The Home Shop

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

I saw 2 cars today with green tags on them:

A grain hopper, with a tag reading : “Do not load. Return to home shop for repairs.”

And a beat-up gondola full of scrap metal, with a tag reading: “Return to home shop when empty.”

I thought most railroads had their shops fix other railroad’s cars, and send them a bill, at the FRA set standard price. If both of these cars were moving, and one was loaded, it would seem the needed repairs weren’t too great. Do the tags mean to send them to the nearest shop of that particular railroad, or to an assigned shop, unique to that car?

2

I suspect that the cars you were looking at were privately owned. Home shops for such cars are usually listed in the Official Railway Equipment Register.

I’m sure that before such a sticker or tag is affixed, the company has had communication with the owner of the car, and knows exactly where it’s going. Or that would be the ideal…

3

I’ve seen those kind of markings on UP equipment quite often. I couldn’t tell you where the cars were coming from or where they were going to. I’d always thought the placards were placed by foreign lines so they weren’t loaded but just returned to the UP empty. Then the UP would send them to whatever shop they wanted.

I would say that most railroads would want to repair their own cars, only letting a foreign railroad do repairs that would allow them to move to a home shop. I imagine the same applies to privately owned equipment. Fix enough to move the cars to their assigned home shop.

The old CNW heads said that at Fremont all trains received from the UP went over a pit with a car man inspecting for defects. It sounds like they used to do quite a bit of business repairing bad orders, and charging the car owners for repairs.

Jeff

4

Not far-fetched at all–When I was in yardmaster training I was told that CNW would emphasize the changeout of defective wheelsets, because the Clinton Shop at that time had the best wheel lathe in the business, and they could do it profitably.

5

It’s better to have the bad order car towed home for repairs, than to have another railroad fix it? Does the owner pay the towing roads for moving the car?

6

Repairing bad order cars is profitable.

If railroad A received a damaged car from railroad B, and railroad A’s carmen discover the damage, then railroad A will bad order the car, repair it, and bill railroad B per the standard FRA interchange manual rates for parts and labor.

So it pay for each railroad to find and repair damaged cars before they forward them, simply because the charge to repair it “in house” is often less than the FRA billing rate they will be charged by the railroad they forward the car to.

As an example…lets say I or someone on my railroad bends a grab iron on a hopper, and we just send the car on without repairing it…the FRA book says to replace a grab iron on a hopper cost $50.00 for the grab iron, and 1.0 hours labor, or 1.25 hours if the rivets have to be drilled out.

So, if we forward this car with out repairing it, and the railroad we send it to catches this bent grab iron, we will be billed somewhere around $150.00 to repair it, plus we would pay the daily storage rate while the car sits still.

On the other hand, if we fix it before we forward the car, the grab iron bought in bulk, (300 or so per box) cost about $10.00, and a good torch man can blast off the old iron and rivets in about 5 minutes, mount and rivet the new iron in and be done with the car in under 30 minutes.

Our in house cost, about $60.00 with labor.

Which one would you want to pay?

So it benefits each railroad to find and repair cars before they are forwarded out, and to find and repair cars they receive from other railroads…pretty much a win, win all the way around.

If you think about it, this keeps railroad B from bending the heck out of a few cars, then forwarding them on and trying to make them someone else’s problem…whoever they forward them to will inspect them on the inbound or receiving track and any damaged cars will be bad ordered…then who ever forwarded the car pays the bill…so if you miss a damag

7

Thanks Ed. Am I reading this correctly, that railcars, like locomotives must receive inspections at regular intervals?

8

Yup…

Next time you are close enough, look about eye level at any covered hopper and you will see the painting info and the liner info, with the date the liner was installed.

And check out the consolidation stencil on any car.

Tank cars with hazmat usually have a big stencil on the side towards one end, telling the car inspectors when the last sill inspection, pressure valve inspection and tank pressure were performed, and the due date for the next inspection.

It will usually state what shop did the inspection and repair/replacement.

Think about it this way…your automobile requires a specific maintenance schedule…tune ups and oil changes at pre determined times.

Just like any large piece of equipment, rail cars also require periodic maintenance and inspection.

Back in the day all of this required an army of clerks, but nowdays the computer can do it all…we routinely cut BO cars out of inbounds because when the train came by in the inbound scanner, the AEI rag tripped an inspection request.

Here at the PTRA, wheel inspection/replacement is a big business and pity for the switchman who drags a flat spot on a car where the wheelset was just replaced!

So every train you see out running, if it departed as a whole train from a major terminal, has been inspected twice…once as an inbound train and again before it leaves that terminal.

The cars may look cruddy and dirty, but for the most part, rolling stock is mechanically sound.

It simply pays better to keep them up.