Old car…full of old cars…
Maybe one for Carl’s “weird stuff I saw today” collection.
I’m surprised to see it has roller bearings; I expected to see a set of old journal boxes!
…Boy, that’s something different. I wonder about the frame strength of a boxcar with the top cut off it…Believe we have read on here recently the box car would not make as strong a “bridge” as a flat car, etc…
I didn’t know Santa Fe once owned cars like this one pictured. Is it a former wood chip car now being used for scrap metal loads by its current owner?
Boxcar frames are plenty strong, but it does depend on what kind of boxcar. This isn’t a box anyways, it’s a gondola.
Does the FRA even allow them on main lines anymore?
I don’t think so.
The railcar isn’t in much better shape than the automobiles[:P]
Weren’t they regulated out of existance some time back (1970’s?). When was the last time you heard of a train being delayed while someone had to wait for a hotbox too cool down so they could repack the journal box?
I think friction bearings were still around as recently as the early 1990s, but with severe restrictions on their use. I’m sure someone can come up with precise dates for their demise.
In the early 1970s I had a little firsthand experience with a hotbox (or, more correctly, a “warmbox”–no flames yet!) we just moved it slowly and set it out in Bain, IIRC. Or maybe Upton.
Very true.
Actually the railcar looks to be in good shape except for a bit of rust and needing a new paint job.
By the way, Ed, I’m not sure I ever saw a Santa Fe gon like this before. Folks are right–it was probably a woodchip car at one time, purpose-built as a gondola, and would have had a stronger center sill than a box car.
(Santa Fe? Woodchips? Something else? Anybody? Buehler?)
Looks like a old woodchip car to me too, Carl.
Note the painted on centering line, and the small arrow on the sill, makes me wonder why they need to center the car, and what does the arrow point towards?
I’m surprised to see that the tires are still on the junk cars. I used to work in a salvage yard and things like tires were always removed prior to selling the car for scrap iron.
Yeah, most of the car crushers here pull the rubber and drop the gas tank…
Coal maybe?
There’s some instructions behind the white line (and the rust). The only word I can make out is “only.”
Btw- which business uses the reporting marks SMIX?
SMIX= Structural Metals Inc., Seguin TX now owned by Commercial Metals Co. It’s primarily a rebar mill
All the Steel is going over to China?