PRR/CR Middle Division Industry - What to Replace my Coal Mine With?

[wm3798]

The Walthers machine shop would be one of the back shop buildings at Hagerstown, should I ever get around to building that...

Lee

[asciibaron]

In Huntingdon there is a VERY swappable set of industries! Owens Corning Fiberglass had a plant in H-town that had a siding with a forklift ramp for unloading fiberglass marbles. It also shared it with truck unloading, so there's a two-fer. And when you backdate, use JC Blair co. They received paper in boxcars to make writing tablets both buildings are still there. The JCB building is now an old folks home and OC Fiberglass is now called something else (but they still make fiberglass). Just a thought.

i had a poetry reading in the OC factory break room while in college.  it was well received.  we walked across the parking lot were a few rounds were bought for me.  Huntingdon is a neat town.

[dougnelson]

Dave:

For small steel processing have you seen some of the overhead cranes from Ken Ray Models - http://www.kenraymodels.com/

Off the mainline, but Kovalchick's scrap in Burnham, PA is a good possibility especially if you like rust.

How about the reefer icing station in Huntingdon.  I was just given some plans of the structure.

Doug.

[asciibaron]

your space is long and narrow.  i again vote for a linear type factory - raw material goes in one direction and ends up finished goods - steel doors, ductile fittings, appliances, autoparts...  image a nice Bendix Brakes billboard on the front in the steam era, and an Bosch for ConRail.

[Dave V]

Doug, thanks for the awesome link!

But Steve has a point, and I was thinking this earlier...  My space IS too small for anything more than a factory or small scrap yard.  I'd LOVE to model a real steel industry like Standard Steel but that space is really cramped.  Even a foundry would be a very tight squeeze!

Maybe the metal industry is something we save for "the big one."

[DKS]

A small fabricator sounds about right for the early-era industry. How about a roller bearing plant, or something obscure but interesting, like a taxi meter manufacturer (had one in the town where I grew up, Rockwell Mfg.; now it's Alltemp, an air conditioning mfg).

How about DPM's Gripp's Luggage as the starting point for a small manufacturer? Nicely generic, ripe for customization. Add a small water tower, a couple of wooden outbuildings, and a billboard sign.
 


Cut down one of these:


Maybe add these too:


Metal recycling would make for nice eye candy for the later era, but it could also just be a new manufacturer in the same building--lose the water tower, billboard sign and storage tanks, change the wood outbuildings to steel.

[Dave V]

Dave, LOL:







Gripp's Luggage is already in service on the Juniata Division as the Juniata Machine Tool Company, soon to be re-classified as the American Viscose Company.  That's what'll need the water tower, BTW, to look like the real deal in Lewistown.  Note the Walthers tank on the side.

But, you're absolutely on the right track!  In fact, maybe this factory is the one that moves to where the mine was, and some new incarnation of American Viscose replaces it.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Dave, I forget the details of the area behind the mountain, but maybe you could just flatten it and expand across the mains.

[Dave V]

Ed,

This is what it looks like now.  An impossibly vertical mountain face with flat ground across the tracks.  A very unprototypical configuration:

[wcfn100]

Looking at the layout plan, I didn't see any bulk fuel.


Jason

[Dave V]

Jason,

The farm store has a small coal trestle and a few oil tanks.  But it's only enough to justify an occasional tank car or 2-bay hopper.

[asciibaron]

your deep straight cut yielding to flat land is not uncommon in places that were widen or were later modified - think B&O Magnolia cutoff.  leave the mountain, it breaks up the flatness of the door and allows the trains to "vanish" around the hill.

[davefoxx]

leave the mountain, it breaks up the flatness of the door and allows the trains to "vanish" around the hill.

...or cut the height of the mountain to a more realistic hill that is not so vertical and add taller trees to replace the scenic screening, if a divider is still desired.

DFF

[wm3798]

Keep the steep slope.  It might look funky in person, but in photos it smacks of central PA.

Remember.  It's a small layout.  Traffic levels are therefore small.  No need for a huge industry that needs 30 cars if your yard can only handle 20.  Stick with a smaller operation, manufacturing...  Vending machines would be good.  Sheet metal and other doodads in, finished machines and scrap out.

Lee

[NorfolkSouthern9708]

Do you need a picture of the water tower Dave? The one near the station?