Covered Hoppers

Model Railroader Prototype information for the modeler
21

When you mean doors punched out, you mean on the side? Or on the bottom? Either way, very interesting thought… would it look somewhat like an ashpit, witht he conveyer going horizontally, into a building…hmmm… interesting scratchbuilding idea…hmmmm…

Brian

22

Straight doors punched out.

Some fancier elevators had tilters that rotated the car fore and aft and amidships to pour most of the grain out.

23

As noted elswhere, before the days of covered hoppers (and in some instances, long after), many commodities were shipped, in bulk, in boxcars. Loading and/or unloading machinery consisted of guys with big shovels and strong backs. Many food-related products had (and still have) allowable limits for foreign material, such as dirt, sawdust, rodent droppings, or dead insects, so a few labourers in work boots shovelling flour probably had little impact on those limits.

Wayne

24

Or people swimming in a city reservior for drinking water.

25

The first covered hoppers were probably those Open-Top Hoppers with a Roof Added, like what was operated by the CN and CP.

I once saw a photo showing that the AT&SF had Open-Top Hoppers at a grain elevator before 1960.

Andrew

26

Okay… from what I recall of my research… but I haven’t actually done the job…

At peak times all available cars were lined up for grain traffic. In some cases gaps in the cladding had to be wadded out with cloth material/sacking to stop leakage. In other cases whole planks would be replaced… possibly leaving an unpainted plank showing in the side - of a single sheathed car - These plugs could drop out with resulting loss of load and spill at trackside/in yards.

Grain doors came in (at least) two forms. A pre-made door several boards deep with the channel steel ends higher than the fixed boards so that additional boards could be slotted in on top as the load filled up. (Remember this for later). The other arrangement wasn’t really a door but simply planks nailed one above another across the door. I believe that at least one layer of cloth was put between each board (someone probably sat on the board while it was nailed in at both ends to compress this cloth) to effectively “caulk” the “door” and stop leaks. Grain is money don’t forget.

I recall some evidence that some boxcars were built with a steel channel just inside on each side inside the regular doors to allow “grain boards” [as i recall] to be slotted into place. i don’t have a clue how common this was.

I don’t have the data to hand but I’m ceratin that timber/doors were at least 1 1/2" thick if not 2". 30 or 40 tons of grain has a lot of push behind it… it is also a very fluid load… so that the door is like a sluice gate in a dam. This was why only one layer of boards were put across the door - and not two layers overlapped -and why tongued and groved weren’t used… you’d never get them out short of cutting/busting when you would have no control over the outflow.

Remembering that last bit… emptying a car… if you bust out a hole in the bottom of the grain door you will get a spray of grain kicking out several feet from the car with som

27

The pit could contain a conveyor under an open bottomed hopper (to direct the grain onto it - and keep the mechanism clear). It could also contain a slope feeding a bucket conveyor lifting the grain up to storage. OR it could contain an auger… horizontal, angled or vertical! Then again… if you have two unloading points… (one to direct use, one to store…)

They could be building a receiver for drop floor/covered hoppers if the dates fit.

A plant with a constant turnover would tend to have either 2 unloading points or a back-up system…

[}:)]

28

Just re-visited another thread and noticed this…

“If you are interested in modelling a brewery buy special publication no. 5 Milwaukee Road’s beer line, published by Milwaukee Road Historical Association. It has lots of pictures of breweries like Pabst and Schlitz as well as other industries. This line was located just northeast of downtown Milwaukee”

29

Um [:I] sorry to be back again so soon…

Just recalled… one of the mags had an article on a brewery (don’t have a clue which or when)… what I do recall is that they pumped water from the well to huge tanks on the roof… I don’t recall there being anything about filtering the water… it mayhave been to give a constant rate of flow and in case of power-outs affecting the pumps (what happened to the rest of the plant)?

EDIT: …or it may have been for the water to settle to ambient temperature if it had come up from cold depths… yes i know that mines are hot etc but where the water comes out of the Malvern hills after coming underground from somewhere in (I think) the Ukraine - over a few years - it is FREEZING. It’s also very nice [:)]

30

Dave,

Thanks for the great info. This has really piqued my interest for quite a scene and some nice modified cars.

Brian

31

Yet another thought…

How onearth did they get up the sides of the boxcars?

Okay… putting the boards in could be done by a dock/platform or just shove the boards, tub of nails and hammers in and then climb in behind them to put them in… but… when they’d finished nailing the boards across the door and climbed into the gap left for loading…how did they get back down?

Similarly… they wouldn’t take the boards out until the car door was beside the collecting pit… so how did they get up to remove the boards?

At the least one would guess that they must have had a couple of ladders on hand… or maybe some steps of some sort?

Anyone know for sure ?

I recall an article (in Trains I think) called "40’ at a time " about BN using old 40’ cars in the Grain Rush… for non interchange traffic as mentioned before. I’m pretty sure that article was in the 80s… so there may still be people out there who have actually done this job???

Hope you don’t mind yet another set of questions… [8D]

32

Again, Wayne, you’ve built some very nice looking cars - and at a very good price! I’m jealous…

Cheers,

Mark.

33

I originally thought that was the case as well, but I have since found a number of early cars built from the outset as covered hoppers, not converted from open cars. Bettendorf built some two-bay sand hoppers for National Glass in about 1928. These were similar in appearance to the USRA 55-ton cars, but shorter and with steeper slope sheets. The ACL had some phosphate hoppers at about the same time, which had composite wood and metal bodies. There are also the large carbon black hoppers that came into service from 1933 onwards.

Cheers,

Mark.

34

Once again, Mark, thanks for the kind words.

Wayne

35

Harven,

I am no grain expert, but I can tell you I grew up in east Toledo, and we had several fairly large grain elevators in my neighborhood. Several of my friends and I would go “play” on the trains down by the Maumee river in the grain yards just on the other side of the Pennsy main. That was in the late 50s and the 60s. We saw almost all 40’ boxcars with grain doors. Any kind of covered hopper was an exception to be marveled at. Even in the later 60s it was mostly boxcars in those rail yards.

The Andersons elevator did have a flock of what looked like 36’(?) two bay coal hoppers, old USRA cars with metal sides, that they got used from Wabash, I believe, and put canvass covers on them, That was in the early 70s If memory serves me correctly. Tichy has or had a model kit of the car complete with the canvas cover cast of urathane(?) and decals for andersons. They always seemed to be outside their grainery on the Maumees west side opposite the NYC main from N&Ws Piling Yard. Perhaps they used them for storage when necessary. I am not clear on these cars, so do not take anything in this paragraph as gospel.

In any case in the mid 50s and 60s we saw very few, if any covered hoppers around the graineries that were used to transfer grain from rail car, and trucks to Ocean Liners and Lake Boats. I can tell you that used grain doors were great for sliding down hills through the tall grass, but that is another story.

Paul

36

doctorwayne wrote: <“Once again, Mark, thanks for the kind words.”> No worries, Wayne! Thanks for sharing your work with us. Cheers, Mark.

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train18393 wrote: <“The Andersons elevator did have a flock of what looked like 36’(?) two bay coal hoppers, old USRA cars with metal sides, that they got used from Wabash, I believe, and put canvass covers on them, That was in the early 70s If memory serves me correctly. Tichy has or had a model kit of the car complete with the canvas cover cast of urathane(?) and decals for andersons.”> Mate, thanks for posting this! I have a couple of the Tichy kits you mention, but until now knew nothing about their prototypes. Thanks again! Cheers, Mark.

38

Dave -the-Train,back in 1970 I was hired at a grain elevator that handled box cars.To load a box car we would use wooden or cardboard graindoors which we carried into the railyard along with light weight ladders.Sometimes we would skip the ladders,climbing in and out of cars. When unloading a car,a pneumatic ram broke thru the graindoor on one side of the car…The car was then rocked up and down on a bridgelike affair to discharge grain onto a belt.After unloading the unbroken graindoors were removed and stored in a box car.We could unload six 55 ton cars a hour. Joe

39

Thanks joseph 2! Nothing like the knowledge of someone who’s done the job! Were the hydraulic rams fixed on a base or moved about to where they were needed (if so, how please)? Was the unloading done undercover or in the open? What did the rocker table look like? Girders or a checker plate table top…or…?

TIA again!

40

Up till 1975 we unloaded boxcars in a large barn-like structure near the grain silos,a track ran thru it. The Link-Belt Company car unloader could be compared to a child’s teeter toter toy because it pivoted in the middle.The locomotive would leave a car on the middle of the deck and exit.Knuckles would rise from the deck to hold the car in the middle of the unloader.The deck would tip to the side 30 degrees and the fixed ram tore thru the graindoors.Grain would pour out of the car’s door thru grates,unto a conveyor belt.The machine’s operator then rocked the car up and down to spill the grain out.The deck was lowered,knuckles receded into the deck floor,ram moved back,locomotive removed car.Most of the deck is plain steel plate.This machine was built in 1949,but we never scrapped it because it would cost too much to remove.Hopper cars are loaded and unloaded in the building now. Joe