Since the Model Railroader is doing a piece on a coal hauling Virginian layout I thought I’d point out a youtube video on the NorfolkSouthernCorp youtube channel about how Lamberts Point processes mined coal while loading ships in the port at Norfolk. Some great footage of the coal dump pier showing cars in the rotary dumper.
Sorry I haven’t figured out how to make this link so just copy and paste it in your browser or visit the NorfolkSouthernCorp youtube channel as there are also a number of other really cool videos about trains and operations on Norfolk Southern.
Sincerely,
Tim
NS Locomotive Engineer and fellow model railroader
From my friend, Trevor here is a link to another very interesting video of a bulk terminal:
"Here is another cool piece of machinery from our industrial past. These were used to unload the lake steamers that carried the iron ore.
It is interesting that the operator rides in a cab with the bucket."
This is wild. At the 5:58 mark or so you get a good shot of the operator descending into the hold on the bucket end of the unloader. and then, of course, lowering the front end loader into the hold to help the bucket operator finish the job.
Thank you very much. I am an N&W modeler. Specifically, October, 1957 on the Pocahontas Division. But, I use a lot of liberty with the area in that I will move towns around and freelance several structures. But, I try to model the Depots as they existed.[8D]
Interesting to see that the rotary dumpers more or less functoin like the old style McMylers dumpers - barney push cars up, dumper rotates and cars discharge, cars roll down tail-back track, reverse and gravity roll back into yard - but NS does something that makes a lot of sense, and I wonder why the CNJ, Reading, Pennsy etc didn’t do it - at Lambert Point, the coal is dumped into an intermediate stage, and then stored in the silos, or send to the loaders as needed, while the McMylers just dumped straight into the ships’ holds. I think that could have made the CNJ (for example) operation at Jersey City much more flexible and efficent, and certainly the technology and engineering capability to do it was available by the 1920s.
And at :55 into the NS Lamber Point video, we have DUST-BOWS! (no other way to describe them).