54' TOFC Times Line

Model Railroader Prototype information for the modeler
1

Hello all!

I am looking for info on 54’ TOFC set ups. I have a full restart on my collection, and I don’t just want to collect the same thing I just had a “completed” collection of. Looking to get into something a bit more modern then just doing the same old steam era (never thought I would say that!), and I have found older 54’ flat cars with trailers for vary good prices. So the question is… How late can I run them? Information seems limited on this first wave pigs. I am hopeful early/mid 80’s at max maybe? But even if it caps out mid 70’s that be ok too.
Thank you for the time,

2

Here’s a history/timeline of TTX:

https://www.ttx.com/about/our-history/

The history of TTX is very much like the history of TOFC, except for pre-1955, of course.

Before ABOUT 1958, TOFC was a lot like a bunch of your 54’ flats. Not totally, maybe, but a lot. Once the long 85’ and 89’ trailer flats came along, the amount of the 54’ cars would have dropped dramatically.

Pre-55, there was no TTX, and no long flats (except maybe for PRR). So, I would think from 1955 “back”, running a bunch of railroad owned flats like you are considering would not be unreasonable. But in the ‘70’s, I doubt there’d have been many of the 54’ flats you’re talking about.

There were some railroads who DID run cars of similar length, I think. Southern comes to mind. But they didn’t have the “look” of a converted flatcar, which is what I think you are talking about.

So, if you want you train to be believable for people who know intermodal, I wouldn’t run any of the 54’s in 1970. Or hardly any, anyway.

I might be proven wrong in all or part of the above; but for now, that’s my opinion.

Ed

3

This Athearn add says mid 1960’s to 1980’s for car modeled

http://www.athearn.com/newsletter/022409/22_N_53_TOFC_flat_022409.pdf

Article page 8 Caption page 10 GSC 53’ flat cars used for 45’ trailers in 1980’s.

http://magazine.trainlife.com/rmj_1992_12/

4

Everything Ed said is pretty much spot on.

A few more details:

Before TTX, most TOFC flats were home shop conversions by the railroads - so in those early days there were 3 times as many types of cars as there were railroads running TOFC.

The obvious favorite was to convert 53’-6" flat cars to carry one long van or two 26’ pup vans, which were very common in the trucking business in the early 50’s.

Prior to 1958, nearly all trailers east of the Mississippi were restricted to 35’.

So a number of roads actually built 40’, or, let’s call them less than 50’, TOFC cars, mostly from old 40’ box car frames. The B&O, NH, ERIE and others had lots of 40’ TOFC equipment

Also, starting in 1953, the PRR, Wabash, and a few others (Erie?) invested in 75’ flat cars to carry two 32’/35’ vans.

In 1958 federal law allowed 40’ trailers nation wide - the railroads who had invested all this money in flat cars to carry vans 35’ and less, now faced a this new problem.

BUT, by then TTX was taking over the equipment problem and developing 85’ and 89’ cars.

So many 54’ cars, of all types, lasted well into the 60’s, because they could carry a 40’ van, and it took time to build enough 85’ cars.

By the 70’s, not so much.

BUT, in 1981 45’ trailers became legal nation wide, and once again the railroads had to adapt. During that period there was resurgeance of 54’ cars used to carry singe 45’ vans while new designs were developed to handle two 45’ vans.

Keep this in mind, TOFC has always been in some sort of change and evolution since its earliest days in the 1930’s.

There is lots of info out there, none of it is complete and comprehensive all in one spot.

TTX, and the various railroads, are always finding new ways to solve specific needs for trailers and containers.

Sheldon

5

Thank you all for the input.
Its interesting that Athearn said 60’s to 80’s, but as Sheldon pointed out in 1981 the 45’ trailers are now legal all over, and they popped back up for a short time.
The idea to use the TOFC will be on the club module set up. (bigger corner module I am going to build soon)
Story/history time:
Wenatchee Southern to based be on a regional short line that almost happened when the GN did not supply enough reefers for the harvest during early 1920’s. Now normal people now would think build reefers, and have your own reefers for when you need, or if another need it sent it there. Profit for all seasons! Now old farmers are old farmers, and they did reach a point where a company was incorporated, sale of stocks, and they purchase right of way… before a permit had been issued by the ICC. Needless to say the Great Northern locked that down, and promised the cars for the future. So the permit was never issued, and all those stocks, and land was wasted.
So look up Wenatchee, Wa on google map, and take a look down the west side of the Columbia River to the Tri City’s. The idea is to at least stretch the real world, and make it so that WS made the link to the MILW, NP, or even down to UP.
As said the road was started by farmers, so older used equipment would be h

6

Ed pretty much covered it, with a little help from Sheldon.

My memory suggests that use of the 54’ cars as TOFC was pretty much over by the mid-60s. Taking them to the 80s in TOFC service is a stretch, but I suspect what’s being referred to is that these cars were often converted to other TTX service as dedicated flat cars. That usually involved a repaint/renumbering IIRC, though.

7

Mike, yes, what I failed to explain in detail, TTX kept those 54’ flats for general flat car pool service, they did the same with the 75’ flats. Then, in the early 80’s, some 54’ cars were converted back to TOFC for 45’ vans, until the better solutions could be designed and built.

So, like I said, there is a gap, call it 1968 to 1982, where a 54’ TOFC car would have been pretty rare. And then those 80’s stop gap cars were mostly gone by the end of that decade.

Side note, the early cars would have all had bridge plates and only some would have had retractable hitches. But the 80’s cars would have all had hitches and no bridge plates. No more circus loading by that time…

Sheldon

8

Speaking of flat cars, and what disappeared when:

Someone (not on THIS topic) was wondering how many 89’ TOFC flats are running today. I don’t have current info, but the July 2015 Official Register says 111 TTEX cars and 222 RTTX cars. I can’t think of any other reporting marks.

That adds up to 444 “platforms” in 2015. NOT many.

Ed

9

If we’re talking about a small bridge line from Wenatchee to Pasco, it would seem that the only freight on that line would be farm related. I can see maybe grain cars. Or reefers. I don’t see TOFC for that railroad. They don’t originate or terminate any TOFC. So their cars would “always” be off-line. Which seems kind of weird.

But, as noted, it’s a BRIDGE line. So I can see maybe a once a day small batch of other railroad’s TOFC cars coming through. The question MIGHT arise, would the big railroads WANT to send their traffic across this bridge route, instead of keeping it on their own lines? I believe the answer is no. Unless there is some significant advantage. Most likely shorter transit time.

I only make these comments because of the fairly strict description offered by the OP.

Ed

10

I got the idea to make an originating point for TOFC from The Port of Quincy. A quickly built intermodal terminal in a small town type setting. Quincy, Wa I can’t recommend going there it at all, but it had enough potatoes and onions to do about two full 5 packs a week and then some on better weeks. Cold Train the outfit that was using the “Port” closed when unit oil trains hit big, and BNSF’s on time delivery dropped off. But it did give me the idea to do a TOFC with refrigerated trailers going out. With the base of the WS being started from the GN failing farmers in the valley, I thought it be a good ol single finger farmer salute to the goat by moving the product to the MILW, and UP. If that seems like a good enough reason… right? But it looks like the flats are still too short for 70’s 80’s for what I am wanting no matter how I’d like to strech it. Now I guess I can run mid 60’s and feel good about it, but when building the loading area Ill just have to keep it long enough for 89’ cars to cover the base of later running. Dose that seems far?

11

The Official Railway Equipment Register, Vol. 103, No.3 issued January 20, 1988 lists 130 52’6" piggyback flats in TTX number groups 475002-475086 (27 cars) and 475087-475286 (103 cars). I photographed 475033 in a westbound SP pig train in June 1985 still painted oxide red instead of yellow. As stated in earlier posts, the advent of the 45 foot trailer extended the service lives of these cars. Cars to handle longer trailers up to 48 feet caused a number of railroads to cut down 50’6" inside length boxcars to convert into piggyback cars. Southern, MKT, and CNW come to mind. Santa Fe converted a bunch of former “Shock Control” underframed wallboard flats to piggyback service by removing the bulkheads and part of the flooring.

12

These cars had a relatively long life for specialized equipment during a period of rapid technological evolution. They also happened to be of a design that was relatively versatile compared to an 89’ flat, for example.

There is a need to be cautious about the number of these that remained active. Some 30 plus years after they were new, the cars listed in those series were officially available, but also largely underused by the later 1960s. Until the 45’ trailers came along, there was relatively little use for these cars for a number of years. Many were likely parked and would have required servicing and other effrts to get them ready for service, even if they weren’t whitelined (which does take them out of the Register.)

Fleet managers tend to put money and effort into their newer, more efficient equipment. They tend to park equipment that isn’t frontline and in current standard configuration. Undoubtedly, when demand caused by 45’ service perked up, cars were put back in service. But even that was likely selective. If a car needed major work like replacing flattened wheels or smthing similar, the fact it was nearing the end of its service life (40 years or thereabout), the uncertainties of demand for containerization, and the looming expansion of trailers to 48’ and the need for new equipment to serve that traffic all likely tended to conspire to keep actual numbers in use limited as they neared the end of ther lives. It’s possible there could have been 150 of these cars running around in TOFC service in 1988, but perhaps more likely there were only 30 or so.

13

While we are discussing 50 something foot piggyback cars, and the mid-to late 1980s, lets not forget the Trailer Train four wheel Four Runners. There were over 2000 of them under TTUX, later TTOX reporting marks. By the 1990s they were quietly retired due to instability issues, especially when running empty. Walthers offers them in HO and one of them with a loaded flatbed trailer would be an great attention getter…

14

Yeah, reminded me of being back in Germany whenever I saw one of those. But they were ~10 times as common as any of the 54’ refurbs and much more likely to be putting on lots of miles as relatively new equipment to sustain a commitment of maintenance resources. The galloping thing certainly did them in. I vaguely recall having a Front Range(?( model of them way back then, IIRC.

Yet still relatively rare in the big scheme of things in that time period. Modeling cars like these is usually sufficiently covered in ones and twos, as seeing even one with a trailer load in a string of 89’ flats then would have been a notable observation in itself.

15

Yeah, I bought some of Walthers Front Runner spine cars but have sold a couple off while I am back dating. I never ran mine but have heard they don’t run too well. Some folks say the hard to build Front Range versions actually operate better once built and modified. I haven’t heard if the newer RTR Walthers Front Runners which come with a trailer have been improved and run better or not? Anyone know?

As for the OP, in his original post he said:

So getting back to the OP’s question. What older 54’ flat cars are you refering to? Brand? etc.

I saw Athearn is offering short flat cars with 2 short trailers - those follow pre-1960’s practices for the most part. The last announcment I saw from Athearn listed fantasy paint schems on the short trailers which didn’t exist in real life (e.g. CNW Falcon, Conrail, and other late 1970’s and 1980’s paint schemes which were actually used on 40 and 45 foot long trailers.

As others have mentioend, there were some 50 - 54’ flat cars used when the 45’ trailers became the norm. The Southern built their flat cars out of old box car frames. ATSF had some as

16

Yes. During my four trips to Germany, I couldn’t help but notice how common 2 axle freight cars were (late 1989 - 1997 period). The trains there looked rather puny and primitive compared to “big time” American railroading. Maybe thats why the KM’s didn’t work out too well back in the 1960’s. [:p]

I think the refurbs and home built short TOFC flat cars dominated at first, but by mid 1980’s the Front Runners started coming online in numbers.

Funny, I’ve seen some relatively recent traffic and/or articles about modifying the FR Front Runners into better operating cars (better than the Walthers RTR IIRC, but don’t remember the details.) Those old FR Front Runner kits still show up on Ebay I’ve noticed in recent years.

Yes, they usually stood out in a string of 89’ TOFC cars. As did the Impack multi unit sets that were operated by Trailer Train, BN and SSW etc.

17

I was looking at Con-cor TOFC kits. For $10-18 a flat car after shipping, and the trailer. It seemed hard to pass up for both with most trailers by them self are around $12-13 a pop. A cheap way to get trailers for repainting because I was thinking about doing them up in local packing sheds, or orchard businesses.

As I said in one of the post its a rebuilding time, so price is a thing… but if its just going to be wrong for what I am wanting, I’ll just save up for the longer cars. I am mostly running Alco stuff with most of my fleet being C420s, but that kind of goes against the idea of the old hand me down farmer mind set. With the Century line being made 63-68. Thats why I wanted to push for 80’s. Although I guess I could toss it to a boom in money in the 60’s and thats how I got the new power…? Maybe kind of?

18

[quote user=“riogrande5761”]

NHTX

While we are discussing 50 something foot piggyback cars, and the mid-to late 1980s, lets not forget the Trailer Train four wheel Four Runners. There were over 2000 of them under TTUX, later TTOX reporting marks. By the 1990s they were quietly retired due to instability issues, especially when running empty. Walthers offers them in HO and one of them with a loaded flatbed trailer would be an great attention getter…

Yeah, I bought some of Walthers Front Runner spine cars but have sold a couple off while I am back dating. I never ran mine but have heard they don’t run too well. Some folks say the hard to build Front Range versions actually operate better once built and modified. I haven’t heard if the newer RTR Walthers Front Runners which come with a trailer have been improved and run better or not? Anyone know?

As for the OP, in his original post he said:

have found older 54’ flat cars with trailers for vary good prices. So the question is… How late can I run them?

So getting back to the OP’s question. What older 54’ flat cars are you refering to? Brand? etc.

I saw Athearn is offering short flat cars with 2 short trailers - those follow pre-1960’s practices for the most part. The last announcment I saw from Athearn listed fantasy paint schems on the short trailer

19

In my post above I failed to mention the recently offered flat cars from Walthers. A RTR version of their original GSC 54’ flat car kit from the 1980’s, versions include early TOFC schemes with trailer jacks as well as later schemes with trailer hitches.

It has long been questioned as to if any GSC cast steel flat cars ever appeared in TOFC service, but again the model gives an effective representation of the wide variety of 50’ flats used in TOFC service.

More later when I have time to go thru my extensive data on piggybacks, a personal modeling passion since I was a child (when I was 6, my father worked for the piggyback operation of the Southern).

My era of choice is early piggyback, my layout is set in 1954. While I like my equipment to be reasonably correct for the era, I do use some “license” as to where in the country some stuff may have traveled…

My fleet includes over 100 pieces of TOFC equipment, with still more to be built.

Sheldon

20

Here are some examples of the later use of single trailer 50’ platforms for TOFC from the Piggyback Color Guides mentioned earlier.

Unfortunately I do not have any pratical way to post pictures of these cars.

ATSF, two photos, slighly different classes, converted from bulkhead flats in 1983, car numbers 293236-293334 and 293336-293433. Cars have straight sides, cushion underframes, side brake wheels, no bridge plates, hitch, inner rear wheel guides similar to the ConCor model.

ATSF, Ft-108, home built spline cars, converted 1984 thru 1986 from box cars, 299601-299683.

ATSF, Ft-105, also home built spline cars converted 1984 from box cars, 299029, quantity unknown.

CN 684012, photo taken 1977, 54’ flat with hitch and 40’ van.

CN684512 and CN685584, both 54’ cars built in the early 60’s for twin 26’ van TOFC, still use as of 1983 and 1986 for single trailer service respectively when photographed.

EL 7028, 1941 flat car, one of 12 converted to TOFC in the 60’s, still in service with a single 40’ van and trailer hitch 1973.

MP99390, still in service 1970, one of 95 cars built in 1938, and converted to TOFC in the early 60’s. These cars were an unusual 45’ long…

So, to repeat, be they older flats rebuilt again, or conversions from outdated 50’ box car frames, single trailer 50’ (+/-) seem to be reasonably popular in the 1980’s to handle 45’ vans.

And apparently a few struggled thru the 70’s…

And, it appears that that many railroads did not wait for TTX to solve the 45’ trailer problem, but rather invested in their own conversions and rehabs. So the TTX roster listings may not have much relevance on the number of such cars in service.

While I have a good background in TOFC in general, my main interest is earlier TOFC, so some of this is new info for me as well.

Possibly more latter,

Sheldon