I’m planning a layout now and also picking which cars I need to realistically flesh it out. Because I’m an engineer, I feel an overriding need to do it methodically [:)]. What I’ve done is make a grid with industries down one side and car types across the top. For each industry I’ve listed the number of spots available then rather arbitrarily decided to have three cars available for every spot. I then divvy that number across the various car types based on what sorts of traffic I’d expect the industry to see. For example, my freight station has five spots which cover an open platform, the station itself, and an end ramp. Three cars per spot gives me 15 cars. I figured that there will be one gondola bringing in something like steel beams, machinery, or even coal, four flats for machinery, vehicles, and equipment, three reffers or insulated boxcars for produce, and the remainder (seven cars) will be boxcars for general freight.
On top of that I sort of also arbitrarily figured that 60% of the rolling stock should be from the home road (the PRR) and the rest foreign cars.
Does anybody else have any methods they use, besides “I buy what looks neat”?
For myself I find that after I choose which Railroad I am modeling [such as sante fe or sandy river etc.] I then look mainly at how practical it is to fill up on what they have for the area I am modeling. For instance, if it is a big Railway like CN or UP then am I modeling the plains, mountains or city etc. So I concentrate on that first. After fleshing that out I look at any possibilities for interchange. For example maybe one or two industries receive from two or more Railways giving me the oportunity to add one engine and spot say one to ten car someplace. For the most part [you being an engineer and all] look at it logically. You wouldn’t add 50 cars from ‘outside’ if your mainline has only 10 cars. Pick one industry or one track in your yard and use that as a starting point for now. Stephen
I’m at the stage where I’m just kind of buying what looks neat. However, I am modeling a generally western mid-late 20th century theme, so I try to pick rolling stock accordingly. I try to go only with roadnames that would be common in the west. So far, I don’t have any two identical cars because I like having a good variety. At some point I’ll probably start getting multiple copies of the same car, though.
I simply selected cars to replicate traffic patterns in Northeastern Pennsylvania.
As such, I have a large number of coal hoppers, boxcars (which I seem to be addicted to), and cement hoppers, with a smaller number of gondolas, flatcars and covered hoppers, plus a few tank cars.
The roads are predominately Northeastern and Canadian roads, with Delaware & Hudson, Reading and Canadian Pacific dominating.
I started with my prototype’s roster and methodically bought 1 car for each 700 listed in the year I’m modeling (eg, the prototype listed 3500 cars of one series, so I have seven.) All of the standard classes are appropriately represented, but oddballs and one-of-a-kind cars (mostly) aren’t.
Then I added a few extra gondolas and flat cars, since I felt those classes were under-represented on a line that would be loading a lot of logs and semi-finished lumber.
Most of the through freights on my layout run from staging at one end to staging at the other, changing engines but not switching. Locals originate or terminate ‘on stage,’ and account for at least 80% of the visible switching activity. There is also a lot of passenger traffic, much of it MU trains without locomotives.
Anything that doesn’t fit that scheme gets earmarked for my freelance coal hauler. That is the only source of non-home-road cars, since my prototype (JNR) was a government-owned national system, a near-monopoly and pretty much the only game in town.
Sicne your modeling the PRR this should give you ample selection of cars and things. Baisicly you just haft to figure out what your layout consumes (these freight cars witht he comspumtion products will come from the staging and or other industries) and what it exports (this wil go to industries that comsume it or go into staging and out to the rest of the world. If you have a staging area this will give you ample amount of possiblities for frieght. It also helps to kno what your roadname does buisness with such as what other rail cars and railroad companys they mostly deal with thats how you deside the percentage of each roadname you have. obiously as you mentioned your want the main railroad to have atleast 60% of there own cars.
Kurt, you seem to have the one of the most thought out and methodical methods I have seen. My collection is random at best. Heck, when I got my first US prototype loco it was a Burlington Route diesel because I liked the colors! I then proceeded to buy some freight cars that sounded like they came from the North East (Burlington is in Vermont, right? [D)]) I was just caught up in the euphoria of the hobby. About 6 months in, I started to actually read about what I was doing and am now a member of the Burlington Route historical society. I have set a cut of date, have a good idea of the interchanges for the area I am modelling and have access to a lot of roster information. I am certainly not a slave to it by any means, but at least I no longer buy Burlington Northern green to run on the layout.
I’m modelling a mythical West Texas oil town in the mid fifties served exclusively by Santa Fe. To find out what cars were common I looked at books. There are several editions on Santa Fe, and at least five on Santa Fe in the mid fifties. You should be able to find tons of books on a huge RR like PRR.
In my case, I concentrated on the West Texas oil industry – LOTS of tank cars. Unlike box cars, tank cars in the fifties were NOT owned by the railroads, but by the various oil distribution companies, so I was able to get a fair variety.
I also got a a few flat cars for loads of pipe and drilling equipment. And I have a few gondola cars for scrap metal for the town’s Pipe Works to manufacture the pipe. Finally, I have a few box cars for general supplies and equipment. The box cars are mostly ATSF, with a few other Western RR’s like UP and Rio Grande. I even added a couple of ‘foreign’ RR’s like PRR.
Bottom line: stay industry and region specific and consult books and websites often
Most of my railroad’s industries are fruit and vegetable related, so reefers are important. Pacific Fruit Express used pool cars owned by many railroads, and Western Pacific PFE cars were almost unknown on their own lines (they were outnumbered by SP, UP and other railroad’s PFE cars) so my PFE cars tend to be SP and UP. I have a couple of industry-specific reefers (I modeled a Libby McNeill Libby cannery, so a couple of Libby cars) and a few assorted boxcars. SN was a bridge line, mostly handling interchange traffic, so anything goes when it comes to roadnames: a definite bias towards WP, and a few SN-labeled cars, but if prototype photos are any indication just about anything could be following one of SN’s electric or diesel freight lokeys around town. I have a few other sorts of cars (a couple of gons, one brand spanking new covered hopper–they were just being introduced in the period I model–and some tank cars) to add to the mix, but boxcars and refrigerator cars (carrying canned goods and the fresh vegetables to be turned into canned goods) makes up the bulk of my traffic. The occasional gon (for loads of tin to be turned into cans, or to take out scrap) livens up the mix.
I’m modeling an actual location, the decision was already made for me. 80% of my fleet is refrigerator cars for my sixteen packing sheds, 15% special service and general use box cars for cement and alfafa/grain loading and the remainder includes such oddities as wine tankcars and the usual flats/gondolas, but no open top hoppers, they were uncommon during my time period …
It becomes easier if you identify a general location and period, are you a large, medium, or small line, fast paced mainline or slow troding branch, what other lines do you interchange with? Are you attracted to a particular type of traffic, ie: coal/other minerals , lumber, citrus,etc…
Do you wish industries to consume what your railroad carries…ie: lumber to the cabinet factory/ citrus to the packing sheds and so forth.
Don’t let the above consume you to the point of fustration, this a not a one size fits all hobby, so yes, if you so choose you could have one of everything by all means and no one will shoot you for it, but if prototype is your goal doing some homework will pay handsome dividends.
Paying attention to the home road versus foreign road (and foreign roads with direct or nearby interchange versus those without) is important.
I have learned to pay more attention to era. For example the “built” date does not necessarily tell you what era the car is painted for. PRR freight cars are a perfect example of cars that went through several paint schemes in their service life and a 1920 scheme would rarely if ever still be seen in the 1960s on that same car. Heralds change too.
I find my pre 1970 layout would have too many cars with the black information boxes in the lower right hand corner that I think were first seen around 1972.
Also it is not enough to know what percentages of what kind of cars your prototype owned – for example the C&NW owned a fair number of stock cars but they were rarely seen in the 1960s on the line from Chicago to Milwaukee which I model. Even the ones i do remember seeing were not necessarily in animal transport. So knowing that maybe 5% of CNW cars were stock cars does not mean 5% of the cars in my trains should be stock cars.
Another thing to learn about is the consist of a particular train. A unit train is an obvious example but it goes beyond that . Again to give an example from the C&NW in the 1960s, one of the afternoon freights was almost entirely newsprint paper cars from Canada. While it was mixed freight I believe those cars were blocked first and dominated. Sometimes the only way to learn about this is to find a retired railroader and ask questions. Getting this kind of stuff right can be fun in and of itself.
Dave Nelson.
You did exactly as I did in setting up your roster.
I figured at a minimum of 3 cars for each industry spot on my layout One coming, One going and one spotted at the industry.
This is the minimum. I am modeling Conrail in the 75 to 85 time period and this allows me to have the PC and PRR cars on the layout as well as all of the consolidation railroads that made up Conrail. I also look at what the industry does and add a number of southern & western road cars to the all north eastern mix I have.
Now I know someone could come in and say that this car or that car would never have run on this line but I like what I have and try to be reasonably accurate to the time frame. It seems that I am slowly moving forward in time as more new cars come out.
I have over 850 cars so far and I figure that I will need about another 75 or so because during our bi-weekly OPs I have seen all of the years empty as all of the cars have been spotted into the industries on line or are in the staging tracks. I need to have enough cars so the trains have to keep moving to keep the yards from filling up.
I am modeling several railroads that I grew up around in Northwest Indiana. I want to replicate some of the traffic I saw back in the late 60s and early 70s. So, I bought (and am still buying) a ot of cars from my home raods, a lot of both eastern and western railroads. I will have a couple of unit C&O coal trains, a couple of unit Erie Lackawanna piggyback trains, a lot of auto racks and auto-parts box cars for Grand Trunk Western. Aside from that, I determined what other cars I need to make believable “manifests” from that era. I built a spreadsheet that I have indicated how many cars of each type and which railroad is to “appear” at each 2 hour session. With the use of the spreadsheet, I assigned percentages to each car as to which direstion, which railroad and which destination each car will travel. A computer generates random number tells me how to calssify the car and where it goes. It sounds complicated, but it is not. Once you work out how you want your train to “look”, then just figure out the odds of each car appearing.
An example of this: I like HiCubes, so I have over 40 of them…far too many. So, each one stays in staging for 15 to38 sessions. I will give my GTW and DT&I cars fewer sessions in the staging area than a Western Pacific or KATY car, only because I remember seeing them more often. Also, I give these cars a higher percentage on the spreadsheet to be on a GTW train than Monon for instance.
I find that my trains are realistic using this system. In conclusion, you can get litterally hundreds of cars, and make an infinite number of uniquely different trains from them.
Give it a try.