The July 99 MR had an article about building an operating coal tipple. I’m going to do the same thing with ore. The fella that wrote the article used real coal that he crushed. What should I use for ore? Is there any company that makes ready made ore? Thanks for the help, and welcome back to everyone, it was a long two days without the forums. Dave
Hi. Ores come in different colours/hues depending on the minerals and on the states of oxydation. I can’t steer you toward any helpful URLs, sorry, but if you have an ore in mind, and can find photos of it on the www, you might try fish bowl grit. Or find a retailer that sells decorative stones and gravel for landscaping, and ask for 3 pounds of it. Only use a thin layer over a lightweight filler in your cars so that they don’t become to heavy or top-heavy. Extruded foam carved as a fitted plug in the bays of your cars will do quite nicely.
A lot of ores that can be hauled in cars filled by a tipple look like rock. Ballast of the proper color will work here.
Ores that assay precious metals in higher quantities might be moved in boxcars using sacks, maybe even security.
Do you have a specific ore or mine in mind?
To purchase ore loads, you can go to stores.ebay.com/motrak-models. Motrak Models makes over 120 loads in HO and N. The ore loads are made out of colored resin.
Ya you need to be a little more specific about what kind of ‘ore’ - are you modelling silver mining in Nevada, or iron ore mining in Upper Michigan or ?? If it’s iron ore, I would be wary of using real ore. Besides being very heavy, real iron ore is both metallic and magnetic - not the best thing to have spilling onto track or getting into locomotive motors!![:)]
Depends on the type of ore.
- Iron ore is hauled in the stubby open hopper cars, WS Iron Ore ballast a good start.
- A titanium ore used by Dupont is hauled in short covered hoppers.
- Processed copper ore is hauled in containers in box cars.
- Other types of low grade ore are also hauled in open hoppers, and look bascially like rock, so ballast or gravel of the appropriate color will work.
Nick
Hello Dave: You didn’t say what type of ore you are going to haul. I’m modeling a freelance road in the upper peninsula of Michigan. For red ore I use a red clay that I get out by the horse stable. I dry it out and crush it to size. I also have about 60lbs of specular hemitite ore from the UP. I’ll use this but I will be sure and glue it down good. Iron ores come in many colors, from red to yellow, blue, brown, gray, and black.
I hope that this helps.
I never realized I had so many options to choose from. I thought ore was always brown in color. So thats the color I’m going to use. Since my railroad is small that is why I’m building a working mine. I want some action to spruce it up a bit. Would the WS iron ore ballast be okay to pour into my loader? Dave