperville for 16 years, until 2009. The meeting had been so successful that it became known informally as the “Freight Car National” or sometimes the “RPM National.” Starting in 2010, the organizer and director of this meeting has been Joe D’elia of A-Line, but the change announced this year was a change for future years, to the supervision of Mike Skibbe and his friends at Modutrak. It is to be hoped that this venerable meeting, located conveniently to a very large population of model railroaders, can be continued and even made better in future years.
     As has been the case for several years, the meeting included a “Friends of the Freight Car” dinner. This year’s speaker was Pierre Oliver, who spoke on Friday about the Canadian side of prototype modeling. Here is Pierre, in the red shirt, beginning his talk. In the right foreground is Perry Sugarman.

     As always, there were a number of really outstanding clinics. I will not state all my favorites, but certainly one of the most interesting and dramatic was the one by Aaron Gjermundson on resin casting. Aaron had brought enough equipment to actually make some castings in real time! He had a variety of rubber molds, measured and mixed up some resin before our very eyes, poured it into molds, put the filled molds into a vacuum chamber to remove most air bubbles, and then into a pressure chamber to compress any remaining bubbles. These steps have been covered often in the hobby press, but to see it all done in a matter of minutes was indeed impressive.
     Shown below is Aaron, standing in the olive green shirt, and to the left of him is Joe D’elia, who was trying to help with a computer problem. Standing to the right in the black shirt is Mike Skibbe, also trying to fix the problem. But it didn’t get solved, and Aaron then met the challenge of describing what he was doing, without visual aids.

     I took a lot of photos in the model display room. Many were for my own interests and information, so I will just show a few of them here.One of the most impressive items displayed was this HO scale feed mill from Clark Propst, complete with appropriate freight cars (you can click to enlarge),

     It is always especially interesting to see models in the process of construction, since so much can be gleaned about the work being done. Here is one example, from an extensive display of HO scale tank cars by Steve Hile. It’s on its way to becoming a General American tank car.

This is an Athearn underframe, appropriately shortened (see Richard Hendrickson’s article in Railmodel Journal, August 1996, pages 14 to 21) to accommodate an InterMountain 8000-gallon tank. Underframe modifications are mostly completed in this view, using Tichy brake gear, styrene shapes, and just visible at the ends, the fine Yarmouth Model Works sill steps with a middle rung. (To see these Yarmouth parts, you can go to http://yarmouthmodelworks.com/details.php and scroll down to the steps.)
     Also of interest was a new model of a CB&Q drop-bottom gondola, shown by Ed Rethwisch, as you see here.

     Lastly, I’ll show an overall view of the vendor room, which though somewhat more sparsely populated by sellers than in some years, nevertheless was busy between all clinic times and in the evening. Nearest the camera is the Kadee Products table, with Sam Clarke standing behind the table. Sam brought a number of the new Kadee tank cars, which sold out quite quickly.

     The meeting seemed about typical of recent years (Joe D’elia reported about 250 registrants) and socially it seemed very congenial, with a lot of networking taking place in the hallways, vendor rooms, bar, and lobby. I look forward to learning what changes and improvements Mike Skibbe may be making for future meetings.
Tony Thompson

East Shumala stock pen, Part 3, office

I introduced the topic of my stock pen at East Shumala with some photos as well as information from the prototype, in Part 1 of this series (it is at this link: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/03/a-stock-pen-for-east-shumala.html ). I then showed construction progress of the main pens that came in the AHM kit, and a tankhouse, in Part 2 (it can be found at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/06/the-east-shumala-stock-pen-part-2.html ). But there were a couple of parts of the project yet to be done when Part 2 was posted. The present post describes one of them, the office.
     To me, the missing element was an office structure that would look right. The brick building that was shown in Part 2, left over from another kit, really does not look right for a facility in the Far West. I decided to go ahead and make a suitable frame office from styrene. Looking at the site, and thinking about how much office space might be needed for a facility like this, I settled on an 8- x 18-foot building. Since it is an SP facility, I used shiplap or “novelty” siding, in this case Evergreen no. 4083. First step is to cut out all the sides, which I did by the usual method of scribe-and-snap.
     Next step was to choose the office door and windows. I chose the Grandt Line 30-inch door with a window (Grandt no. 5028), one of the Grandt double-hung windows (no. 5117), and a horizontal sliding window (no. 5081). Once these parts were laid out with pencil on the back of the wall pieces, I then cut out the window openings with  a corner chisel (I showed the use of this tool earlier, at: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/05/building-guadalupe-fruit-part-3.html ). Once the rough openings are cut, a flat Swiss file quickly cleans up the sides, with frequent checks against the fit of the Grandt parts. I really enjoy this part of a project like this, making the door and windows fit right.

     Next came painting. First, the building was assembled with 1/8-inch square styrene strips in each corner. Then I airbrushed the walls with Tru-Color no. 153 (Colonial Yellow), and painted the trim strips, door, and windows with a lightened version of Tru-Color no. 163 (Light Brown), since I think their color out of the bottle is distinctly darker than the SP color drift panel. Last, I airbrushed Tru-Color no. 154 (Moss Green) onto a piece of Pikestuff shingle sheet (part no. 1015) from Rix Products, for material to make the roof. Here are the components at this stage.

     Another feature I wanted to add, to make the building unmistakable, was a roof sign, of the kind visible in a number of SP photos. Here is an example, from an SP photo print marked “Fort Ord”  (California) on the back. The sign is above the right end of the freight car.

The end-door automobile car is UP 161089, Class A-50-14, built in 1937 with the then-standard Roman lettering, and still has its “NEW” weight stencil. The SP Consolidation, no. 2838, is lettered “SOUTHERN PACIFIC LINES” on the tender, which is pre-1946 lettering. My conclusion is that this photo probably dates from 1938. Why? The car is moderately dirty, thus not brand new, but the date is before 1939, when the car would have been reweighed. Anyway, here is a closer view of the sign atop the freight station.

The sign appears to have a dark, probably black frame.
     I used SP’s “Egyptian” font for this sign, as that was pretty standard for signage. I glued the printed sign onto 0.040-inch styrene sheet, framed it with black-painted scale 1 x 8-inch styrene strip, and glued it to the office roof with canopy cement.

The sign looks a little larger than I expected, and I may replace it with something a little smaller. And the office needs a concrete front step. But for now it’s complete.
     Having a better looking office (and one which better fits the space) is a step forward for my stock pen (which SP called a “corral”). The only remaining task is to add a third pen to make the facility a little bigger, as I discussed in the first post in this series (link shown at the top of this post).
Tony Thompson

Operations: non-rail-served customers

Some folks reading the title of this post might think, “Why would we care about customers who are not rail-served?” (meaning, of course, on a model railroad layout). The answer is that they were actually quite important on the prototype. Many railroad lists of customers would show a considerable number with no siding, meaning of course that they had to work through a team track, freight house, or the freight section of a depot. Therefore these customers naturally offer a wonderful variety of possible load destinations and origins. Think of furniture stores, appliance stores, auto dealers, lumber yards, and a myriad of other retail establishments which might receive rail freight by unloading it directly from railcars, and conversely, of course, who might ship products out by the same means.
     This means that some of the open-top car loads you may have, such as lumber, creosoted poles, structural steel, or crates of machinery, can be destined to a team track. And of course almost any load in a box car can be delivered to a freight house or depot. Most railroads referred to the track serving the freight end of the depot as the “house track,” and that would be indicated on the waybill for such a load. Though we don’t usually bother to do so on model waybills, prototype waybills usually gave specific spotting instructions (such as “Building 6, track 2”), or team track, or house track.
     I have had visiting operators on my layout look at a waybill and say, “The bill says McKay Machine Shop, but I don’t see their siding.” I tell them to read the rest of the destination, which says “house track” (sometimes abbreviated by something like “HS TRK”). Here’s an example with an SP box car:

     Here is the car identified in that waybill, at the Ballard depot. (The SP tried to keep its “Overnight” box cars in LCL service but did not always succeed.) One reason to ship to the house track instead of a team track is that there is a platform, which may help in unloading from the railcar, then transferring to a highway truck.

     The same kind of thing happens with team track destinations, and though I emphasized above that open-car loads are quite appropriate, the same is true of house cars, as in this example. Plywood could, of course, readily be unloaded to a flatbed or box truck from the box car.

In a previous post, I showed an open-car load of concrete pipe in a PRR gondola, and its waybill, to illustrate that kind of example (at this link: http://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2015/10/relocating-team-track.html ). Another example might be a delivery of lumber. This commonly took place on flat cars or (for finished lumber) in box cars. But on the SP, it was not uncommon to ship rough lumber in gondolas. This is an example.

Shown below is the waybill for this load of lumber, again with the team track destination identified with an abbreviation, “TM TK.”

     I hope that these examples indicate the kinds of opportunities presented by house track and team track destinations for freight cars on a layout. They certainly are effective in offering variety on mine.
Tony Thompson