I started building a sand tower IHC kit #5005 that I had sitting around here for years.
It had a steam engine on the box lid picture but from reading loco service books, etc. they seem to
refer to them as “modern sand towers” and of the diesel era.
Would this model be appropriate for a late '30s through late '40s loco yard? I’m planning on mostly steam
but may have some diesel, not sure just yet.
Thanks.
He means this: http://walthers.com/exec/productinfo/348-5005
Thanks flashwave.
That style of metal-tank sand tower became available in the mid-1930s, supplanting the wooden ‘miniature coaling station’ and sand tanks at the top of regular coaling stations.
‘Modern’ is always relative. To a historian, the, ‘Modern era,’ started about the time that Newcomen was thinking about his first steam engine.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
For information, pictures and plans for a small branch or steam logging RR sand tower, drying shed and bin see NG&SLG, March/April 1995 and May/June 1983. Here is a partial picture of my small narrow gauge logging facility
Peter Smith, Memphis
AHM had a sanding facility kit available for years–it might have also been acquired by IHM, though I understand it’s discontinued, now. It was based on a Rio Grande prototype and had the sanding tower mounted on the roof of the sand-drying house. So they’ve been around since at least the late 'twenties, early 'thirties.
Walthers offers a sand tower kit that’s a sort of ‘two in one’, with an older single steam tower and a newer ‘diesel’ tower, so that you can either pick and choose or use both. I’ve got the steam tower at my engine facility, the ‘diesel’ tower is still in the parts box.
Here it is waiting for one of my Yellowstones to get into position.
The Walthers kit also includes the ‘sandbox’ and the drying house. It’s a neat kit.
Tom [:)]
I added a sandhouse to the small Walthers coaling tower, then hung a “steel” dry sand storage tank on the coaling tower’s superstructure. I used Tichy sand pipes for steamers, and scratchbuilt some diesel-style hoses using styrene rod. Green sand delivery is on the same track as that for coal delivery.
Wayne
Thank you very much guys! Man, it’s like asking “the great oracle” around here. Instant knowledge!
I thought I’d seem them in the past with steam loco yards. All of a sudden I just couldn’t seem to find a picture in back issues and the loco servicing Kalmbach book other than with diesels.
I really like this kit. It’s highly detailed and the plastic is softer than most so the gluing is extra easy.
I appreciate the responses. I’m enjoying your pics as I’m trying to decide on a color. Grey/silver or black-ish, etc.
Steam era: If it’s not black, it’s gonna be by the end of the week.
Would you still have a bin and drying house like in this Walthers kit on an 80’s/90’s era layout?
I inherited that (ATLAS?) kit that has the tower mounted on the shed roof and could never figure out how to place it. It doesn’t look correct sitting right next to the tracks. I thought about buying a more modern sanding tower form Walthers, but I don’t know if I would even use the shed/bin on a more modern layout. I guess pipes from the shed to the tower would be run under ground??[%-)]
Any thoughts?
The shed and the bin are for “green” sand: the green sand is stored in the bin, the shed has a dryer that removes the moisture from the sand, then uses compressed air to lift the sand to the tower, where it’s stored until needed. Nowadays, the sand may arrive at the tower already dried, in a covered hopper - they wouldn’t store it in the bin, nor would they need the dryer, but they’d still need a way to get it up into the tower. Some roads today don’t even use sand: the steel plant where I worked used a black product that looks a lot like anthracite: so much so, in fact, that a quantity of it followed me home [swg] and ended up as loose loads in some of my hoppers.
Wayne
**doctorwayne-**So you probably wouldn’t have the “green” sand bin, but you would still have a remote pumping shed?
That’s only my guess: if the sand is delivered “dry”, it still needs to be put in the elevated storage tank so that gravity can be used to get it to the locos’ sandboxes. Any of the sand hoses that I’m familiar with were gravity-fed from an elevated storage tank or bin. I’m not sure how they’d get the dry sand out of a covered hopper and directly to the storage bin, though - perhaps there’s a fitting that goes on the outlet gate of the hopper, with a compressor to elevate it to the bin.
Wayne
Actually, I suspect you would have a bin. It may be the weeds that are green instead of sand, but an open area in an engine facility will find something shoved in it. I’ve seen an ex-green bin holding rail, wheels, tool stuffs, couplers, spikes, you could put the yard dog in it, a wash area for dirty crews, (IE: “Shiela’d kill me if I walked in the house looking like tI was the brush for the steamer’s boiler again”) or wash for the loco id the orthers have places. Generally, it would hold all the stuff that they need in the shops/yard but don’t want laying around the yard willy-nilly. One could also pull one side out and park the company truck in there.