I am planning a loads in - empties out arrangement with a southern Ilinois coal mine on one side of the backdrop and a small St. Louis, Mo power plant on the other. Time frame is about 1960, train length will be 10 - 12 hoppers with 2 GPs or F units for road power. Upon arrival at either location, I plan to have the road power run around the train and push the arriving cars in. then pick up the outbound train.
How would the prototypes manage the caboose in this type of situation? Would a short train get pushed wih the caboose still in place, or did safety or work rules prohibit this? If allowed at all, would it make a difference (weight) with full loads vs empties? I can probably work in a caboose set out track if needed, and I’d like to have operations as prototypically correct as possible.
If the caboose has a steel frame under it, pushing a loaded train is not an issue. You did not indicate if you have two tracks or one at the mine/power plant. If two, shove the entire train into the inbound track with the caboose. Then pull the other track and pick up the caboose. The prototype always tries to do these things as simple as possible!
Jim, Thanks for the reply. Pushing the train in with the caboose in place would certainly be the easiest apporach. I will have 2 tracks through the backdrop servicing the mine and the power plant, with a thrid stub track at the mine. I am kitbashing the Walthers New River Mine to fit, but have not selected a power plant yet.
On a related note, I want to use coal hoppers (or is it gondolas?) that are appropriate for the midwest in 1960. I have a variety of MP, UP and Frisco coal hoppers I picked up in various places, but don’t know rolling stock well enough yet to ID if they are 55, 70 or 100 ton. Length varies from 34’ to 40’, some with two discharge chutes and some with 3 (1 with 4).
I’d appreciate advice on appropriate coal hopper size for 1960, and how to ID the mix of cars I have today.
Those 2 bay hoppers usually carry 50-55 tons of coal. The larger 3 or 4 bay cars usually carried 70-75 tons of coal. More modern cars in the 1960 may be in the 90 ton capacity range. The Athearn offset ‘quad’ hopper is a nice 70-75 ton capacity car.
As the conductor was in charge, and the caboose was his “home away from home,” I’d think the caboose would be set aside prior to moving the hoppers to/from the coal tipple. Would you want your home close to all that coal dust? Trainmen didn’t want their “ride” to be bashed back and forth during switching operations. Come to think of it, I’ve never seen a photo of a switching move at an industry that included the caboose in the cut of cars going to/from the immediate idustrial track. Steel caboose frames have little to do with this.
Guys,Fantasy sure lives in the model railroading world…[swg]
However my real life experience taught me 90% of the time there is no run around at a loadout…We simply reverse move up the mine branch just like NS and CSX still does at some older mines.
We would simply drop the caboose on a lead and switchout the loadout or in some rare cases where the mine had their own switcher we would simply shove the empties into the empty track and pickup the loads on the" load" track…The caboose would be safety sitting on a loadout lead and placed at the rear of the train after we finish switchout the cars and making the require train inspection-all air hose connected,brakewheels release etc…
To answer your question we would simply push against the caboose since there is nothing gain by switching it out of the way.
The thing to remember there’s nothing gain in making extra work and unnecessary moves.
The sides of the cars will have data that will tell you the weight of the car. It was required by regulation.
By 1960 the majority of cabooses were steel. If it were advantageous for a railroad to use a steel caboose rather than a wood one, they would assign the steel one to the job. Note that the key thing about pushing (normally only a factor when a helper is pushing behind the train) is to have a steel underframe on the caboose…doesn’t matter so much if the body of the caboose is wood or steel.
Remember too that the caboose would stay with the train it came up with normally. The train bringing empties to the mine would leave with a train of loaded cars, and the same engines and caboose it used bringing the empties to the mine.
As for worries about gettin’ the cabin dirty…have you ever ridden in a caboose (or pusher, like me) on the rear of 90+ loaded coal at 40+ mph on a HOT, dry day? (or even watched one go by ?) Lots of times I couldn’t see the far end of the car in front of me for the blowing coal dust! HOOO - Haaaa !!! Bob C.