How were trailers loaded in double on 89’ flat cars? how were trailers loaded on spline cars? When were these cars starting to come into use?
Up until the 1980’s when top loading became more common, TOFC on 89 ft flat were loaded “circus” style.
The cars were placed against a ramp, all the stanchions were lowered, the bridge plates between cars were lowered and then a trailer would be backed onto the flat car. The car furthest from the ramp was loaded first. The stanchion would be raised under the trailer. When all the cars were loaded, bridge plates would be railed and the track could be pulled.
To unload the cars, they would be switched by trailer direction, spotted against the ramp (one ramp for each direction), bridge plates lowered, stanchions lowered and then the truck would back onto the cars, driving off each trailer, on at a time from the car closest to the ramp to the end of the track.
Spine cars are all top loaded with either a crane or a packer.
Having spent many of my early years at ACF selling car parts, including hitches and bridge plates, to TTX and their customers, I have never heard of hitches being referred to as stanchions. The hitches were raised and lowered via a pneumatic “wrench” to facilitate the circus loading mentioned.
The modeling opportunities to capture the variations of the early 89 ft TOFC cars are the bridge plates and hitches themselves. Typically, a cushioned underframe (such as an end-of-car type (EOCC) - think shock absorber on mega steroids) car had rigid hitches and 60-inch bridge plates while the 48-inch bridge plates were typically found on rigid underframe cars using cushioned hitches.
Some of the old “circus style” loading ramps were made of built up timbers filled with cinders. But I have also seen retired old flat cars with one truck removed and the truckless end essentially butting right into the dirt, with the trucked end still on the rails and, obviously, already at flatcar height. You also see this at some MOW loading areas near RR yards.
Dave Nelson
Larger facilities would be situated on the tail of a wye or would have a large purpose built concrete dock with stub tracks on both sides so they could load and unload trailers in either direction.
There were also portable ramps that the “hostlers” (trucks that moved the trailers around) could move around a paved over ramp so that cars could be unloaded in either direction.