I thought about adding an ammunition facility that replaced/forced the original manufacturing supplies during WWII.
I was wondering if I put bullets, torpedoes, or other materials inside boxcars? But I thought about using reefers because of heat when traveling.
If ammunition were so sensitive that it needed to be protected from heat during transit by using reefers instead of boxes, it would run the risk of it being stunningly useless on the battlefield.
Ed
Read all about it here:
http://www.insensitivemunitions.org/history/railroad-train-fires-and-munition-explosions/
I seem to recall another explosion that occurred when the wood floor of a munitions box car caught fire as a result of a hotbox.
There are several other stories of munitions ships burning and exploding but I’ll let you do the research on those…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halifax_Explosion
Regards, Ed
The current Harley Davidson plant in York Pa started out as the York Lock & Safe Co and became the Naval Ordinance Depot, producing the Bofors 40mm gun in WW2. It looks like a rail line ran west of the factory.
#3 is a bridge over the rail line #4 is the depot. You don’t have to limit yourself to just munitions.
Yeah I know. Since I’m modeling a kitbashed Luggage Manufacturing kits. With an added water tower and a nice expansion building. It was the only thing I thought of when backdating the year.
I read about that article too Ed. I forgot it was ammunition accident.
I’d think that reefer cars would be in enough demand just carrying produce, though I wonder rather than being returned empty, they may have carried ammunition.
On a very quick look it would appear that you’d be on safe ground using box cars to carry ammunition.
To my mind, the one unusual railroad car of WW2, is the ATSF open air seat caboose, a previous discussion on them is here…
http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/13/t/243832.aspx
The good thing about factory buildings are that, unless they have a particular feature that relates to a specific industry, they can be used to model any industry.
Cheers, the Bear.[:)]
The prime spotting feature for an ammunition factory is the small magazine buildings that are arranged in a grid pattern. Many defense related items like torpedos are built and the high explosives are added later so there would not be any high explosive concerns when shipping or building. A building that actually manufactures the high explosives for your era would usually be a narrow two story building with slides coming out of the second floor. The building would have earth berms almost as high as the building on all four sides.
There were hundreds of plants providing shells, cartriges etc. during WWII, here is a list of plants by State and City, the owner and what they provided. It is amazing how we changed over and built new plants for the war effort.
http://www.heritageresearch.com/ourlibrary/databases/wwii/authorized/pennsylvania.htm
Rick Jesionowski
I do believe the massive explosion of munitions in a freight car you are thinking of was the Roseville yard incident on SP.
a munitions factory. Is definitely a different industry to model. Some had in house railroads
Modeling the various mounds, berms, and hollows of a plant dealing with ammunition could be fun. Might take up too much space:
If one still wanted to do WWII military war production, something like the M2 mortar:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M2_mortar
might make sense. A relatively small stand-alone building could be used. There would be no particular safety demands to incorporate. Looking quickly, much of one could be manufactured in such a building–excepting perhaps the stamped baseplate and the tubing, itself. Certainly assembly and some small work could be done.
Thing is, I doubt there would be a sign outside saying something like “Center City Mortar Company”. It would be difficult, looking at the model on a layout, to see just what it made.
The picture is ammunition storage bunkers not necessairly connected to an ammunition manufacturing plant.
Ammunition trans-shipment facility Concord, CA
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/concord.htm
Hawthorn NV Weapons Depot
http://www.hartshorn.us/Navy/navy-18.htm
Boxcars used at Concord Navel Weapons Depot to transport Ammunition
Yes. I was indeed showing storage. I am/was assuming that this kind of storage would be an element of all such plants. Are there ammunition manufacturing plants that don’t have storage (like this)? Of course, I picked a photo of a “rather expansive facility”. I wanted to emphasize the point. Perhaps, in some cases, just one “pile of dirt” would do.
Ed
I recall seeing pictures of boxcars carrying ammunition in the WWII era. I’m not sure, but they may have been Delaney photos from the Chicago area, As I recall, the photos showed single sheath boxcars from some Midwestern road, with large X’s painted on the doors to indicate the lading.
Tom
Hawthorne NV both manufacturing and storage. Concord storage, don’t know about others.
At Concord ammuniton would arrive from Hawthorn and perhaps other plants by rail. Stored there temporairly, then tranported by rail the short distance to Suisun Bay where it was loaded on ships for transport to the Pacific war.
This was great information guys.
I knew they didn’t use refrigeration cars for transport. Just an idea.
I have seen a picture of the box cars with the “X” , not sure they were WW2, may have been WW1. I do remember a caption said “X” not used very long because it clearly identified ammunitation cars. A BOOM [:D] to sabatours.
For the ultimate ammunition plant railroad, you could model Oak Ridge in WW2. All you need is the railroad disappearing behind a fence with some armed guards. A lot of stuff went in.
jim