I have came across a few frieght cars and have been trying to find info on them for a few weeks and havent found nothing. I would like to know there history and what they hauled.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2608357 Glasshopper?
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2608602 Caboose
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2426929 Engine
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2563545 Passenger car
All info will help Thanks
Hard to say what that covered hopper hauled as I can’t see the hoppers to tell what kind they are. It could haul grain, corn, various types of seeds, clay, sugar, or anything else that needs to stay dry.
The cab carried the rear brakeman and flagman. The other car carried the mail. That’s all I got, I dont know any specific history on any of this equipment.
I’ll take a run at this: Tend to agree with Georgia Railroads on what a car like the GlassHopper would load.
The ACF “Glass Hopper” appears to be constructed inpart with a fiberglass component[ notice the rivit lines on the cars side]
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=490651
As to the Caboose: It would appear to be cut down from a steel boxcar [check out the pressed steel roof panels] seems to have entered a second life as an office in a MOW Yard or as a storeroom in same.
The GEEP; Paint indicates a locomotive from the IORY which is a RailAmerica property and operated som 550plus miles from the Cincinnati area into SE Michigan with lines into Eastern Indiana. The photo is taken at a Locomotive rebuilder and salvage company in Mount Vernon IL (NREX)
The Passenger Car: Is a Baggage Car, judging from the paint it is/was part of the ICRR’s Business Car Fleet, Probably photographed at the rail yard in Centrailia, IL. Ending its useful career as some kind of materials storage car(?)
My best guesses! Hope it helps.
The third car is a combination baggage-mail (RPO or Railway Post Office) car, and the baggage compartment, the right half of the car, could also have been used for bulk storage mail transport. Also for passnger’s baggage and possibliy (but rarely) loaned to Railway Express. It is a heavyweight, pre-WWII car, probably originally Illinois Central and then, as painted, Illinois Central Gulf.Would have been on the “head end”, directly behind the power with similar cars, on any of the railroad’s passenger trains, except the City of New Orleans and the Panama Limited after the latter received lightweight and modernized heavyweight “streamlined” equipment.
For more info on the Glasshopper, see this article (costs $31.50 to buy):
The design, fabrication and testing of the Glasshopper prototype covered hopper rail cars
D.C. Ruhmann a
aGlasshopper Program, ACF Industries, St. Charles, Missouri 63301, USA
Composite Structures
Volume 27, Issues 1-2, 1994, Pages 207-213
Special Issue Advances in Fiber Reinforced Composites Technology
Abstract at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0263822394900817
That’s darned unusual - thanks for sharing and asking !
Caboose - looks very short to me. Notice that is has no reporting marks, either (unless they’re under the banner/ sign ?), so it would have been hard to keep track of out on the road. Also none of the usual stencil info on the brakes, etc. But it does have the curved grab irons at each end, as well as the covered end platforms,
Without spending $31.50, I couldn’t go into the intended use of the Glasshopper (this car was a prototype, one of only two built, one each in 1981 and 1983). Notice the reporting marks–RNDX, a play on “R&D”, used by ACF Industries for such prototypes. Again, the report would probably detail the roles that Cargill and SP had in the car’s design and construction. Cargill and SP didn’t have that much of a customer-carrier relationship that I remember, so I’m assuming that Cargill was probably responsible for manufacturing the resins used in construction, and that SP would have used a fleet of these cars in ways similar to how it used most of its own Center Flows, primarily for rice and barley.
The caboose, photographed in Madison, Illinois, probably belonged to either the Alton & Southern or TRRA. It was no longer roadworthy (notice the missing end steps on the left end). I’m pretty sure that it was being used as a stationary (in spite of the trucks) office or shed by this time. As for being rebuilt from a box car, I’d say that it’s remotely possible, but not likely. I know of one railroad’s (FEC) cabooses that had been rebuilt from box cars, and they retained their original height–this car is nowhere near as tall as any steel box car, nor as long. I suspect that it was purpose-built for yard or transfer service, and once had a thriving career in the St.Louis area.
IORY 54 is an ex B&O GP-7 (an old one, Started life in 1953 as #726) never modified or upgraded by CSX. When INOH got it, it replaced BEEP #52 (ex ACL) which was a much more interesting mongrel. It spent plenty of time in between Cleves, OH and Brookville, IN…;later going to Monroe, OH and then to Central Soya at Jeffersonville, OH (I thought it was still there…the agridummies must have hurt it somehow or let it freeze up - It was a very basic simple unit that spent a lot of time around Cincinnati)
I would agree with Carl, in that it is definitely a transfer caboose and probably TRRA. I haven’t seen an Alton & Southern caboose for years but they used cabooses that were shed-on-flat-car design.
Manufacturers Railway (late lamented) had these same type of cabooses, but painted green. Haven’t seen them in a while either.
Thanks for the Information I Also ran A cross this crane and was wonder who owned it ?
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2631393
Patience, young glasshopper. I’m sure someone read that article and will speak up.
sorry.
Just, sorry.
[(-D] [:o)] [tup]
Looks like
L / I Industries Corp. on the door, whoever that is (was). KInda of reminds me of an old Loram M/W logo, but I’m not sure and can’t prove that.
That Model 40 is hardly “rotting”. Looks to be in very good shape and has modernized glass & moulding. Model 30’s and Model 40’s are everywhere to this day. Still a very usefull piece of equipment in the hands of a good operator. Only setback is that it can’t set-off. Wonder if the rider car and ramp were around? Clamshell buckets don’t appear with these too often. Usually seen with self-threading burro tongs or an electromagnet.
Once again I have a few more frieght cars I dont know much about.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2641343 Odd tank Car
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2641330 A Odd Coil Car
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2590596 a Coal Hopper with odd Bottoms
I want to thank you for your Responces and your Patience with me.
Not a tank car, but a covered hopper car (note the roof hatches). Also, the number on the caption is wrong–this car is RGCX 80356, not 60356. Cars like this were built by the Union Tank Car Company, mostly between the mid-1960s and the mid-1970s for hauling materials that could be unloaded pneumatically or with pressure-differential systems: cement, clay, caustic soda beads, frac sand, and other such commodities were common. As these cars were supplanted in that type of service, they were downgraded to the transportation of things like sand. This car probably began life as UTLX 80356 (big clue to helping me detect the wrong number!).
What’s really odd about it isn’t noticeable form this angle: it has no wooden troughs or dividers. The reason for that is explained by the permanent “Hot” placard or stencil on the center of the side: it is designed to handle hot coils, steel plate, or molds (as shown), from one steelmaking facility to another, saving the steel company from having to reheat the steel for further production. I believe it was New York Central that began doing this, hauling hot stuff from the Cleveland area to northwestern Indiana. It apparently works, and NS, whose car is shown, is the successor to that business.
[quote user=“waltersrails”]
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Thanks for the information this is a huge help.
Here is an other Hopper in Question? http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2644782
This is the only time ive seen this type of Car. http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2644922
I was trying to get some history on that first covered hopper car, but no luck. It looks like one of those smaller covered hoppers built in Canada for sodium chlorate service. If so, it’s probably of aluminum construction. Edit: I just confirmed that it’s a former UNPX covered hopper car (owned by Procor, Limited, a Canadian outfit), pretty much as I described.
The bottom car is typical of those built for transporting titanium dioxide slurry. DuPont has a fleet of them; others are owned by Millennium Inorganic Chemicals. Note the slope in the bottom of the tank toward the discharge outlet in the center. This slope seems to be more pronounced than on the more common tank cars used for transporting clay slurry.