The new Missouri Valley Western

[Ed Kapuscinski]

In late fall there'd always be a big push to empty the pits beneath the hog barns and get the manure on the fields as fertilizer for the next growing season. This always seemed to be a particularly virulent-smelling mess.

We called it "super sh*t".   

Jim

Wow, I love living in Towson.

[MVW]

Wow, I love living in Towson.

Yep, best not to think about where your bacon comes from. 

(Since it is obviously a gift from the gods.)

Jim

[CRL]

It’s clear to me that pigs are superb at filtering anything that tastes or smells terrible and dumping it out their butts, leaving behind only wonderfully tasting porky goodness.

[davefoxx]

Wow, I love living in Towson.

You'll never hear those words come out of my mouth.  I'll gladly stay on this side of the Susquehanna and the Bay. 

DFF

[Hawghead]

Now we live in a city with a cereal manufacturing plant. Most days, it smells like brownies. 

Jim

I remember visiting my Grandmother in Battle Creek, Michigan (home of Kellogg's cereal) when I was a kid.  The air in her neighborhood smelled like sugar.

Scott

[Specter3]

Towson. Did a weekend point of sale install back in 2000 there. Guy I was working with took me to some place “owned by _______” ex NFL player I didn’t know and can’t remember. What I do remember is the best crab stuffed mushrooms I have ever had. Still make them myself 2-3 times a year as I got my wife liking them as well.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Towson. Did a weekend point of sale install back in 2000 there. Guy I was working with took me to some place “owned by _______” ex NFL player I didn’t know and can’t remember. What I do remember is the best crab stuffed mushrooms I have ever had. Still make them myself 2-3 times a year as I got my wife liking them as well.

Was it Bill Bateman's?

[Specter3]

That sounds right.

[MVW]

I'm setting up ops to reflect the C&NW's racetrack across Iowa in the mid-'50s.

The largest shipper/receiver on the layout — Armstrong packing plant — needs a steady stream of livestock, and a way to speed its loaded reefers to eastern markets. Fortunately, the Chicago & North Western has just the answer: Train #256, “the Calumet.”

The Calumet originates on the C&NW's “Cowboy Line” through Nebraska, Wyoming and the Black Hills, and is the primary conduit for livestock to Chicago and eastern markets. At Missouri Valley, on the western edge of Iowa, it will add livestock and meat from South Omaha, and perishables from the UP, then race across Iowa with just one stop. It will speed on to the C&NW's giant Proviso Yard in Chicago, where livestock bound for local slaughter are cut off the head end, and the rest of the train is forwarded to the New York Central.

In reality, the Calumet's one Iowa stop was in Boone, but since my fictional city of Cedricsburg is taking the place of Boone …

During its 75-minute layover in Cedricsburg (11:30 p.m. arrival), the east-end switcher will cut off head-end stock cars bound for the Armstrong plant, and push them down to the west end of an adjacent track, where any other cars bound for the plant await. Meanwhile, the west-end switcher has removed the caboose and delivered it to its nearby track, then grabbed a string of reefers loaded with Armstrong meat and tacked them onto the end of the train. By the time the new caboose has been added, the road power is back on the front end.

Minutes after the Calumet rolls out of the east end of the yard toward Chicago, local Switch Job #1 (don't know what it should be called) slips out the west end, with the newly arrived stock cars in tow, on its way to Armstrong packing. (We need to expedite the movement to comply with the 28-hour law, or so I say.  )

At least that's the theory. We'll test it out shortly. Using an 8:1 fast clock, we'll have a little over nine minutes to get the Calumet on her way.

This whole sequence of events encapsulates the cycle of “stock in, reefers out” that drives much of the activity on the layout. Therefore, the Calumet is the most important through freight on the schedule. It not only supplies the layout's largest receiver of goods, it carries off much of that same plant's output … all on a schedule.

As far as motive power for the Calumet, there are options. There are three photos of the Calumet in volumes I and II of “Chicago & North Western in Color.”
   • In 1950, it's behind one of C&NW's massive H-class 4-8-4s.
   • In 1956, it's behind a lashup of F3, F9B, F7
   • In 1958, F7s are on the point

As I have a pair of Kato F3s in C&NW livery (awaiting decoders), they'll likely get the assignment. But it would be great to eventually have a few Northerns wandering the system. They lasted until the end of steam on the C&NW in 1956; “C&NW in Color” has shots of them hauling extras between Chicago and Council Bluffs as late as 1953, all within the ballpark of my 1954-55 setting.

Next up: Time to give a little thought to this train's consist. It will originate in western staging, run straight through to Cedricsburg, be subject to the switching mentioned earler, then run straight through to eastern staging. After an indeterminate layover, it will return as a westbound, undergo switching in Cedricsburg, then head off to western staging again, where it will remain until its return as the Calumet in the next ops session.

I had originally intended to have the Calumet return as #253, the Dispatch (pictured behind a set of F3s in 1952).  In reality, it returned as #117, the Aksarben (H-class in 1950, ABA set of F7s in 1952). I'll have to give a little thought as to which will work better for the overall operating scheme. The Aksaraben arrives in Boone (Cedricsburg) slightly earlier, 11 am as opposed to 12:01 pm for the Dispatch. Either way, whatever switching we do on her in Cedricsburg will have to leave her set up to re-appear as the Calumet in the next session.

Jim

[Angus Shops]

You’ll also have to deal with the empty stock cars out and empty reefers in…

[MVW]

You’ll also have to deal with the empty stock cars out and empty reefers in…

Yep, that's the plan.  And I think there's a way to make it all work with just one train. I'm putting together a graphic to show how, and to help in blocking during ops.

I'm going to try to do the same thing for the major freights I include in the schedule. There were more than I'm going to simulate, but then the prototype had a double-track mainline. I don't.

But by testing out the required switching as I go, I'm hoping to develop a workable plan that maximizes traffic flow ... without overwhelming staging.   

Jim

[MVW]

Alright, let's say the Calumet pulls into Cedricsburg at 11:30 p.m. looking like this:



We're going to pull off the first two blocks of cars (Stock #1 and PFE #1) on the head end, and tack a string of reefers on the back end. And do a caboose change, so that when she pulls out of town at 12:15 a.m., she'll look like this:



And since I'm going to treat staging as a parking lot, rather than a fiddle yard, she's going to return unchanged at 11 a.m. as train #117.

This time, we'll cut the reefers off the rear end, and add new blocks of stock cars and PFE reefers that have been returned to the yard during the session, so that when she leaves town, she looks like this:



And, of course, she's conveniently re-staged and ready to roll as the Calument (#256) again next session.

It could be accomplished with three sets of stock cars, three sets of PFE reefers, and two sets of C&NW reefers. The last set, the red block labeled "Reefer #0" , are Swift, Wilson, etc., reefers symbolizing through shipments from Omaha packing plants to eastern markets. They never leave the train.

There will be little variability in traffic, but that can be accomplished with other trains.

Jim

[MVW]

Just tested the switching required for #256, and it only took about 6.75 minutes real time (54 minutes by an 8:1 fast clock) with switchers working from both ends.

That doesn't include the time necessary for the road power to couple on to the train, but since there are an additional 21 fast minutes (a little more than 2.6 real minutes) scheduled for the layover, it appears there will be little difficulty keeping the Calumet on schedule out of Cedricsburg.

Made one little change in consist, though. It probably makes operational sense to move the first block of PFE reefers to the front of the train, and keep all the stock cars together behind it. This way, when the east end switcher takes its cut of cars, it can run the whole string down to the other end of the yard, leave the stock cars bound for Armstrong packing, and pull away with the PFE reefers to sort.

Jim

[MVW]

#256 the Calumet and #117 the Aksarben are just two of the seven scheduled Chicago-Council Bluffs/Omaha freights in C&NW's 1951 timetable. Time to figure out which of the others we can fit into our operating scheme.

Here's the daily lineup at Boone (Cedricsburg):

#252  7:30 am - 8 am
#258  9:40 am - 11 am
#117  11 am - 12:01 pm
#253  12:01 pm - 1 pm
#254  4:30 pm - 5:30 pm
#251  11 pm - 11:45 pm
#256  11:15 pm - 12:30 am

Interestingly, #117 arrived in the middle of the busiest time in Boone, with three hotshot freights in and out of the yard in three hours and 20 minutes. We're going to have to recreate that chaos by scheduling at least one of the two adjacent freights.

Unfortunately, I have very little info on either. All I know about #258 the Packer is that it wouldn't be unusual to see PFE reefers in its consist. Pretty helpful, right? My knowledge of #253 the Dispatch consists of a 1952 photo of it pulled by F3s.

Well, let's allow that to hang there for a moment while we schedule a train (or more) to complicate the other end of this train's schedule, when it arrives as the Calumet. Because #251 the Roundup was too important overall not to include in operations.

According to %u201CC&NW in Color, Vol. 2,%u201D it wasn't unusual for the Roundup to run in three or more sections, handling cars out of Proviso for Council Bluffs, UP transfer, Sioux City, and C&NW's lines west. We'll have to schedule at least the first of those sectons into Cedricsburg at 11 p.m., just minutes before the Calumet arrives.

Cedricsburg is the easternmost city on the layout; eastbound trains leaving it will immediately enter staging. So we can't force the Calumet to fight its way eastward against following sections of the Roundup. But we do have the luxury of scheduling additional sections of the Roundup into Cedricsburg, if we need the traffic flow.

But first, we're going to want to schedule #251's return as an eastbound train. There are three still on the schedule, but we can probably eliminate #254, since it will have passed through the yard just 5.5 hours earlier (a little over 40 minutes, real time). And #252 has the shortest allotted layover, so to hell with it. Looks like #258 the Packer is now officially in our lineup.

#252  7:30 am - 8 am
#258  9:40 am - 11 am
#117  11 am - 12:01 pm
#253  12:01 pm - 1 pm
#254  4:30 pm - 5:30 pm
#251  11 pm - 11:45 pm
#256  11:15 pm - 12:30 am

We now have four hotshot freights on the schedule, and it looks like things are gonna be hoppin' in the yard in the runup to both noon and midnight. Now is probably the time to take a closer look at how the Roundup and the Packer are going to serve online traffic flow. That -- and staging limitations -- will determine what other through traffic we schedule.

Jim

[Cajonpassfan]

Jim, following with interest, and a bit of confusion…probably because I’m unfamiliar with your part of the country.
So the PFE cars are all produce loads going east, empties going west, right? The other reefers (mix of 40 and 36 footers?) are meat cars going east loaded, coming back empty, right?
Just some random thoughts: Reefer loads need to be iced, hogs, sheep and cattle watered and rested…why not keep those car types together? Also, cars with livestock generally tended to move in the head end block to minimize loss due to slack….empties (reefers and stock) could be anywhere convenient. At least some of the returning PFE cars could have clean dry loads going west; adding operational interest. Finally, priority loads would draw a hot shot train, empties could go back on just about any train with available tonnage, even drags (except where there is a shortage of a particular car type).
Just my two cents, may not be relevant to your situation.
Fun stuff, enjoying your progress.
Otto