Are your freight cars associated with industries on your layout

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
21

Thinking back, my rolling stock generally came first. From my old teenage layout, I still had hoppers, tankers and gons, but very few industries. I remember thinking that I needed more industries, without thinking about much except how I would for them on my layout, which was already filling up.

The tannery changed that, a bit. The instruction sheet from Walthers had a brief description, including what raw materials it required. I repurposed a couple of Tichy undecorated boxcars for hide service, and added a chemical tanker for acid and a covered hopper for salt. I found a closeout on stock cars for my slaughterhouse. The car float terminal needed a few flat cars as idlers, but they don’t really haul freight.

I also realized that I didn’t have any boxcars for my home road, the Milwaukee. I’ve accumulated a number of them from Accurail, which keeps bringing out new road numbers.

22

I think I misunderstood the original question. Yes I have cars that only are shipped to or from specific industries. I have a paper mill that receives a trio of chemical slurry tank cars on a regular basis. These cars only serve the paper mill and are then shipped empty back to staging. I have a lumber yard that receives most of its product in boxcars but they are boxcars from railroads serving northeast woods as well as a sawmill that is on a connecting short line. Most of my industries send and receive boxcars but some are more likely to receive product from specific areas. Empty foreign road boxcars will sometimes be spotted for a load going back to their home road.

23

My railroad was not a major bridge route, so most of the traffic is to/from on-railroad industries.

However, I’m only modeling part of it, so some of those industries are off-layout, and the cars will come up from staging to the modelled interchange point. There is also SOME small amount of bridge that runs end-to-end using the ACR to connect two other railroads.

But certain types of cars like TOFC/intermodal, autoracks, stock cars, grain hoppers, will not use my line due to simple geography and none of those types of industries on my railway.

My railway’s industrial base consists of:

Steel Mill - off the modeled part of the railway, but the biggest customer. Traffic is well represented by steel loads from staging to the on-layout interchanges with CN and CP. Some interesting research on the steel industry also adds in the occasional load of various chemicals related to the steel making process (flatcars, gondolas, tanks)

Mine/Ore Processing Plant - biggest modeled industry on the layout. Processed iron ore is shipped south to the railway-served steel mill (off-layout/staging). Also limestone and coke is brought in to the ore plant via a harbour a few miles away on the same branch. (open hoppers)

Sawmill - one significant on-layout modeled sawmill produces lumber and woodchips. A few other off-layout lumber, veneer, and plywood mills provided additional lumber bridge traffic (boxcars, flatcars, woodchip gondolas)

Logging - saw logs and pulpwood are cut and loaded in several locations. Some to the on-layout sawmill, some to an off-layout paper mill (flatcars, gondolas)

Fuel Dealer(s) - several small fuel dealers receive tanks of gasoline/diesel fuel or propane (tank cars)

Copper mining/smelter - (off-layout bridge traffic) mining/smelting activity on a connecting road provides boxcars of refined metal products and tanks of sulphuric acid to bridge traffic (boxcars, tanks)

Paper mill(s) - a major mill is served by my railway,

24

I have several “universal” industries. Freight houses and team tracks can accept a wide variety of cars. I have one dummy interchange track that can send or receive just about any type of car. I use the interchange track as a fiddle yard to swap equipment between sessions.

25

Yes! I have the following industries and cars:

cement factory: box car, small closed hopper

lumberyard: bulkhead hopper, box car

coal mine: open hopper

grain elevator: long closed hopper, box car, tank car (for AA and LPG)

oil dealer: tank car, box car

warehouse: box car, gondola, flatcar

Forgive the duplicate response, but the popularity of certain cars varies greatly. Many factors drive this including, era, timeframe, industry, freight line, etc.

I also have interchanges and a yard. This enables me to have some cars “passing through.” The variety is quite realistic.