Okay, I realise how naive I must sound here, but I’m just kind of getting into model railroading for the first time since childhood. My question is; How do you know which boxcars, hoppers, gondolas to mix on a particular linThe CSX line runs by my house and since it was L&N, I never recall seeing, for instance, a Seaboard Air Line boxcar or even a Seaboard Coast Line boxcar within a CSX train. My dad swears that he sees all kinds of boxcars here ranging from Santa Fe to Canadian National Railway in our CSX trains that pass by. If this is true, how does this happen? How does a Canadian National boxcar make its way to a CSX freight yard? Do they buy or trade from other companies and then not redecorate them? I realise how ignorant I must sound, but I thought I;d ask just the same.
The railroads interchange cars. That is a CSX boxcar may be loaded with furniture in Pennsylvania and sent to California for delivery by the UP. UP might have a customer shipping tractors by boxcar to Virginia so they use the CSX boxcar for that load since it is going “home” to CSX. Similarly freight cars of all types are interchanged between the roads. The railroads have a system of paying each other rent for the time/mileage that cars of other lines are on their line.
Enjoy
Paul
Thank you, Paul, for answering my question. However, I can’t help but feel a bit dumber for not figuring that out myself.
Correct. The more you watch the more you will see. I’ve seen Canadian Pacific loco’s in Philly. Recently I posted a thread where a local short line is using X-Southern pacific. You can see it all if you just keep your eyes open [:)]
We even see BNSF and UP locomotives here in central Florida from time to time. I see a lot of CN boxcars and covered hoppers here in Florida.
Basically, if it’s standard gauge and suitable for interchange undre FRA and AAR rules, it might show up ANYWHERE. The major exceptions are superheavy cars on routes with weak bridges or substandard rail. The term for keeping heavy wheels off light track (or for anything else that has issues) is embargo.
In days of yore, the limiting factor was usually locomotive weight. (I once found a long-ish industrial spur on the NYC’s West Shore division - pre PC and 'way before Conrail. There was a sign adjacent to the switchstand that listed the classes of locomotives that weren’t allowed on that siding - about 90% of the NYC steam roster.) More recently, some light-rail country branches have been embargoed to 100 ton capacity hoppers.
Also, low-value commodities are most likely to be moved in home-road cars. Crushed stone and river gravel aren’t worth enough to ship very far.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Keep in mind that the SAL and SCL haven’t existed for many years, so there may not be that many cars (if any) around still lettered for them. The Seaboard Air Line merged with the Atlantic Coast Line in 1967 to form Seaboard Coast Line. SCL was for a long time part of the “Family Lines” with L&N and the Clinchfield. They later merged with the Chessie System (CSX stands for “Chessie Seaboard multiplied”) in the 1980’s.
Santa Fe hasn’t existed since it merged with BN in the mid-nineties, but there are still some cars out there lettered for the the Santa Fe, and some warbonnet diesels too…though they’ve usually had BNSF lettering added.
There are lots of threads on this subject, the mix of cars on a particular line, so I’ll just start by saying the mix varies by individual route.
Modern railroads have a higher percentage of privately owned cars (the initials end with the letter “X”). Then there is normally a fairly large percentage of home road cars (the railroad and its predecessors). Next there typically is a big chunk of cars for roads the railroad connects to. Last is the chunk of cars from the roads the railroad doesn’t directly connect to.
Private cars would be intermodal cars, tank cars and many covered hoppers.
Home road cars for CSX wout be CSXT, BO, CO, WM, SBD.
Direct connections would be UP, BNSF, CR, NS, FEC, CP, CN and shortlines connection to the CSX
Indirect connections would be MRL, KCS, DME, TFM/KCSM, FXE and shortlines not connecting to the CSX
In the modern era since most of the big railroads connect to each other, you will see a lot of most of the big railroads on each other.
Open top cars, especially those hauling coal, ore or rock tend to stay on the home railroad. Boxcars tend to go all over the place (depending on the type of boxcar). So on the CSX, you are more likely to see a UP boxcar than a UP hopper car. Route is important. If you are on the route of one of the perishable expresses, you will see lots of UP reefers (ARMN initials). If you aren’t on one of those routes you would probably only see occaisional single cars.
Thanks, Dehusman. Now two more questions: (1) If I were doing an L&N railroad, which is another I’ve always wanted to do, because it was my native railroad line, would it be common to see a SAL boxcar or two on the line even as late as the mid '70s? I never see any now, but I’m guessing that since they were in use in 1970 as that picture shows, they might still be seen occasionally in the seventies.
Last night I almost bought a 50’ boxcar wih the SCL/L&N logo and then changed my mind at last minute and bought an straight out L&N hopper instead. I’m glad I did, because when I got home I wikied it and discovered that the SCL/L&N merger didn’t take place until 1983. Man, this is going to be hard.
(2) Is there perhaps a website that would show how cars from say L&N have changed over the years, you know what they looked like in the sixties, seventies etc.?
Chuck,
do you have a picture from this sign. I think it would be a nice modelling feature.
Wolfgang
There is another kind of traffic that raises its head with railroads, that is the Auto Parts cars going from parts plants to the final assembly plants.
For example the when Ford had a final assembly plant in Califormia the DT&I, WAB, MP, RI, UP, D&RGW. MILW and WP all contributed cars to the train based on their mileage from Dearborn to California or to whatever plant they were being delivered too. Some railroads contributed cars even if they did not have a plant on their property.
Rick
If you see car you want, go for it, you could justify a later time period because railroads seem to be in no rush to repaint their equipement. Here in Portland, OR we have a decent sized UP and BNSF yard and I have seen UP trains still sporting Rio Grande and Southern Pacific paint. I have seen photos fairly recenlty of CSX trains still in Contrail paint. And the mix of cars… I have seen CSX cars here and I have also UP and Sante Fe cars in Ft Lauderdale. I try to have a mostly CSX fleet but I dont worry too much about my rolling stock.
What do you mean by “fleet”? Are you referring to engines/coal cars? I thought “fleet” meant rolling stock.
I suspect a search for “Louisville and Nashville historical society” will probably come up with something. If you’re modelling a particular railroad, joining their historical society is always a good idea. I don’t know how much is available online, you may need to step back to the dark ages of ‘hard copy’ research…that is, buy books on the history and equipment of the L&N. Unfortunately there probably isn’t going to be a quick and easy way to find all the information you need, but you may find in time that researching and looking for answers can be a lot of the fun of model railroading.
You could just google the L&N
http://www.lnrailroad.net/louisvillenashville019.htm
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hunter1828/sets/72157601107760230/
I believe there is a “twenty year rule” the bans equipment that is over twenty years old from interchange service.
That’s actually a forty year rule, but other circumstances can shorten it. Cars can be banned for such things as non-compliant trucks (no friction bearings!) and non-compliant safety equipment. I wonder how many older cars were scrapped before their time because they weren’t worth upgrading with the most recently mandated widgets.
Again, some research is in order. You will have to find out when things were either banned [wooden car frames, arch bar (and other design) trucks, roof walks…] or mandated [AB brake systems, shelf couplers on hazmat cars…]
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Here are some dates from the Layout Design Wiki
http://macrodyn.com/ldsig/wiki/index.php?title=Timeline-Freight_cars
Enjoy
Paul
http://rrpicturearchives.net/locoList.aspx?id=LN
http://rr-fallenflags.org/ln/ln.html
http://freight.railfan.ca/ln.html
http://freight.railfan.ca/cgi-bin/search.pl?marks=LN
(This site is currently down for a server move but should be back up in a couple weeks)
I’ve seen rolling stock on trains and in various yards around the L.A. area, from just about every line in the USA, Canada and even Mexico. Some from very old lines like NP.
It used to be, Santa Fe, UP and SP were the companies in this area, but now SP is gone and SF is BNSF. Locomotives are less mixed although occasionally I see an oddball loco like Norfolk Western or even Chessie system a few years ago. Of course most trains now are containers which ruins all that.